'60s Gibson Skylark | The Evil Within

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[@BlugubriousMusic]

Added benefit of keeping track of those cup washers is not later finding them under the lip of the speaker magnet...AFTER you buy replacements!

[@stevelark9840]

Those Skylarks can end up sounding REALLY good with some tweaking. Gibson had about 5 revisions of the tone circuit on that model and the later revisions were voiced to "work with humbuckers" and those are the nasty sounding ones. Looking forward to part 2 on this one.

[@edwardhannigan6324]

Interesting project, makes a change from all the Hi Tech gear you work on...It's simple like me...! Look forward to it's repair..Ed..uk..😀😀

[@dortoh1]

Lyle I'm really liking your channel. People may think your grumpy, but as someone that has spent over 45 years in the body shop business dealing with other peoples butcher work and ridiculously bad design, I know you come by it honest.

[@mrbuttons1243]

Really makes you appreciate how Leo Fender put an amp together.

[@gerrickreidenbach8147]

It's humorous to see someone dealing with these for the first time because you have to disassemble the whole thing.

[@brianjohnson2258]

That moment when you realize going through the front is the better path. Been there.

[@TunaUnlimited]

Hey Lyle, looking forward to part 2 for any circuit changes. Have the same amp with the T filter - which I bypassed - but could never get a "full" sound out of it. Interested to see your take on it!

[@michaelfuller34]

Yes, you are awesome!

[@waynead754]

My 1960 Gibson GA-79 (which I've owned since about 1965) came with a two prong plug with a ground wire that you could attach to the screw on the outlet cover plate, providing some sort of ground. At some point I spliced on a grounded plug. Relax, I've since had a proper three with cord installed.

[@Murry_in_Arizona]

Whenever I see these old "student" or starter type amps (valco designs?) I can't help but believe they were the prototype for "landfill products" and not a vintage market. I've watched Uncle Doug go though a few of the discount catalog Sears, Monkey ward stuff and some were fire and electrocution hazards new right out of the box.

[@goodun2974]

I have a theory that some of those student amps were designed to 1) "weed out" people who weren't really serious about learning to play, perhaps by near electrocution, and 2) motivate the remainder of guitar students to mow a lot of lawns or flip a lot of burgers to earn enough money to buy a better amp! (That's my story and I'm sticking to it!). That said, I have a weakness for "underdogs" and oddball/weirdo designs, and some of these can be made to sound real good.

[@bobjones7082]

Hey Lyle! Thx for the plug on TWoodfrd. Great stuff!

[@tedcuff9155]

I have a 64 and it was interesting getting it apart. I removed the Sprague 102C84 T filter. Really made the amp sing.

[@drgearaustralia]

I did a rebuild on the non tremolo version of this amp. Worst part was the preamp uses a 6C4 in V2 and the sockets for them are so hard to find to fit the chassis cutout. Getting that chassis out was fatiguing.

[@DaveHilts]

Lyle, you had me laughing because I just went thru the same head scratcher last week when I attempted to work on a similar skylark! Mine was also missing the gibson logo on the grill cloth and you can really see how that might happen. What a crazy way to remove a chassis! You made my day with that one. Thanks!!

[@memphisscottrogers]

That one’s logo was removed by a dog who was not known for chewing things up…

[@robertmahaney6831]

ah the shocks I received from my Gibson hawk......memories

[@johnwilliamson467]

Sprague started making them in the 60's so depending on the code on the cap they could well be original to the amp . Would have to see the printing on the cap for sure . A very early adopter of them then . Personally I think the orange drop is over blown in this application . There are at least 4 different time ranges and location of making them . you have (mylar) polyester. polyester/ polypropylene pure polypropylene and polystyrene types of orange drop all with their own sound that is about 64 types of orange drop when taking in all the factors. A rather large blanket I would say . Currently only the 715p and 716p are being of interest . Vishay is currently making the orange drops they also make so very good other caps and resistors.

[@neblledroc3059]

S.o.b. Gibson built it like it never had to come apart.

[@Satchmoeddie]

More accurately that is the Gibson Skylark GA4T "CRESTLINE" variant of the GA4T. The orange drop dropped in 1965/1966. The 1966 225P was only rated for 75 to 100 VDC. The 150-1600VDC rated orange drops were the 6PS or the 1970 HCX product line instead of the 225P line. The HCX orange drop is a 1970s product.

[@davidhelfrich5657]

They make it tough to work on. I rebuilt the same model without Trem. Someone had used foil gum wrapper as a fuse. New trannies , new sockets (rectifier was welded to the socket). love the sound of these 6aq5's and were cheap when I got mine a decade or more back.

[@goodun2974]

The 6AQ5 is basically a miniature 6V6 with lower plate voltage and current ratings.

[@goodun2974]

Now here's a poll question: I have about 50 NOS GE mil spec 6005W/6AQ5A (ruggedized versions) and at least as many military 6X4 rectifiers; what amp(s) would you all build or clone with those?

[@Andrew-ry7iw]

Does the lower rear cover come off easily? Wouldn't that give you more room to manoeuvre your hands?

[@matthewf1979]

No couplets!? Lucky you!

[@fiddlix]

Wow…no couplet in the signal path either.

[@danielsaturnino5715]

Hey, fewer parts, less chance to fail? :) I could be wrong... on a side note, should one bias an amp with a triode-pentode switch on which setting? Thanks for the video.

[@weschilton]

Wow, Gibson *really* doesn't want you going in there!

[@Burgschall]

OD 225P should be around at least since the mid 60ties...

[@butchlauer]

The Crest series leaves a lot of design flaws hidden for all to enjoy.

[@jimmyjoefine]

I feel your pain. I have three Scout/Galaxies from this era, and while not as hard to get inside as this one, they are still a pain to remove the chassis. Those 225p's are original, Gibson used those extensively in the Crestline and white panel amps that followed. I made the mistake of replacing the initial Sprague .047 coupling cap with a Mallory 150, and it absolutely ruined the tone of the amp. Turns out the Sprague cap was dead on as far as value, so I promptly restored it into the circuit, and now it sounds great.

[@williambock1821]

I heard a pretty knowledge electronics technician say that 3 prong cords can actually detract from sound quality. I dont know if he was including all types of amps or just hifi. Do you have any idea what he’s would’ve been referring to by saying that? I think he was working on an old early hybrid tube/solid state amp. He changed the cord to 3 prong for safety sake but said he would leave it two prong if it was his personal amp. I don’t think he plays an instrument for whatever that’s worth. Just curious about your opinion.

[@PsionicAudio]

That's absolute horseshit.

[@williambock1821]

@@PsionicAudio HAHA!! You definitely have an opinion about it! Thanx! Yeah,I couldn’t figure out WHY it would do anything for the tone one way or another other than making MORE noise if the polarity was wrong.

[@stevehead365]

I think your ' knowledge electronics technician' had a sense of humour.

[@neblledroc3059]

I don't know why loathing the amp is funny. But true if you have the finger scars too.

[@kevinlopota3626]

Was I the only one that noticed the bent speaker basket?

[@JayRCela]

LOL, I had one of these things for about a half year back around 1981 or 82, I paid $50 for it. Eventually I took it to pawn shop for $10.00 and left it there. :_)

[@richardlynch5632]

🤔 😎👍❤🖖

[@daniellarson3068]

Looks a lot my old Kalamazoo amp. Two prong plug, bad hummm

[@goodun2974]

Done right, a Kalamazoo Model One can sound really really good, like a miniature Vox AC15 or AC30. Aside from needing new filter caps, the chassis was used as the return for the heater circuit. Rewire the heaters with twisted pair wiring, change the electrolytic caps and make sure all the resistors are within tolerance, and the lil' mo-fo will surprise you. The circuit does seem to be sensitive to the brand of EL84 (an old used Amperex Bugle Boy made a huge contribution to the tone and drive). And yes, add a grounded cord.

[@alecboyyes]

@@goodun2974 I read somewhere that Vox lifted the top boost circuit straight from a Gibson GA amp, so that would make sense.

[@rjschmirler3794]

Those kinda amps will give a young fella like yourself grey hair...

[@jamiemorgan4146]

You definitely would Not use this amp to gig. There are many great Gibson amps. This era was not. I have a tweed GA19 RVT… It’s really good.

[@kaarefestvog6540]

I had one of these and the baffle nuts were completely rusted together. Terrible design.

[@goodun2974]

I've worked on Fender amps, and others, with rusted baffle and speaker mounting hardware; nuts rusted and fused to the bolts, so that the entire speaker- bolt assembly (those pointy spiky things) spin together as one and you can't get the nuts off to get the speakers out. It's all about damp storage conditions, and no manufacturer's amp is immune to it. (The heads of those damn speaker bolts are underneath the grill cloth and they don't have screwdriver slots in them either, so when they start to spin in the baffle it's a real bitch to get the speaker off of the baffle. None of the manufacturers that I am aware of used stainless steel hardware).