NFAD

ICBM

New FREE Amp Day!

ESchap just gave me this which he was clearing out - for nothing - OK it's not a vintage Marshall, but it's quite brilliant in its own way .



The mighty Leem GA-610D - a whole 10W of raw transistor power through a 6" speaker.

Just needed a pot/jack clean and the back panel supports gluing since they'd split - the screws weren't pre-drilled at the factory, tut tut.

It sounds *great* for what it is - a practice amp which cost about £40 new I think. Surprisingly for such a small thing, it's hugely bassy - even to the point I have to turn it down below full, which is highly unusual for me with small amps - and very loose-sounding, it's easy to make the speaker flap if you want to. The EQ is extremely powerful - especially the Middle, which is actually a backwards 'contour' type control, it's scooped at 10 rather than middy - and it's as easy (or more so) to get dreadful sounds as good ones, but if you persevere it's possible to dial it in to sound genuinely good, especially clean but if you're careful even with the Drive switch engaged. It's not enormously loud but plenty to annoy your family… you might even get away with it for a coffee-house type gig with very quiet drums.

I haven't tried the headphone jack because I value my hearing .

This is actually the second Leem I have - there's also the even more mighty 100W Pro Multiple Amplifier which is a sort of acoustic/keyboard/PA-in-a-box type thing and which has given me a huge amount of valuable use over the years, at everything from radio sessions to childrens' parties...

So if Mr. Leem is reading this - I'd be happy to endorse your products .

thomasross20

Nice!! And free! 
Get some clips up - I know you play great!
How much does it weigh?

ICBM

thomasross20 said:

How much does it weigh?

7lb 7oz, including the mains lead .

thomasross20

Argh so amazing!! 

ICBM

It's actually a pound lighter than the Blackstar HT-1 *head* .

But don't get excited - it wouldn't be any good for you. It's probably not quite loud enough, and when it breaks up through running out of clean headroom it doesn't sound all that good. It's also microscopically fussy about settings - literally a millimetre of turn on one knob is enough to take it in or out of the 'sweet spot', all the controls are extremely interactive, and it needs re-adjusting for different sounds. A lot of solid-state amps are like this, which I think is a big part of why players don't get on with them like they do with valve amps - they just don't respond naturally in the same simple and intuitive way.

I just like the challenge of making 'junk' amps like this sound good, and it's nice to find one which does .

thomasross20

You're the man to do it!
And ... now I'm a valve convert lol.... 

DJH83004

Its good fun when something unusual turns up, now and again, ever seen one of these, that came in recently:

ICBM

'Doobie' - genius .

I like that a lot - does it sound any good? Reverb too!

thomasross20

I thought the acronym title meant "New Fender amp day"  

DJH83004

It was a lovely little thing, with a genuine spring reverb, and driven by a pair of LA4420 chips in bridge (which I had never heard off, but apparently used in '80s car stereo / cassette applications - one of which had blown). The limitation was the speaker of course, but really nice, from the US I suspect?  

ICBM

Japanese going by the very unique corner protectors, and the knobs - looks like a Guyatone/Pearl.

bingefeller

ICBM said:

Japanese going by the very unique corner protectors, and the knobs - looks like a Guyatone/Pearl.

Is there anything you don't know?!

DJH83004

Totally agree about the origin of the amp, especially if you saw the components, but I think they were marketed in the US. BTW if you ever get one in for repair, I have a couple of the output chips going spare :-)

ICBM

bingefeller said:

Is there anything you don't know?!

Much more than I do . I just like to bore people with the stuff I do know about .

DJH83004 said:

Totally agree about the origin of the amp, especially if you saw the components, but I think they were marketed in the US.

And while neatly getting around being sued by Mesa, opening themselves up to the Doobie Brothers possibly .

DJH83004 said:

BTW if you ever get one in for repair, I have a couple of the output chips going spare :-)

I've never seen one, dead or alive, but I will file that away with all the other retentive-memory stuff I have just in case!

xSkarloey

ICBM said:

'Doobie' - genius .

I like that a lot - does it sound any good? Reverb too!

Hey hey hey. I bet that Doobie amp is really smokin' man. 

Bellycaster

thomasross20 said:

I thought the acronym title meant "New Fender amp day"  

It was Leo Fender, not Leem Fender.

;-)

Moss

Bellycaster said:

thomasross20 said:

I thought the acronym title meant "New Fender amp day"  

It was Leo Fender, not Leem Fender.

;-)

Just saying...

LEo fEnder (with an extra M to throw people off the scent)

midiglitch

I've had to clear all my stuff out of the house and in the loft I found a couple of these kind of amps. A squier sp-10 and a similar one by park.  They actually sound alright when dialled in, for what they are!  And you can get a range of usable (though not necesarily 'nice' sounds out of them.)
how easy is it to kill them though?
when turned up it sounds a lot like the speaker is going to rip itself to shreds.  Is it in danger of doing so?
what'll likely give up first if I push it: the amp, or the speaker?

FX_Munkee

Wow I have one of those Leem amps, I also got it free. I've given it to #1 son for his bedroom while he learns. I can't say it sounded good to my ears but then again I don't think I tried very hard to make it sound good. I will now have another try

ICBM

midiglitch said:

what'll likely give up first if I push it: the amp, or the speaker?

Speaker, I think - it really does sound like it's being tortured if you crank the level up without reducing the bass to almost nothing.

FX_Munkee said:

I will now have another try

Start with the settings in the picture above - those are pretty much the points where the EQ knobs have the greatest effect for the smallest movement, so you can finely balance it… which you need to, it's very easy to go from tolerable to diabolical . (The settings may not be exact, since pot variance could make a big difference.)

thomasross20

So are you keeping it?