What kind of price should a late 70s silverface champ be?

mattdavis

I know there are many variables but I wondered if anyone interested in older gear knew the answer to this one? My online research is throwing up some fairly random prices. Most of them often have a speaker change but assuming they are otherwise ok does £400-500 sound about right? Am trying to avoid getting stung.
cheers for any info

richardhomer

That does seem about the 'going rate' - which seems a lot to me, given their lack of reverb and tonal limitations.

They sound (and obviously are) 'much' smaller than a Princeton and lack the sparklingly highs of bigger Fender amps.

mattdavis

does seem a lot but have got a yen for something vintage-y and near my birth date - can't really spare the pennies for 'proper' vintage stuff at the mo. maybe one day...

jpfamps

£500 would be "all the money" for a very clean example.

You can look at sold prices on eBay and Reverb to get a good idea of the market rate.

Winny_Pooh

£ 350-450 IMO. Replace the speaker and they are real nice and portable. I've installed a regular speaker jack in mine so I can run a larger cab too. 

mattdavis

cheers fellas / fellinas

timhulio

If you like this guy, then look at silver face Musicmaster Bass amps too. They're 12w in a nice cabinet with a 12" speaker that's asking to be upgraded. They make excellent guitar amps (far better than they do bass amps) and run to less than the price of any Champ.

mattdavis

Cheers - looking for something small to hide from the wife -

matron!

ICBM

As already said - anywhere between about £350 and £500 depending on condition, speaker etc - which seems like too much for what they are as an amp to me, but it is what they go for.

Be aware that later ones have particle-board cabs not pine (the speaker baffle is particle-board on all of them), and I do think sound slightly less good. Some very late ones also have no valve rectifier.

The Musicmaster Bass is a very nice amp too, fuller and thicker-sounding than the Champ as well as louder, but it can be prone to noise problems.

mattdavis

Cheers @ICBM By late, would you mean '77? If they're a bit generally rubbish then maybe I should quash my romantic notion of a birth year Champ...

ICBM

Yes, I'm sure a '77 will have a particle-board cab. I forget the actual changeover year, but it's earlier than that.

They're still not bad amps but I wouldn't pay £400-£500 for one… although that may be just me.