This vintage 1958 Fender Bassman amp with desirable 5F6-A circuit, tweed covering, and four speakers came through the shop a few years ago. I'm always a vintage Fender amp buyer but I especially love the Bassman model amplifiers from the 1950s. You can contact me here to sell a Fender amp.
If you're looking for help with Fender amp dating then check out my blog post on How To Date A Fender Amp.
Check out a few other vintage Fender Bassman guitar amplifiers that have come through the shop:
1964 Fender Bassman amp black with white Presence knob
The Fender Bassman Amp with 5F6-A circuit was the pinnacle of the tweed Bassman's with updates in output and presence control. Jim Marshall was so impressed with this circuit that he essentially copied it for his early Marshall JTM-45 amplifiers. "Lilly" wired this amp at the factory in April of 1958 and her name is still visible on the small piece of masking tape on the inside of the chassis. Lilly's 1958 Fender Bassman 5F6-A was lightly played and wonderfully preserved throughout its lifetime. It retains all its original parts in good working condition except for a new leather handle, fresh full set of new old stock GE tubes and three prong power chord.
This 1958 Fender Bassman amp plays nicely with strong output and very low noise even with original Astron filter capacitors. The circuit is fully untouched with original solder joints, capacitors, transformers, potentiometers, etc. The only modification was a properly installed three prong power chord for safety. The original Jensen P10R speakers sound strong with original cones. The chassis face is clean and free of pitting although there is a small area near the input jacks that is slightly bent. We chose to leave this for the next owner to decide whether or not to bend it back.The tweed is in nice vintage condition but does show wear on the bottom corners. It's clear that this amp was stored properly under some kind of cover since the tweed is still clean and not musty or dirty like most.
This clean 1958 Fender Bassman amp 5F6-A is in excellent collectible and playable condition without excuses or issues. The classic look of lightly worn but well preserved tweed is unmistakable compared to reissues or recovered tweed amps.
Comments
Thank you so much for sharing this awesome article!
The Bassman is legendary for so many reasons, and there are few resources to see what the insides of a pristine one would have looked like Factory Fresh from the late 59’s.
I actually came across this article trying to see if the original Jensen P10R speakers had the bell on them or not, and it blows my mind to see the top 2 speakers don’t, yet the bottom two do! – I guess it makes sense to give the top speakers a bit more clearance for the amplifier electronics, I’m so delighted that you have a clean clear picture of a model that seems untouched – unfortunately I’m trying to decide if I should put a bell on the back of my Jensen P10R speaker for a single speaker combo I’m working on (if all 4 had bells or didn’t have bells I would have gone with that – but half and half is awesome to see, yet doesn’t help my decision making haha).
Even tho I’m still as 50/50 as when I started for my particular project, I really do appreciate this beautiful look into one of the most unsung legends of Rock History – thank you for this