Adding Spring Reverb to a Valve Junior
Epiphone started out in the early 1900s in New York City producing stringed instruments that eventually would lead to its guitar line. Often in the shadow of rival Gibson, Epiphone became known as a producer of inexpensive Gibson-like guitars when Gibson acquired the company. Epiphone has emerged from Gibson’s shadow and produces guitars and amplifiers, including the Valve Junior as a stand-alone practice amp and as an amp head to be attached to a speaker cabinet. Both versions are simple, Spartan, small amps, but you can add a reverb unit to either of them with a little work. Because of their small sizes, it is virtually impossible to install a spring reverb unit inside the Valve Juniors. You must add them externally.
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Things You'll Need
- External reverb unit
- Patch cords
- Spring
- Case
- Phono jacks
- Phono plugs
- Old amp with spring reverb
Instructions
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Use a stand-alone spring reverb unit. Many modern reverb units use digital simulation chips, which make it easy to get reverb in a small tight space such as the Epiphone Valve Junior combo amp or amp head. However, to get real spring reverb, you need a real spring. Several companies still make spring reverb units. The most famous is Fender. Getting your hands on an original Fender stand-alone reverb unit, made between 1961 and 1966, can be expensive, but the company has reissued the device several times. The use of tubes and a real spring can give you the surf music reverb you want.
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Take a spring reverb unit from an old amplifier and hook it up to your Epiphone Valve Junior. The spring reverb unit in most amps that had them was a self-contained steel box with the spring inside. Usually, this device was bolted to the inside bottom of combo amps, meaning amps that included two 12-inch speakers in the same cabinet. Unbolt the reverb unit while at the same time noting how it is wired into the amp. Use a stand-alone pre-amp to connect the reverb unit to the Valve Junior. Using this type of spring reverb unit may not be pretty, but it will get you the right sound. You can build or buy a case to install the steel box within and wire it to an input jack, but unless you use a pre-amp, you will not have control over the amount of reverb you get from the unit.
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Install a spring reverb kit. Several small companies sell such kits for installation inside various amps. Instead of installing it inside the Valve Junior, however, you can build it into a stand-alone case that you can place under the amp. You may have to modify the wiring slightly so that your encased spring reverb unit has external jacks, but otherwise the instructions that come with such kits should provide complete directions.
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Tips & Warnings
If an external spring reverb unit is impractical for your needs, you can get kits to install digital chip reverb simulators in the Valve Junior. The sound may not be as pure, but it will lighten your load when you have to transport your musical equipment.
Note that the only real reason you cannot install such a kit inside the Valve Junior is size. You need a long case for the extended spring to provide the correct type of reverb. Placing a shorter spring reverb homemade unit inside the Valve Junior may give you some reverb in your guitar playing, but usually not the type most people want.
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Comments
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Was this supposed to be useful? There is no information here whatsoever. This reminds me of the Monty Python sketch of an educational show called "How to do it" where basically they did things like teach you how to play flute by saying "blow on this end and move your fingers over these holes."
