Fender Champ, Silverface, 1x8 Valve Combo

🚨 It works and it sounds good. The grade is 6 anyway, and here is why, because the reason is the whole point of publishing a scale.

Chassis and power supply. As far as the owner knows it has NEVER BEEN RECAPPED. On an amplifier of this age that means the filter capacitors should be assumed to be original, and a cap job is owed whether or not it sounds fine today. That single fact sets the grade, because we grade at the worst axis and never average. The work is not included and is not priced in beyond what the asking price already reflects.

Speaker. NOT ORIGINAL. It has been replaced. If originality is what you are buying, this is the sentence that matters.

Tubes. Replaced. That is a consumable, like strings, and it is disclosed rather than counted against the amp.

Controls and jacks. Working. Cabinet, tolex and grille carry the wear of an amp this old.

⚠️ Mains cord. Most Champs of this era left the factory with a two prong cord and a ground switch. Ask us what this one has before you plug it into anything, and do not assume it has been brought up to modern wiring, because we are not claiming it has.

The amplifier. No cover, no footswitch, nothing else.

The Champ is the small amp that ended up on more records than most stacks. Single-ended, one 8 inch speaker, a handful of watts, and it breaks up early enough that you can get the sound in a room rather than in a hall. Studios kept them because a Champ at volume in front of one microphone is a finished guitar sound with nothing to fix afterwards.

The speaker has been changed and the capacitors have not, which is a combination that takes the originality premium off and leaves you the amplifier. If you want a Champ to plug in and use, that trade is in your favour. If you want an all original example to keep, this is not that amp.

It powers up and it sounds good. It also owes somebody a cap job eventually.

Pickup only. We are not shipping instruments yet, so this one is bought here: 215 East Lewis Street, third floor, Livingston, by appointment.

Right for recording, for a practice room, and for anyone who wants real valve breakup at a volume that does not clear the building. Right for a player who is comfortable having a tech go through it at some point.

Not right for a collector buying originality, and not right for somebody who needs an amp that has already been gone through and certified. It has not been.