Jimbilly

more mids in the V30 to my ears through the tv is most of what I noticed (I don't seem to have particularly picky ears), makes me wonder how similar Pete could make them sound with some eq adjstments

how low is the action? how's the neck relief? Since it's nearly new and this is a new problem, less likely the nut or bridge, more likely a truss rod adjust issue. I live a somewhat humid area, but I understand that in very dry areas the humidity packs, or something to keep the guitar from drying out too much, can be necessary to prevent damage. It could possibly be a bad string, I had a DR once where the winding was not tight from new, sounded dead/buzzy.

Did their bassist play a Cruise?

I had a mid/late 60s Twin Reverb for a bit with JBLs: clean and heavy! I should have weighed it to compare against my two 4x10 combos

Just because they have some 'pedigree' doesn't mean you have to get them fixed, - especially if they're too heavy and you won't use them. I recently gave a pair of EV Force 10s to a friend who might use them, they needed re-cone, I have no regrets about giving those away. 'Weigh' the cost of getting those repaired against getting a lightweight cab or some Neo 12s and save your back. I pretty recently had a Fender Bassbreaker 2x12 cabinet, it was really surprisingly light, and I liked how it sounded, $200-250 ish is used market value for those iirc. I have four old alnico speakers in a '72 Univox 412 cab, I got those speakers while scrapping out a couple of organs. They sound great with a low wattage amp, and the cab is light enough to actually move around. If you have a low wattage amp, you can do a little legwork and get old alnico 12s almost for free. I almost kept that Bassbreaker 2x12 to put organ speakers in, that would have been crazy lightweight

A thing Peavey did right was to make it user-friendly to replace the 'basket'(as I remember it being called) with just 3 bolts (3 bolts and you could pull the frame/cone/voice coil assembly off the magnet part), but maybe they somehow knew that would be done frequently? I'm sure I'm not the only one who has 're-basketed' a few Peaveys.

Not sure about nut width, I just have one Centaura and just had one bolt on sustainiac Chap years ago. Re the trem and routing: I'm going to guess that the early setneck Chaparrals had an above-grade mount (also found on set neck Steve Stevens models), and the later bolt on Chaps got the recessed routed trems, along with the Centaura, my bolt on Cali's also have the route/reccess

those stories keep me going to garage sales. I found a really early Magnatone solid body electric (like 40s or 50s) at an estate sale 20 years ago for around $300, saw it around 11 am, contemplated and called a couple of friends, went back around 2-3 and bought it, my friend sold it online for me for 'quite a bit' more than that. Apparently I missed a couple of lower value tube amps that had sold earlier, so someone else passed on the real treasure. I think of that everytime I pass that house. The only other thing I found garage saling was a late 60s crybaby for $5. And that's why I always carry cash I know a guy who once found a matching pair of blackface princetons at a St Vincent De Paul thrift store for a bit more than that, but that was quite a while ago

exactly I have an Ampeg VT40 that was reportedly owned by Nokie Edwards, I believe the story from when I bought it in '85. It's too new ('72) to have been used in any notable way. (further sidenote/rabbit trail) Some of the Ventures touring amps are fs locally https://seattle.craigslist.org/tac/msd/d/tacoma-authentic-ventures-touring-amps/7907942103.html

Keep in mind that there was a recent story about the Beach Boys Dumbles (2) being recently located, is that also the "Dumble Sound"?

I just emailed their customer service suggesting they get World Tour to do a headless gig bag, they'd sell a bunch of those, there are no low price options that I can find

it looks to me in your photo that there is a green wire attached/soldered to the T pot that point up and connects to nothing, I would attach it to the outside point/lead on the output jack, that one it almost touches in your first photo

good idea on the alligator clip test. And yes, as I recall emg's don't need conventional grounding to the bridge, I think the tip and ring are wired to turn the battery on which is why you don't want to leave them plugged in for long periods of time. My old Boogie Bodies with emg's has a barrel jack, and the outer/ground goes to the body/ground of the tone control, I see that as verification that your green wire should go to the outer/ground on the barrel jack

this just arrived, I've never had a case for this guitar, spotted these for $30 free shipping, it's a pretty nice bag and a good fit I got it here https://www.americanmusical.com/p/world-tour-deluxe-20mm-gibson-epiphone-explorer-guitar-gigbag?sku=WOR-EXPG20DN

I'll grab a photo off my Cruise 5 emgs for you shortly, it should look the same. That green wire is 'ground' on the pot it's connected to, which should also be ground on the jack/plug, - and it looks like you've got nothing going to ground on the plug/jack right now. If that one is original, it's likely due for a change. Another vote for Switchcraft, but you will need 'stereo' with the 3 prongs like you already have, not the one mentioned above which is for passive pups. (edit) - mine looks a lot different, so it would be no help

here's much more on the Tube Safety Control feature, and it looks like having matched tubes is still highly recommended https://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/articles/what-do-the-tsc-lights-on-the-back-of-my-hughes-kettner-amp-mean/

found one for a great price, I had been dissatisfied while trying to get higher gain out of all my other amps, this seems to really check that box for higher gain, but also great cleans, - really a fun little amp. The red-box di out actually sounds good! Other interesting features include some sort of 'auto-bias' and warning lights for the power tubes, which I haven't fully explored, this was intriguing because I have a pretty good collection of good used US and euro el84s. I did test the tubes before I tried it out at home, I think it had been barely used, and I did replace V1 with a vintage Mullard, and the 2nd 12ax7 with an RCA (couldn't help myself, couldn't put those China 12ax7s back in). I've tried it through 3 different cabs, and brought it to a friends house, super cool little amp. It has a 'di only' option on the output switch (no speaker, 1watt, 5 watts, or 20 watts output), safely disabling the speaker out so you can use it for direct without a speaker. It would be nice to have separate EQ for clean and for dirty, but it is a 'lunchbox' amp and priced as such. I'm wondering about putting old Deluxe Electric Mistress or similar in the effects loop, and using the B output from that effect to go to a 2nd amp?, I might have to give that a try. (update) Yes, a stereo chorus in the effects loops allows for a preamp 'tap' to be sent to a different amp in addition to driving a speaker and/or the xlr out. I used a guitar wireless plugged into the B out of the chorus to send that signal to the external amp, that creates all sorts of fun possibilities, and might be good to avoid ground or polarity issues?

I feel the same way about the 'prof of rock', I can't watch those, and I'm otherwise pretty accepting of a variety of characters

you should look up Riggio up this way to add to your list of builders, authentic (or not) strats to this sort of thing https://reverb.com/item/92015365-riggio-guitars-arrowhead-production-1-first-licensed-2023-natural

Sorcery! Witchcraft!!

a well repaired headstock break on a Hamer doesn't bother me all that much, of course it affects the value, probably more than it should imo.

Ideally bias will be set within spec, AND use a variac or 'brownbox' attenuator to get the voltage consistent. The Brownbox looks really neat, but I already have a variac, it's only a bit large... - and one more thing to carry I was fortunate to make friends with a local amp builder hobbyist a few years ago, and had a couple of custom hand-wired builds done really affordably, using donors from amps that weren't highly collectible. This Plush, half of which is a Dual Showman, and now has bias check probe ports built in, which (as I understand it) is like having that eurotobes octal tool (pictured above) built into the tube socket in the amp. The Plush has a 'short' amp box without much room above the power tubes, only the short 6L6s with the thin base fit in there, but I don't use it often and those tubes should be available for some time if I ever wear these out. If necessary, I can always drill holes in the top of the cab to make more headroom for different tubes. my photo isn't sideways in my folder, sorry

I've never messed with bias to try to see if the tone changes, I remember a demo that Lynn Ellsworth did when he was trying to sell his Speedster amps with the adjustable bias knob on the front, I seem to recall that you could supposedly change the tone by messing with the bias, I think it was pretty subtle, and I also don't remember being super impressed with those amps at that time. I think I also understood that messing with that might seriously shorten tube life, with my tube collection being pretty small at that time. I bought one of those Allessandro dual VU bias meters ages ago, it wasn't super cheap, but I've used it a quite a few times, and I've rarely regretted buying any good quality tool. Apparently using something like above that plugs into a multi meter works well too, I have one of those for el84s that my tech made me, I seem to remember him saying something about it just being a socket with a "1 ohm resistor" wired into one of the pins or somehting like that, really simple to build iirc. The Allessandro is plug and play', but only works with Octals like 6L6s, and doesn't work with 7027s (which, in my Ampeg VT40 can be swapped for 6L6s because there's no connector in the socket to the extra pins that the 7027s have).

just last night after a show I ran into an old local Hamer dealer and was able to chat for a bit, he even did a Paul's voice impression (which I have never heard anyone do before) while talking about a custom order. This guy still has a couple, and his kid is trying to talk him out of one or two "that will be tough" he told his kid.