Leaderboard

Wowzers. Fab new guitar from Heritage.

It definitely is reasonably priced for what it is, and now that Gibson has pretty much pulled out of that market entirely, it was time for Heritage to get back into it. Still, I'd think you'd at least be able to specify a color for that price. Then again, compared to flat top acoustics, archtops are definitely a much higher end and more limited market item. I was always amazed at how Heritage was able to offer different types of archtops at a relatively low price compared to G-brands. I wonder how it compares to the archtops that Heritage used to make like the Sweet 16. Which of them were tap tuned? I admit I never paid nearly as much attention to the Jazz Box side of things.

I am 100% in favor of spending the money on NOS PREAMP tubes. They sound great (better than current production preamp tubes) and last at least 10-12-15 years with regular use. As far as paying top dollar for NOS power tubes, no thanks. I never heard a difference and I really like the Tungsol RI, TAD, and other reissue power tubes. The main preamp and power tubes that I (personally) can't stand are JJ tubes. To me they are sterile and lifeless. Yea, they work, but that's about all they do well. I had two sets of JJ power tubes redline and have a major failure, nearly ruined a Carr Rambler amp that I used to have. No other power tubes failed on me like the JJs did.

They need to resurrect the H-516. Gimme that with a fat neck and some P90s. Jazz, blues, rock, country. It would be a do it all guitar. I’m convinced it would sell for less than $13k.

Not tap tuned, tone-tapped spruce top

A speaker that is rated at twice the amp power rating has long been the safe standard, or the combination of multiple speakers equaling twice the rated power. I personally don’t think that is really necessary though. I have now built 3 6g3 amps and paired them with 65 watt Scumback M75 Speakers. I would use lower wattage but there isn’t one until you get down to 25 watts. The amps have varied in output based on the power transformer used and plate voltage supplied. The lowest wattage of the three was 12.9 clean and 17.4 cranked all the way up with 355 volts on the plates. That would be fine for a 25 watt speaker. The first one I built I used a vintage spec PT and had 440 volts in the plates which gave almost 30 watts when fully turned up, that would not be good for a 25 watt speaker. So from a manufacturing standpoint, a company would spec a speaker that can cover variations like that. Smaller builders may have much less variation or can even spec the speaker based on a single build. I’m comfortable with a speaker that is around 10 watts more than the amp is rated for something lower wattage like a 17 watt amp. I built a JTM 45 that maxes out at 42.78 watts (JTM 42.78?) and I’m comfortable using the same 65 watt M75 in that amp but I probably wouldn’t go lower than that. The last gig I used that amp on I had a 200 watt Eminence Em12n speaker and it sounded great, especially clean. There is zero speaker breakup but the dirty sound is just a little sterile compared to the M75 that gets a little breakup and adds some warmth to the sound. Some may prefer the 200 watt speaker though, to each their own. The amp has a master volume and I turned it down to the level the sound guy wanted, then when I got home I measure the output. I played the gig at 14.5 watts dirty and about 8 watts clean with a 200 watt speaker. 8 watts with an efficient speaker is louder than most people realize and with todays stage management makes amps like the JTM 45 obsolete without a master volume or attenuation. I have a 20 speaker that is going into yet another 6g3 variant I’m building only this is a single channel and uses 6k6GT power tubes and should max out at 10-12 watts and be perfect for most places I play.

Now that's a gorgeous archtop! And Henry Johnson is the perfect player to endorse it. Unfortunately it's priced over my pay grade at $12,999. https://heritageguitars.com/products/custom-shop-core-collection-h-717-archtop-guitar-honey-burst

Gotta love HJ! Great guitar and great player! Thanks for posting!

What a surprise, a new Fab jazz guitar from Heritage. Reasonably priced for a hand built American made jazz guitar.

I'm still in mourning over the closure of the "The Tube Shop", which is where I got a lot of ANOS (As New Old Stock Used) preamp tubes, as well as some NOS rectifier tubes. Yes it was all order by email and they would get back to you, but I got some great tubes at nice prices. There's still KCA Nos Tubes out there, which has some good deals on the ANOS tubes. JJ Tubes, unfortunately are now the tube of choice for a lot of amp companies, as they can withstand high cathode follower voltages, and are rugged. My Mesa Mark V was full of them when I got it, and I think my Friedman JEL-50 probably is as well. When I get some time I've gotta get rollin' rollin' rollin'. Keep those tubes a rollin'.