> center tap is B+ regardless of color
CENTER tap. Push-pull. Think of a see-saw. If you move the pivot to the left end, and put the kids center and right end, it don't see-saw too good.
> Why they want to go messing with old standards?
There was no reason for the UK and US to have common standards until WWII. Not really a lot of cross-ocean mechanical or electrical trade. Different bolt threads. Different ways of specifying bolt tolerances. Different way of drawing blueprints! Some of this was cleared-up, enough to make guns and tanks. There was some feeling there should be more commonality. But UK cars and cycles used Whitworth bolts into the 1970s-- why change?
You know a US RETMA/ASA color code.
Apparently UK transformer makers knew another code.
There was little cross-Atlantic transformer trade until the Williamson, mid-1950s. Even then, the cost of shipping large iron over the water fostered many USA clones. Also a true Williamson, or the UL variant, has so many leads that the builder really has to Be Careful. UK color codes may have been rare in the US until the Marshalls started coming in large numbers.
If you are restoring a fine old UK Marshall, you "HAVE TO HAVE" the original genuine wire colors. ClassicTone does it correct per the originals.
> glad I didn't hook that red up to B+
Interestingly, it would not blow up. But it would be way-way down on power. Like the see-saw with the pivot at one end instead of center.