Just picked up a 1975 Peavey Mace 310T

[Pavedog]

Having only worked on one other Peavey in my time(5150 ribbon cable repair) this is new ground for me.

It is a 1975 Mace 310T, use to be in a local studio and the guy that originally bought it from the studio took it out of the combo cab to make it into a head but never got around to doing it.

It has a fair amount of problems, 5 of the 6 6L6 tubes were missing the guide pins and one had been powered up clocked wrong in the socket. Burned up a trace and a grid stopper, along with some charred board under the 10W resistor. All the caps are stock and the ones I checked with my ESR were bad so I will swap them and the carbon comps.  Should there be anything I should be looking for specifically?  The 160W is an interesting prospect with no MV, any recommendations on which MV works best with this SS circuit, or just use the preamp knob? I am going to turn it into a head unit, as far as I can tell they are the same chassis so will try and find one or just build one.   Pics below.

[Latole]

Schematic ; https://el34world.com/charts/Schematics/files/Peavey/Peavey_mace_deuce.pdf

[tubenit]

If that were mine, I'd look at gutting it and turning it into something else like maybe a 5F6-A Bassman or Twin Reverb & add a tube preamp.  Where are you going to play 160w amp?


As far as master volumes go, I have been happy with the PPIMV type.



With respect, Tubenit

[Pavedog]

You are correct, there are few places to use an amp capable of 160W plus(likely I will use it at 8ohm which is 100W).  Not sure about turning it into a bassman, I am intrigued by the solid state preamp. I may remove the board for the power section and handwire that.

My question on the MV, was what was the best way with this SS preamp circuit?

[Latole]

Same wiring as a all tube amps.

Each side of the tube is like one transistor in the schematic.

[Brownie]

I owned one of those when I was a dumb kid and thought that 160W was better than 60W. It broke down just as often as my Fender 75 head did. There's a master volume on each channel, isn't there?

[Pavedog]

Kind of,  it has a preamp knob on each channel but it doesn't really act as a MV.  The later versions(VT) had a master volume.

[Brownie]

Don't those volumes say "pre" and "post"?

[Pavedog]

Yes, but in my very limited time using it the post did not act like a MV. I was able to run it quieter through dialing back the pre, but it is all clean.  Maybe once I am done restoring it the post knobs will act like a MV, but a family member that had one back in the day said to get any useable distorted tone it had to be loud. I have a freyette which should be able to attenuate too.

[Brownie]

I was able to turn those post volume pots right down to 2 and get decent dirt out of mine at decent lower
levels