In an earlier post I mentioned that I recently bought a Marshall Vintage Modern 2266C Combo amp.  Ever since I acquired this amp and started producing some really vintage tones, I’ve been getting more and more into understanding how tube amplifiers work.

I bought a few books off Amazon to expand my understanding and I have to recommend “The Guitar Amp Handbook” by Dave Hunter.  To help start you off on understanding how tube amps work, Dave Hunter does a great job of walking you through an early 1950s Fender Princeton amp circuitry and explains the various components contained in vacuum tube amplifiers.

Finally I understand what a “cap” does and why it’s important to your tone and how, if you’re not careful, you can electrocute yourself if you don’t properly discharge them. Tubes are obviously covered in great detail as well.  Honestly, it’s become a bit addicting for me and I’m worried about getting a case of gear acquisition syndrome (aka GAS).  I came very close to placing a bid for a 1958 Fender Princeton tweed on Ebay.  It was all original!!  There’s just something to be said for owning a piece of history as well as an amazing sounding amp.

The book also contains interviews with some famous amp makes and at the end has step-by-step instructions to build your own Fender Princeton-style amplifier.

Buy: The Guitar Handbook

After the jump, some great YouTube’s of the vintage Fender Princeton!

Here’s some YouTube videos of some classic Fender Princeton’s