Guess everyone is cashing in....

[FUCHSAUDIO]

Seems like HAD has been quite lax lately on policing E-bay. Lots of people throwing the D word around without too many "pulls" .

[tjauernig]

Yes, the Masterpiece 50 is a "D" inspired amp, but not really designed to sound like one. Although, the right player can get those sounds out of it. As far as the name, I always hated it, reminds me of BBQ sauce. The look, standard Peavey "batwing" they've been using for decades, so they didn't steal that, it's part of Peavey's registered trade dress. (personally, I can't stand it) The original protos didn't have that by the way. The "treble bleed" isn't new folks, been around forever. There were 3 custom shop models. The Masterpiece, named after a handgun, the Sensation, get this....named after a salad, and the Studio Special, recycled Peavey name of yore.

Hartley doesn't have a Dumble, but there are 3 owned by employees. (2 of which I'm sure Hartley doesn't even know about) One is great, the other two sound like dung to be honest. Quite frankly, most of the clones of the mighty D amp sound as good or better than the real deal these days. There's also a few of them that don't sound like anything even worth mentioning at all, but yet people on the various forums wet themselves over them.

I have 4 screen names on this particular forum, and have posted 100's of times. The forum is a good place to look for ideas and learn. Unfortunately, when you work for a company, or have one of your own, people think you're always after something.

To set the record straight, I'm just a guy who plays guitar, likes great tones, and has been fortunate enough to build a lot of stuff for some really great players.

I've built by hand, and sold over 8000 pedals, designed 4 amps for Peavey, (4 in current production...there are several others I would assume they'll get to someday) been a contract builder for several other pedal builders, had licensing agreements with several international music related companies, currently have 2 amp designs licensed, and 13 pedal licenses. I've also done 7 years of industrial engineering work for Siemens, the solar energy industry, automotive industry, taught college level electronics courses.........etc. Am I qualified yet?

On top of all that, I actually gig 3-4 nights a week on average.

The Peavey thing....why am I no longer there. NO, I didn't get fired as some of you fine folks have speculated. If you knew even a tiny bit of the BS that goes on there you'd understand why I resigned my position in August of 2009. I mean gimme a break....naming an amp after a salad! WTF! Another thing is the reality of: who in their right mind is going to pay the $ they're asking for these things. Also, not my idea. And, I'll say this as well, if the man whose name is on the building down there says it will or will not happen, that's the end of it. Guess what folks, he doesn't play. That's all I'll say on that. Meridian sucked as a place to live as well. Just nothing going on there. My family and I hated it. But hey, the offer was presented and we said why not, you never know. Live and learn I guess. There are some really talented people at that company as well that just are not allowed to do the right thing.

Sorry if I offended everyone. Apparently I don't get the jist behind the forum. I have never attacked any product, or any member personally in any of my postings. I have given my opinion of things from time to time that I have actually used, or own/owned. But if I didn't think I knew anything, or the topic had no relevance to me I stayed out of it. The between the lines jabs at me from some of you quite frankly surprise me.

[FUCHSAUDIO]

Jauernig; Not knowing you had a multiplicity of screen names (and likely contributed with some of them), makes a big difference. A search of your current screen name shows a small amount of posts, mostly to ask questions about transformers to build wreck style amps etc.

This is supposed to be a community of people trying to share stuff and help others. As a manufacturer, it's very tough to walk a line between wanting to help, and not giving away any ideas you consider proprietary etc.

Unfortunately, this forum like others (particularly this Dumble forum), had more than a few people who started businesses from direct data here. Since it was a password protected limited group, that's not really fair.

That's not an issue as much as only half the deal: the other half is being a contributor. One foreign operation basically built their business here. This from people willing to share data, in some cases people gave away surprising amounts of data that lo and behold became products !

A few self-proclaimed "circuit guru's" come here to complain (bitch) about nobody sharing with them, they claim (elsewhere) that they "know special secrets about Dumbles nobody else knows), but they come here and share little themselves. Apparently, it's tough for them to walk the line between being a maker and a supportive forum member without sharing these top secrets....you really can't have it both ways apparently.

It's lots of drama over nothing imho. Thanks for the Peavey insight. Heard that about other companies too....I love this business.. lol.

[ampdork]

One foreign operation basically built their business here

You cannot be speaking of Nik cause he was doing business for YEARS before this place existed.

[Structo]

[img:400:275]http://lh6.ggpht.com/_MHnI-B0pJ8k/TIk1G ... PeavDy.JPG[/img]

It says, even if you don't like the tone you shouldn't throw it in the garbage.

[FUCHSAUDIO]

[img:400:275]http://lh6.ggpht.com/_MHnI-B0pJ8k/TIk1G ... PeavDy.JPG[/img]

It says, even if you don't like the tone you shouldn't throw it in the garbage.

I feel like I've seen s/n "prototype" floating around for quite some time....hmmm..

[FUCHSAUDIO]

One foreign operation basically built their business here

You cannot be speaking of Nik cause he was doing business for YEARS before this place existed.

Nah, you see his wooden Ceritatone table radios and 40's tweed amps on E-bay all the time....

[tjauernig]

[img:400:275]http://lh6.ggpht.com/_MHnI-B0pJ8k/TIk1G ... PeavDy.JPG[/img]

It says, even if you don't like the tone you shouldn't throw it in the garbage.

I feel like I've seen s/n "prototype" floating around for quite some time....hmmm..

Peavey uses "proto" designations all the time. Individual serial #'s are unique to each product. While I was there, Peavey was changing it's accounting and tracking system, so literally 1000's of products got tagged as protos for a brief time.

[stelligan]

tjauernig,

Thanks for chiming in. So you didn't dig it down in the land of boiled peanuts, eh? My wife did a stint down there when Union Pacific merged with Kansas City Southern, I think. She said it was real "country" down there but. liked some of the food. Please tell me what the yellow caps were. Rebranded something or other? Hope I didn't offend with any of my posts.

Cheers,Dave

[Structo]

I had an aunt that was from Georgia.
For years I thought she was saying "bald peanuts".
That woman could invent syllables that weren't there.
(no offense intended to my southern brothers)

I had no idea she meant boiled peanuts.
What the heck are they, what do they do and what are they for?

[tjauernig]

Boiled Peanuts. Thy actually boil then both in and out of the shell, then add various cajun type spices. They're pretty darn disgusting. They also deep fry just about anything down there. Fried green tomatoes are pretty good though. I draw the line at Oreos and Twinkies though.

The yellow caps, ahh yes. They're some sort off Mallory 150 knockoffs. If I remember right, all the caps were Ill. branded. The original protos I built in 2007 had orange drops, and Sprague electrolytics. I also had all Heyboer trannys in the originals. The 1 watt amp used Hammond trannys. I believe currently, the Sensation is still using Heyboer, but the Materpiece has a Heyboer PT, and a standard Peavey OT.

There were also a very small number of 100 watt Masterpiece amps made. Those had a really great clean tone. We did a lot of one-offs for artists in the custom shop as well. One of the coolest things was a 50 watt Vox-ish 2 channel amp we did for Charlie Sexton. That thing had jangle like crazy. It had Mercury trannys, and went out under the Budda brand. There was a ton of cool stuff we did there. And the guys in the cabinet shop could build anything. We were also using finger joined solid pine cabinets in the custom shop. We had come up with some really good sounding ported 412's that sounded HUGE!

If anybody is interested, send me a PM, and I can send some pics of some of the cooler stuff we did there. There were some amps in flame maple cabs, and custom colors that looked great. I did a pair of 40 watters with EL84's for Earl Slick that really sounded great. Those beasts were loud.

[boldaslove6789]

tjauernig,

Thanks for the insight and putting it in perspective. I hope I didn't offend/insult you by posting this. My intentions were aimed at the Corporate cookie cutters and not to the builders personally BTW.

[talbany]

The look, standard Peavey "batwing" they've been using for decades, so they didn't steal that, it's part of Peavey's registered trade dress.

tjauernig
If it was Peavey's intention to make the wood fronts resemble a Bats wing then someone should speak to their graphics designers..
Seriously... if Peavey stole it I am flattered if they didn't I certainly apologize..I know we did it before Peavey.. Good luck in all your future endeavors and thanks for the perspective!!

Tony

[tjauernig]

The wood front is just referred to as a "batwing" , it's not supposed to actually be one. I don't know anybody there that likes the look of that. But, it's one of those things that started back in the 60's there and has been around ever since. They actually do have the look registered. They have done them on all sorts of products over the years, and they have been made from wood, metal, plastic. Take a look, you'll find them all over the place in Peavey history. Send me a pm, and I'll tell you a very interesting story about the batwing and a line of products.[/img]

[trandy]

Has anyone here actually played through one of these amps?

I have extensively....you might be a little surprised...I know I was.

As far as price goes... I think, comparitively speaking, they're rather affordable.