The “font” used for the Ampeg script logos and Portaflex amplifiers (as shown below) was designed by Henry Konarsky. According to Jess Oliver, Mr. Konarsky was “a good friend, artist and guitar player. He also did several of our catalogs and we kept him in amplifiers“.
Ampeg/Portaflex logos
Here is a scan of a Portaflex cutsheet. One page explains the operation and benefits of the Portaflex design. The second page shows a flowchart for troubleshooting musical instrument amplifiers.
I’ve been trying to find good information to post in this “misc.” category and I thought that I would share these photos. They are of the modified toaster oven that Jess Oliver uses when repotting single transformers. If I thought I was going to be repotting many transformers in the future I think I would try to find an old toaster oven and do the same. It would be better than having to clean up my real oven if I ever dripped some of the melted compound (again)!
Modified toaster oven
Ready to begin
Lowering transformer into oven
Removing the transformer can
The finished can
The shock mounts that Ampeg used to use were manufactured by Lord (they are referred to as “plateform mounts” in Lord’s literature). The model that Ampeg used was 100PDL-8. Lord’s product literature has not included this part number for several years, but it is still produced. If you are not wanting to buy in quantity it’s much easier to just get them from Fliptops.net. I believe they are also available from Vintage Amp Restoration, but I haven’t confirmed that.
Another option is to get something similar from McMaster-Carr. They carry a similar model shock mount from Lord, p/n 6008K61. This is Lord’s model 100PL-8. The only difference between it and the mount that Ampeg used is that it has a square base rather than the diamond base. They can be used just as they are, or you can file/grind down 2 of the corners to make them look like the originals. I haven’t tried this yet but it should not be too difficult since the base is aluminum.
Shock mount comparison
I have set up this category to be a bit of a catch-all location for miscellaneous information that I don’t think falls within another category. I hope I have a few useful things to post here!