SWR Workingman's 12 112 Combo

Mine was made in the 90s, before Fender bought SWR. It's a 100W combo. I think the 120W combos you see out there are from after the Fender buy-out, and are generally not as good, in my opinion.

The features:
100W amp
A single 12" Celestion, ported in the back
A Le-Son TLX-1 Piezo tweeter horn, which you can switch off
Active & Passive inputs
Effects Loop
Headphone Output
Tuner Output
XLR Direct Line Output
Peak Limiter (can be turned off)

Knobs:
Gain (with red LED to let you know when you're clipping)
Aural Enhancer
Bass
Mid
Treble
Effects Mix (Pulling this knob out turns the peak limiter off)
Master Volume (with green LED to let you know when the limiter is kicking in)

I've used this amp in many, many settings and it has never let me down. It's plenty loud enough for rehearsals and small-scale performances. I need to crank it to about 7 when playing in a band with a drummer, but it comes through like a champ when I do.

Plugging in an 8 ohm extension cab and turning the limiter off will get you a little extra headroom, but I usually find it simpler just to go through the PA when I want more power. Roadies love me, because I don't make them lug around a big 8x10 tower for my rig.

I've used this with both passive and active pick-up 4 and 5-string bass guitars, as well as acoustic basses, and even the occasional stratocaster, telecaster, les paul, or hollow-body electric guitars. It takes everything I give it and sounds beautiful doing so.

The precision on this thing makes it perfect for Jazz, but it's a great little rock amp, too.

Some may disagree, but I like the sound of this amp better than most 2x10 or 4x10 cabs. The 12" speaker moves plenty of air, and the horn brightens it up without ever sounding harsh.

As others have pointed out, no noise at all. Turn down your guitar knobs, and you won't even know that it's on.

If you want a little subtle distortion at high volumes, you turn the peak limiter off. Otherwise it's immaculately clean at all times.

If you had enough of them, you could build a castle out of them. Rock solid. The steel grill on the front is very comforting to have.

I can, and have, gigged without a back-up with this thing. Nothing has ever gone wrong with it, and I suspect it will still work fine long after I'm dead.

The company is gone, but who cares? All pre-Fender SWR gear is out of warranty by now anyway. Customer Support doesn't matter because you'll never need it.

I've been playing for about 20 years, and have never owned a better bass amp.

If it were stolen or lost, I'd try to find another just like it, but I'm not sure if I could. They are getting rare because those who own them know better than to sell them.

I've lined it up against recent combos and stacks from GK, Behringer, Ampeg, Fender, etc. They all have come up short in comparison, when you consider all the features (especially if you consider ease-of-transport to be a feature that matters!)

I used to wish it had a non-balanced D.I. output (for situations when I don't have an XLR cable handy), but then I discovered that the "tuner" output is exactly that, and have been happy ever since.

Just the basics. Three tone knobs, an "aural enhancer", preamp gain & master volume. "Active" and "Passive/Active" inputs.

It has an output jack specifically for your tuner on the front, which is nice. It also has an output jack on the back that you can use to drive a second cabinet, though I found that doing so doesn't offer much more beef.

The switchable tweeter is nice, for reasons I'll get into in the Sound Quality section.

This amp is nearly perfectly transparent. Meaning a professional-quality bass with sound outstanding through it, but a crummy bass will still sound crummy. It does NOTHING to mask flaws if you plug cheap gear into it.

I'm not crazy about sound of the "aural enhancer" feature. It tends to make my bass sound a bit too trombone-ish. If you like a nasal punch to your sound, go with it. I tend to dial it down, and would be perfectly happy if it wasn't there.

The switchable tweeter is nice. I leave it on full-time, but if you are using a noisy vintage axe for a specific sound, it's nice to be able to kill any hiss or high buzzing by switching the tweeter off.

You will never get the big boom of a big Ampeg tower, nor will you get tube distortion out of it (or any distortion, for that matter, the limiter cuts it down before you get to a level where the waves start squaring off). To use it in a rock stage show, you will absolutely need to either mic it or run the output to the board. Even in gigs where the drums are not amplified, you will frequently need more power to keep up with the band. A guitarist on a Marshall half-stack will utterly swallow you up if this little amp is all you're running.

However, for studio use it's like having a magic box which does nothing more than deliver the "true" sound of your bass with absolute precision. It's also a nice rehearsal amp which you can lug around with one hand and fit in the trunk (or passenger seat) of even the smallest cars.

It's also great for church gigs or any other settings where a lot of room echo draws attention to noisy amps, because it's nearly dead-silent when you're not playing.

I've never experimented with the effects loop. I tend to play with a clean sound when I'm playing bass.

It's a rugged solid-state amp. Heavy wood cabinet, metal front grill protecting the speaker, and all the electronic components sealed up nicely. I've used it with no back-up on many occasions and have never feared for it.

It is my understanding that SWR was bought out by Fender, so I suspect support is similar to anything else under their umbrella. I wouldn't know because I've never had a problem with it.

I needed a solid, dependable, transparent studio amp that was also somewhat road-worthy, and walked into the music store POSITIVE that I would buy a GK. For more $100 less than the 80-Watt GK I intended to buy, this little miracle worker was slightly more powerful, cleaner-sounding, and actually looked slightly more rugged.

You won't find a better small combo in the 80-120 Watt range for the money. For both sound quality and ruggedness it beats the pants off many amps which cost more.

If I lost it, I would probably get another one. For what it is, I actually prefer it over the more-popular "Workingman's 15". Even if I were to buy a big-cab system for gigs, I would still want to keep this puppy around the studio.

Bought 2007, no idea when it was made.
I play Jazz, Classic Rock mostly, using double bass and electric bass, handles anything I can throw at it.
It has one channel with 3-band active EQ, aural enhancer, a limiter and has an effect loop, tweeter, DI out.
I don't really want for anything else, the name says it all, it's an amp for going out and gigging with.
I have it in my bedroom but it seems much more solid and reliable than my previous gigging amp (Ashdown Electric Blue)
It's only 100 watts but i'm sure if I had a larger gig I'd DI out it to the PA, like I did with my old amp.

I use a cheap but well made Peavey bass, a Squier fretless Jazz Bass and a plywood double bass with this amp, it has a transparent sound that just suits me for jazz. With the aural enchancer I can add a bit of raunch that suits rock and just the electric bass a bit more power. With my double bass I have to cut a lot of mid but I'd blame the pickup more than the amp, I'm thinking of getting a preamp. With electric it sounds just like it would through the mixing desk and that's what I want, I don't want a coloured tone that covers up a poor sounding bass.

This amp, as far as I can tell, looks rock solid and there's a chunky feeling about it (especially the metal grille and reassuring weight) that just screams quality. I have no doubts about taking out on gigs, even though it hasn't been out on one yet, I'm sure it'll be up to the task.

No experience with SWR.

I've been playing for five years, I use the same bass that I started with, plus my fretless and my double bass, but I find that it offers me a perfect transparent sound that suits my jazz inclinations and perfectly fits into rock as well. I also have a fender champion guitar amp and musicman sub1 guitar for playing guitar.
I love the fact that it accurately reproduces the sound of my bass and just reflects my technique, which ultimately defines my sound. There's nothing I hate about it, apart from the fact it's really quite heavy, much heavier than some considerably bigger amps I've used, but that's reassuring, it means it should be indestructible.
I also have an Ashdown Electric Blue 15 and this amp walks over it. I don't have to adjust the EQ when playing electric bass, it just reproduces the sound I want.
I didn't really compare it to other amps, I bought it based on recomendations by other players and wasn't disappointed.

A compressor would be nice, but I run a digitech bass squeeze dual band compressor in the loop, and it works nice

I use a washburn 5 string, peavey fretless, spector import 4 string, and an old fender musicmaster with the swr. the 5 string needs an additional cab, I use a peavey 15 inch cab to get the extra lows. I am a jack of all trades and master of none player, so this amp works well in all styles. A tube preamp or dedicated bass distortion might improve dirty bass tones, but I use a line 6 xtlive with the bass upgrade package for those kinds of tones. The main reason I submitted this review was to point out the non-bass uses for this amp. It makes an excellent acoustic guitar amp, especially with an art tube preamp. I have also used it in orchestra pit gigs with an xtlive for electric guitar. the amp can be tweaked fairly flat to clearly reproduce the xtlive's sounds. It is full sounding at low volumes, and in that setting, it is only a monitor, with another feed from the xtlive going to the pa. In short, I get a lot of use from this amp!

No problems, just don't forget the detachable power cord!

a 1993 model..still have it..
quite bright sounding to the extent of being to clean somehow
i had to warm it up with a sansamp bddi
i lent it to a guitar player who said it sounded thin
wouldnt have another or the 15"
i only play small venues so power was ok..but my P sounded muddy
now i use a stingray 5 which is tighter anyway and more focussed
strong cabinet and robust speaker served me well
wish it would blow up though so i could get an ashdown

P bass mainly and sounded muddy and unfocussed..changed so many pups till i got another bass

reliable and strongly built
never let me down

no repairs done...

been playing around 16 years..this is my third combo
started with a peavey monster 15" 60W which did the business
then a little 12" ohm bottom of the pile combo
thought at the price the swr would be rolls royce...but its way overpriced and i lost out

I WILL RATE THIS AS A PRACTICE AMP OR IF IT USED WITH A MIKE INTO A SOUND SYSTEM IF GIGGED, NOT AS A STAND ALONE GIGGING AMP AS I DON'T THINK IT IS CUT OUT FOR THAT.

You can see the features off of other reviews so I won???t bore you with that. For a small combo it is not too bad with the features it has. I like the ability to put headphones on, turn the tweeter off (see below under quality) and lastly the ability to have a dry/wet mix to my stomp boxes. I'm not going to rate this compared to an amp/cabinet as that wouldn't be fair. This is a great practice amp and maybe more (see overall rating).

I have an Ibanez SR800 with P/J type of pickup. I use a number of stomp boxes, and jamman looping through it. At levels up to about 60-70% it sounds pretty good, but beyond that it gets real muddy. Some styles may be different but I play mostly rock and blues so I need a deep sound and very clear depending on the song. Of course if you can ???mike??? this into a sound system or PA it would be fine. However, you loose some control for sound level, but that???s what the sound engineer is for anyhow. Just talk to them about when you need to have more presents in the room.

If you are gigging and have no ability to mike the amp, THIS IS NOT FOR YOU. That said, it is still great for garage or basement practice, unless you have band mates that don???t know how to practice at lower levels. Save your ears and turn it down for general practice. For dress rehearsal prior to your real gig, get out your bigger amp. I use an Ampeg SVT 410-HLF cabinet with a SVT-4 PRO head with no problems at any gig for my go to gear.

The combo is not as tight as I would like unless I turn the bass way down, but it gets muddy with the bass cranked up and the gain up.

The frequency range doesn't lend well for a drop D or lower note. It plays it but it is very hollow sounding so don't get this expecting your 5 string or drop D will sound nice. I blew the tweater at some point when I was trying to keep up with a rather loud practice session. I started to hear a buzz and realized it was the tweater. Glad it has a switch on the back to turn it off.

Practice amp at low levels = 8 rating
Giging amp miked = 7 rating
Giging amp with out mike = 2 rating. (It just doesn't have it)

Well, as stated above, the tweater blew so...
I have not had any other problems with this combo for the last 7 years so I guess I can't complain. I just pushed it too far.

I've been playing for about 8 years (this time round). I don't think I would replace this amp because I think there are several better combos out there now that weren???t available when I got this one. I can???t say I love or hate anything about this combo, it???s just ok to me. Originally I got this combo because it wasn???t very expensive and I was just getting back into playing bass and I needed to buy everything again. That and I only wanted something I could practice with or jam to music on my computer.

This is one of the 2nd generation models with the red and white screenprinting on the front panel. Like other SWR amps it accentuates the highs, which makes it good for quiet playing or jazz. If you play louder, you better be REALLY good, because everyone will hear your mistakes. I would not suggest this for your average rock bassist.

This amp is mainly used in my practice room along with a 15" cabinet so I get the full 120 watts (amp is only 100 watts to the internal speaker).

I use this mainly with my Fender P-Bass Deluxe (P-J pickup configuration), and occasionally with a 1972 Precision. My musical style has changed back to rock since I bought it, so I'm not sure it fits anymore (I recently picked up a SansAmp Bass Driver DI pedal, which I feel improves the sound considerably). There's really not much variety in the sounds I can get out of it. For the jazz style I originally purchased it for, it sounds great. Very transparent.

I'm not sure I can say much about the reliability. When it was only a year old it stopped working entirely, but it got fixed fairly quickly under warranty (loose wire to the input jack). Then last year the speaker blew out, but that is probably because I accidentally turned off the limiter and drove it too hard. I've replaced the original speaker with an Eminence Delta 12, which has improved the sound considerably.

I have used it for low volume "coffee shop" gigs, and it is fine for that. I would think twice about taking it to a rock gig, though. When I use it for practice the red limiter light basically stays on the entire time I'm playing, and the heat sink on the back gets really, really hot. Barely keeps up with a drummer.

As mentioned above I did get it repaired under warranty once. It was done quickly and well, but I was initially concerned because my local SWR repair shop was in the basement of some guy's house! Considering the size of the city I live in, I found this odd.

Nonetheless, SWR (when they were pre-Fender, anyway) was very helpful in the matter.

I have been playing for around 18 years now. Other bass equipment I own includes an Ampeg B2R Head, a custom 15" cabinet, and an Avatar 2x10 cabinet.

If it were stolen I think I would look at buying something else. The new WorkingPro combos that SWR puts out now just don't do it for me anymore. I like having a combo amp handy, so I think I would look at Ampeg instead.

I chose it because Bass Player magazine rated it highly for sound and portability. They said it fit nicely in the trunk of a Honda Civic, which I happened to have at the time, so I bought it. The only other competition it had at the time, in my mind, was the Workingman's 15. But, I decided I wanted something smaller.

I've had this amp for about 4 year and have gigged and practiced with jazz combos and at home. It's a pretty no-nonsense amp but has everything you need - not much EQ flexibility but I see that as an asset. It's just enough power to keep up with a medium-loud drummer, with extension speaker you may be able to do better. It has a built-in limiter to keep you from clipping and blowing the speaker or output section, which is defeatable. I wouldn't recommend this, though ;). Also, it has a very good sounding balanced DI for running to a PA or recording. Nice touch.

Amazingly, this amp sounds GREAT! Every bass I've played through it, whether P or J, fretted or fretless, or acoustic bass guitar, it sounds great. It may be a bit peaky in the lower midrange for you upright players, but for other basses - it's pretty surprising. I compared this to several other combos when I bought it, and it came down to this or an Ampeg 15. The SWR edged out. It surprised the salesman, too, guess he expected people to go with the defacto bass amp.

I've not had any problems at ALL with this amp. I trust it completely, and believe me, I've pushed it to its limit more than a few times.

Never dealt with SWR. Never had to, see above.

I have a Euphonics Audio big-ass combo (iAmp-800c) for the heavier rock gigging. The SWR won't cut it in those instances, but hey, it's only 100W (120 w/extension). I prefer the sound of the SWR, I have to say. If it were stolen, I'd just not replace it because I have the EA, but I'd miss the tone. Plus, I don't think they're in production.

Had this amp since 1995. Its got if you need more features then you have the wrong concept of a BASS tone. If anything the amp could do without the AURAL ENHANCER feature. 100watts solid state is fine power for small rock gigs. Ive been playing Jazz on upright Bass with this thing and its been with me for over 10 years.

On Upright Bass come off the mid range a bit and put everything else at 12oclock and use a david gauge pickup. On electric get a "real" P Bass and play with everything at 12oclock. If you cant get a good sound on an amp with all the eq set at 0 then DONT BUY THAT AMP.

Over 10 years and no problems

Never talked with them.

I would recomend this amp as a cheap option insted of an acoustic image or GK small combo. For upright sound you get what you need and its not too heavy. Jazz guys gig a couple nights a week instead of a couple nights a month like most rock gigs so for long term realiablity and sound check this amp out.

This is a feature laden amp for its size. Decent DI out, ample power for my needs. Sounds great with electric and upright. Headphone out, extension speaker out (8 ohm), switchable horn.

Very clear nice sounding amp for its size. This amp will reproduce the sound of your bass. Not much coloration, although tone shaping controls work well.

Amp been totaly faithful

Great amp. In my opinion, this is the best small amp for the money on the used amp market. You can get these things for $250 in good shape. I had an SWR LA12, which I thought was completely un-useable outside of house.