CeriaTone BF Vibro Champ

This amp was made in 2008 and I've used it for 9 months now. You already know the specs or you can find them elsewhere, so I don't write them here. I use this amp for home playing, studio, and different kinds of gigs (usually miced). I use a home-made cabinet of 15mm birch plywood with a Celestion vintage 10 inch speaker. This combination works for me and I get much more volume than I actually ever need. It has 5 knobs and if that's not enough for you, you can buy pedals if you have money.

I use an old Yamaha SG2000 guitar with 2 humbuckers. I play many different styles with this amp (soul, county-rock, funk, pop, tango, jazz, reggae... in my opinion great for Clapton's 461 Ocean Boulevard kind of sounds). This amp gives me a simple clean tone that I can manipulate with pedals. I use an ibanez ts9, a boss compressor/sustainer and a dunlop jh1 wah (which sucks my tone when "bypassed" so I don't use it that much). I like the tremolo of this amp, but I would like to have a footswitch for it. If you want the natural distorted sounds out of it, you gonna have to play very loud. But it can be worth it... (i've tried and i really enjoyed it, but it was way too loud for normal use).

I don't have a backup amp. If it doesn't work some day, i hope it's not a gig-day. It is easy to fix (for a pro), it is (i've understood) a very simple amp.

Mr. Nik at ceriatone always responded fast to my questions concerning the amp and recommendations for a speaker. That was really nice. But I have to say that when I asked for a recommendation for a speaker for this amp, he didn't have much to say... I don't know why, and I don't want to speculate. There are so many different speakers out there, and after trying a bunch of them, I bought a cheap 10 inch speaker. You just have to test them and trust your own ears.

I've been playing for 17 years. This is my fourth amp, and I finally feel at home... If lost, I would buy this same amp again. I love this amp's good simple clean tone. I use this amp with external cabinet, and if I would build the cabinet again, I would make it one piece, a combo, for practical reasons. I don't have very much experience about many different amps, but I did a lot of research and listening before choosing this one - and I just made a lucky choise. I really like the idea of a simple low power guitar amp (is 6 watts actually "low power" when you listen to it closely???).It's not for everyone, nothing is.

The features are basic: speed, intensity, bass, treble, volume. Two neat features are the switchable impedance in the rear and support for two cabs. I am running a 210 cab and a 212 cab, both with vintage Randall speakers.

I play a number of different guitars, Strat, Tele, Les Paul, etc. I'll focus on the Strat sounds. The amp is very warm and sweet and extremely quiet. I primarily play rock and blues. Volume is room level until about 7 or so, and a bit of crunch creeps in. I don't think this amp tends to overdrive too much naturally, but that's what I like. I have pedals for overdrive.

The tremolo is just right and is very adjustable. The amp takes to pedals very well. I plugged in my Tube King and was able to get wonderful distortion. The amp sustains very well, even without the use of a compressor.

It looks to be built like a tank. The chassis is very heavy and all the components look to be of high quality, including the switches and knobs. The amp came with two sleeves for the 12AX7 preamp tubes that protect the tubes and also prevent rattle.

As noted everywhere else, Nik is very communicative and was extremely helpful. I even received tracking info from his shipping clerk.

I've been playing for 35 years, and have owned an original blackface Vibro Champ. It's a great amp, and I'd buy another if it were stolen. I love the warm sound and the "just right" volume and tremolo functions. I also own a Blackheart Little Giant and the Ceriatone, to me, has a better feel to it. Note that I didn't say a better sound, because they are voiced very differently. I did look at a number of other alternatives, but this fit my needs extremely well. It'll be mounted in a custom combo cab soon with 1 10" Delta Demon and 1 10" Copperhead speaker.

The price I paid was for the complete amp (pack 3) and shipping. A very good value.

Tremolo adds some mojo to this amp. Has 2 speaker outputs and switchable impedance between 4, 8, and 16 Ohms. This amp isn't really about features, tho.

Trannies and caps are spot-on. This kit is every bit as good as the original. Sound is extremely detailed. Range from clean to crunch is great. It is easy to get sounds from fat to thin using the treble knob on the amp and the tone knob on the guitar. It's not the be-all-end-all amp for everything, but it is the ultimate amp for 1960's Fender sounds. With volume in the last 1/8 turn, the low register is too weak for power chords on humbucker guitars, but that is typical of Fender amps.

Building a repro from a kit takes the anxiety out of trying to find a reliable Vibro Champ. The originals - even silver faces - have been all snatched up for the most part. I don't feel good about finding original Fender amps on eBay nowadays. With a kit, the build quality depends on me; my Vibro Champ is well built.

Nik answered every email I sent - very helpful. He is in Malaysia, so there is some response delay because of the time difference.

Been playing 25 years, some of it professionally. Currently doing mostly songwriting for others and teaching. I already build my guitars and pickups from scratch (lumber, copper wire, etc) and build stompboxes from schematics online. I had been wanting to try homebrew amps for a while, but was afraid of shock hazard - and especially afraid of making a mistake I couldn't find somewhere between sourcing parts and assembly. The CeriaTone kit made it extremely easy for me. Nik doesn't supply instructions - I assume because of liability - but if you have ever assembled anything electronic, it is easy to do. And it is a great amp - I haven't touched another amp in the 3 days since I completed it.