Lab Series L6

Ive owned my L6 for about 25 years and still love it. It has never failed me and the volume it emits from any of my Bass Guitars is excellent. It's loud and when set properly there is very little distortion.

It's very quiet and just sits there waiting for me to play. There is no noise issues what so ever. A low "E" on a bass might cause it to distort but other than that it just sounds clean.

I bought this amp used in the early 1980s and it has never failed me. It still works fine. And thats 3 bass guitars ago.

Never had a problem with it.

The L6 is a good solid bass amp. It simply is solid and loud.

It's one heavy mother but Im guessing thats one of the reasons it has such depth and sustain. It'll rock a cassette tape off of a table---Its that loud!(Whats a cassette tape?)

The Lab Series L6 100W 115 is a solid-state, 1 channel amp with 100W output to 1 15" ported speaker. It is a good, solid, heavy bass amp, but you can use it for whatever instrument. On the face of the amp there are two inputs (marked "HI" and "LO"), a switch labeled "DEEP", a preamp volume control, a bass tone control, two knobs for midrange tone control (a frequency knob and a cut/boost knob), a treble tone control, a limiter switch, a master volume, a 1/4" preamp line-out and a 1/4" power amp line-in.

The main features of this amp are ample (and clean) volume, fairly versatile tone controls, and a limiter. The tone control section provides an adjustable midrange control that sweeps from 100Hz to 2kHz, plus or minus 4dB. That is unusual for an amp, and it allows more tone shaping than most amps of this age and price range. We paid $150 in a pawn shop for this amp. It has been very reliable, through gigs and a lot of home use. The limiter isn't really that useful to me, but it does work, and it has a nice indicator light to let you know when it is actually limiting the signal.

I'm one of those folks who don't rely on amps for effects, I like the amp to do its job cleanly, and this amp really performs on that front. The 15" speaker helps a lot, since most guitar amps have 12" speakers at best. For instruments with a naturally deep sound, this amp shines.

We have used it in gigs to amplify a bass fitted with two humbuckers, the tone was clean and present. We've used it at home for very heavy bass synth work, as well as both electric and acoustic guitars. My acoustic guitar (Takamine 6 string) sounded much better through the amp than directly into the board. My Fender Telecaster sounds fantastic through this amp, and really low-noise as well. Running it into the "LO" input with the preamp volume at max, you can get a nice slightly overdriven sound with a great deep tone (thanks, DEEP switch).

This isn't an amp that can compete with something like an old Fender Bassman for its characteristic sound, it's just a solid, heavy amp that reliably reproduces what you put into it. Some folks actually like the way their guitars sound and don't pile effects over them, and this is definitely a great amp for those folks.

It has never broken down. I wouldn't bring a backup amp to a gig, because this is one heavy mother and I probably wouldn't be able to carry an extra one. We're thinking about putting some wheels on the bottom of the amp, just because it is so heavy.

We don't have a warranty, and if it malfuntioned we'd probably fix it ourselves. And I hear the company is out of business anyway.

I like this amp so much I'll be scouring the pawn shops for the L5 (the guitar amp that Lab Series put out), I hear that's a real keeper too. If it were lost, I'd buy another one if it were readily available, but I've never seen another one for years so I imagine it'd be hard to come by. The biggest downside to this amp is the weight, but that comes with the territory when you want to amplify low-end.

mid 80's
only one channel as I recall.
Reverb was sweet. compressor/limiter was a nice touch.

great clean sounds.
Distortion was weak.

reliable enough. Amp did break down while playing a second cabinet.
Most likely wrong ohm match.

Never had to deal with Norlin

I miss this amp for it's clean sound and the compressor/limiter part
was ok if set at low setting. Good sustain. I would buy one again if
I could find one for the right price.

Picked this one up off of eBay. Late 70's model. 100 watts, two non-switchable inputs, gain, bass, mid freq, mid level, treble, and master volume. Also has a deep switch that cuts out a bit of the treble and a lot of the midrange, good for a nice thumping fingerstyle, but you may want to switch it off if you like to slap. Also has a hard limiter with on-off and thresholdcontrols, plus a limiter active LED. I'm not a big fan of the on-board limiter due to the pop it gives with a high-gain signal. Effects loop send (line out)and return (line in), good for hooking a tuner to. 1x15 Eminence driver, produces a lot of sound.

Using it with both a Yamaha RBX-260 P-bass and a piezo-equipped Michael Kelly acoustic, I was surprised at the range of sounds I could get with both. The deep switch is perfect for an out-of-the-way, dark bass sound. Turn it off, and you get a lot more midrange. This was somewhat of a problem for me; the deep switch lets you ignore the midrange, but for the absolute best sound, you have to really tweak it. This was a change from a Fender Bassman 100 I tried in the store, where all I had to do to get a good punchy sound was plug in. I eventually found a good fingerstyle sound by putting the midrange frequency at about 1 or 2 o'clock and turning the mid level all the way down... I'll try it with some smaller-gauge strings (I have .105s on now). The gain control allows you to easily clip the preamp at much of anything over 3 with full instrument volume, but it is solid-state distortion, not the warm tube overdrive sound most are after. Still, when clean and properly adjusted, the sound is great. Deep and boomy, with nice treble.

About two months after I got it, I left it on overnight and the thing just quit making sound. It was an easy fix, according to the music store (I still haven't gotten the amp back from these f***ers), and I hope to be playing it again soon. The cabinet is very solid, the pots are still in great shape, and the speaker, though it looks reconed, is in great shape. For an amp that may well be older than I am, it has really lasted over its lifetime.

These amps were made by Norlin Industries, which I don't think is still in business. One of their child companies, Gibson, is going strong, and I think that'd be where it would go if it were to fail catastrophically. But, with the warranty long passed, the simplest way to fix it would be to take it to your local music shop. Just make sure they'll get the work done promptly (the shop I took mine to had the entire Christmas break to fix the thing, and they still didn't get it done on time).

For the price I paid, owning a small part of bass history was well worth it. It's a rugged little amp with a decent sound. The only two things I'd want added to this amp are a compression ratio control for the limiter, and a compression or piezo horn to get some more treble. The horn may be a possibility. If it were stolen, I'd probably get a Fender Bassman 100, and pay three times as much as I did for this one.