Product: WEM/Watkins er40
Price Paid: UNKNOWN
Submitted
07/12/2006
at
05:36pm
by
odhran
Features
:
8
price:free in a friends shed
my current amp is a(i think anyway) mid 70's wem er40 solid state guitar head, the contols are really basic, just volume, bass and treble with a treble booster, the amp has 2 chanels with 2 imput's each, the amp was in a shed when i found it, and needed to be repaired when i got it,
the amp is a solid state, but, in terms of sound is on a higher level then most modern 40-watt transistor amps, and the treble booster really makes my tele so sharp it would almost cut you, i only use overdrive and wah, and the high end is too much when both the treble-booster and the wah on, im giving this amp an 8 for a few reasons, 1 it only has dual-band eq, you really miss the mid controls when you want to take the harsh-ness of the treble, 2 it's speaker output read's 6ohm, 12ohm, 12ohm as i say, this amp was made in the 70's and i dont have the origanal speaker so i im curently running a speaker from a broken vox ad50vt-a 12 inch celestion whitch runs on 8ohms, so i cant get the full volume out of the amp as i dont want to break the speaker i have to run it through the 6ohm output
and lastly, it is a solid state amp, as i am a huge fan of tube beake up, nomatter how hard i push this amp it will stay, more or less clean
having said that, the oerdrive pedal that i use does me fine when i need the dirt
Sound Quality
:
8
as i say, the amp sounds better then alot of the other 40 watt soid state amps around today, the amp drive the 1x12 cab perfectly, and the amp is loud enough for very small club gig's again as a fan of valve amps, if a had the choise, i would take something like a hiwatt custom 20, or an orange,laney that kind of thing, but as a teenage guitar-player the amps does me fine, i have fallen in love with the treble booter, it adds the perfect sharp, overdriven kinks live sound
and clean the amp does the 'london circa 1966 sound really well'
Reliability
:
10
the amp is 30 years old, show me a mesa that will be working when its that old
nuff said
Customer Support
:
10
well, the founder of the company, charley watkins is still alive and will reply to any e-mail sent his way, and as it is a fairly simple-looking(to my hoplessly untrained eye) solid stae amp, i would say that amy tech worth his salt would be able to fix it
Overall Rating
:
8
i own a fender tele, a danelectro fabb overdrive pedal, and a dunlop crybaby wah, and this amp does what is says on the cover, thats all i need, really, if it were lost,i probably wouldnt buy it again as there damn hard to find and it just aint a tube amp, but thats not to say
im not extreemy fond of it and will keep it for as long as possable
