Wem Dominator rebuild

[fenderbass39uk]

Yes for the price they are brilliant. They look a bit 'vintage' as well. Just working on the cab at the moment I need new grill cloth and WEM logo but they are hideously expensive for copies online mainly because people are building wem 4x12 clone cabs due to the 'Dave Gilmour' effect ☹

[fenderbass39uk]

Do you guys join tags 3 and 4 together on the ez81? (B+ to heater) some Dominator diagrams show this and my amp originally was, but I haven't done this on my rebuild. Just wondered why they would do this?

[fenderbass39uk]

20200219_164153.jpg

20200219_164221.jpg

Finally finished work on the chassis and its sounding great. I've installed 2 x220R resistors in the supply to the ez81 which has brought the B+ down from 370v to a more Dominator like 325v. (thanks to geoff1965 for his help on this) All of the valve sockets were eventually changed as they were very worn and noisy. I've added a standby switch also as the faceplate needed a patch where I stupidly cut a hole in it years ago to install a mains socket. here's my final modified schematic.

20200226_153838.jpg

[geoff 1965]

nice work Colin, should be good now for another 50 years!

[fenderbass39uk]

Thanks Geoff it will certainly see me out!
Quite by chance I bumped into an old mate at the pub the other week who used to live next door to the chap whome I acquired the WEM off. Apparently this chaps dad was a dustbin man and it had been put out with the rubbish! Considering this was about 1975 the poor amp must have had one heck of a hard life as it was only 5 years old then, and was already quite a wreck.

[zaphod_phil]

What a beautiful build and what an amazing background story! Some years ago I saw one of those vertical plinth style Dominators on fleebay and was very tempted to bid on it.But the bidding had already gone too high for me

[fenderbass39uk]

20200302_223326.jpg

Thanks Phil. A question to yourself or anyone else. I've fused the incoming mains voltage with a modern fuseholder which has left two redundant fuse holders inside the chassis so I've routed the two 300v feeds to the ez81 via these to protect the transformer which is rated at 120mA. What value fuses would you recommend? And would they be fast blow?

[geoff 1965]

you might struggle with that Colin!, why don't you route your centre tap through one to ground and fit a 500mA fuse,that will protect the transformer. It works, my hand slipped checking the voltage going into one of the 25Ws and it popped the fuse straight away!

[fenderbass39uk]

They seem to be doing a job Geoff as I blew one fuse today clumsily poking around taking some measurements I've got a 250mA in each leg. Centre tap to ground is a good idea, but I'll stick with this for now.

[fenderbass39uk]

Finally finished. Cabinet refurbished with new handle and the 1978 G12M returned to duty. A new back panel made (I may cover it with tolex at a later date) I decided to paint the cab as it was speckled with paint from previous house projects. I still had the original slip cover and after a few repairs its cleaned up nicely. Reproduction WEM logo sourced from Denmark Street. I have used Marshall grill cloth and piping until I can source some reasonably priced WEM stuff. I've put 2 Mullard EL84s in also that I have taken from a 1950s tape deck. Oh... and it sounds really good and loud too!
Thanks to everyone for your help and kind comments.

[fenderbass39uk]

20200419_132753.jpg

[fenderbass39uk]

20200419_130936.jpg

[fenderbass39uk]

20200504_220522_resized.jpg

[fenderbass39uk]

[fenderbass39uk]

20200504_112922.jpg

[Daviedawg]

Thanks for sharing your work Colin. Great job

Dd