List of updates / new info. on Vox solid state amps (1967-1972)
2018 - June and July
7th July
The JMI Foundation Bass page has been tidied up, and Supreme serial number 2316 registered here.
No. 2316, in company with 2236, survives with a full set of original covers. Covers for amp sections are scarce but not hugely rare; but full sets are very uncommon - so too covers that have escaped from their original cabs. Of the latter, only two are known at present - one in London, one in the USA. But there may of course be others hiding away.
An old pic of an assembled Supreme set. Amp, amp cover and footswitch belong together. The cab came from another source and the cab cover from another again.
6th July
A late "Super Foundation Bass" speaker cabinet - from late 1972 or perhaps early 1973. The number of diamonds on the grille cloth: 21 x 16.5. Speaker complement: two 15" ceramic Goodmans Power Range, 8 ohms each, for a total of 15/16. Earlier SFB cabs had 2 x 18". In common with end of run Foundation Bass cabs, there are wells on top for the feet of the amp to sit in. Thanks to Dave for the pictures.
Above, Foundation Bass serial no. 2774, showing how the feet locate. Further pictures are here.
30th June (3)
"Melody Maker" magazine, 18th May 1968. In August '68 retail price of a new Dynamic Bass amplifier section was £92.
30th June (2)
Relating to the entry below, the output socket to a Gyrotone on the rear panel of a Vox Midas all purpose PA amplifer. Links to pages on the Midas are here.
The input socket on the cabinet
Bulgin octal cable of the sort required by the Midas and Gyrotone. These cables were also employed by British hi-fi manufacturers - Leak being one.
30th June
The page on Vox Gyrotones has now been updated. Below, the advert placed by Macaris in "Beat Instrumental" magazine, March 1968, just over a year after they had taken over the 100 Charing Cross Road shop from Jennings. The shop remained the chief London outlet for Vox into the early 1970s.
"Gyrovox" was the early pre-production name for the Gyrotone units. See this page.
The other thing to mention is that Tom Jennings and Dick Denney, having been dismissed from Vox in late 1967, went on - through their new company "Jennings Electronic Industries" - to sell rotating speaker units and PA amplifiers that were pretty much identical to ones designed and indeed sent to market by JMI. Some sort of working accommodation is likely to have been reached: that Jennings and Denney could re-use certain designs that they had been instrumental in creating.
The JEI "P.O.1 Pulsation Unit", first noted in the literature in late 1969, but probably earlier, was little more than the Vox Gyrotone II with JEI cloth.
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Above, a detail from the JEI brochure of 1969. In late 1971 / early 1972 the P.O.1 cost £157.00. The Vox Gyrotone II cost £155 in late 1970.
24th June
"Melody Maker" magazine, 10th June 1967, the earliest shop advert for an amp in the new Vox solid state range - a Conqueror in this case - that has come to light to date. £170 scrapes under list price by 2 shillings.
22nd June
Currently on Reverb - "Vox Sound Equipment Limited" Supreme serial no. 2106. Produced in the second quarter of 1969.
19th June
Below, pics of the Orange shop, 3 New Compton Street, set up in September 1968. Inside, a Supreme just visible. Pics from this page.
Immediately prior to Orange, the shop was the home of "Better Books", which gave space to the "London Film Makers Cooperative" (to mid 1967).
One of the floors of the building, probably the shop again, was apparently once leased by JMI - see this page - based on interviews with Gary Hurst and others. It was vacated c. 1964. Jennings's move out probably coincided with Better Books' move in, mentioned here.
Inside, one can just see a Supreme on its trolley middle left.
17th June
A new page has been started on "Vox Sound Equipment Limited" at the "Associated Musical Instrument Industries" Trade Fair at the Russell Hotel, London, 18-25th August, 1968 - click here.
Below, part of the Vox stand at the Trade Fair the year before, 20th-24th August, 1967:
Note the Discotheque Unit in the background. This was probably the one signalled in the ad in the entry immediately below. The lights, just slightly back from it in the pic above, may well be the ones mentioned in the ad too.
16th June
Small ads, Melody Maker magazine, 20th July 1968. Note the "VOX PROTOTYPE DISCOTHEQUE UNIT". Evidently the idea to build a disco unit arose either in late JMI days or early "Vox Sound Equipment Limited". In July 1968, the new company, VSEL, was little more than a month old. The seller was in Erith where the Vox Works were.
The earliest advert for the "Discotheque", the idea presumably having been revived under "Vox Sound Limited", is August 1971:
Full page advert, Beat Instrumental, August 1971. The disco scene. Note the new office/showroom: 9 Gees Court.
11th June
Paper sticker for the bass range. The legend reads:
DYNAMIC 30W BASS SPEAKER 15" 15ohms - 30W
FOUNDATION 50W BASS SPEAKER 18" 15ohms - 50W
SUPER FOUNDATION 100W BASS SPEAKER 18" 15ohms - 100W
DYNAMIC 30, FOUNDATION 50, SUPER FOUNDATION 100, BASS SPEAKER WIRING.
For the stickers in Conqueror and Defiant cabs - there was none for the Supreme - see below, 9th June (1).
9th June (2)
A great pic of "The Hykells" playing on the pitch of Birmingham City Football ground, 1968 - two Supremes with tilt-back stands.
9th June
Below, the wiring schemas pasted inside early Conqueror and Defiant speaker cabinets. None seems to have been provided for the Supreme, however.
8th June
The three different formats of preamp stamping in the JMI solid state bass range (Dynamic, Foundation and Super Foundation):
JMI format 1
30W.B PREAMP SER No. 01001 - Dynamic Bass, the first preamp section made, or stamped at least - from Dynamic Bass no. 1135. Even though the preamps for the three models in the bass range were identical, the type of amp envisaged was specified (30W = Dynamic Bass).
It seems likely that only the first hundred preamps (and perhaps fewer) were stamped in this way. The changeover for Conquerors - from "30W.T PREAMP SER No. 0xxxx" to "PRE / AMP.T SER No. 0xxxx" - had taken place by preamp no. 01113.
JMI format 2
PRE / AMP.B SER No. 01530. From a preamp that survives with a box but no power section. The absence of a wattage designation in the format meant the section could go in any member of the bass range - a simplification of the sorting and assembly processes.
The lowest known number in this format is 01180, the preamp in question belonging to a Foundation Bass. In view of the fact that a third format had come in by 01782 (below), around 600 bass amps must have been assembled in this "middle period".
JMI format 3
B.S / No. 01782. Foundation Bass serial no. 1328 - "Solid State" in the logo. It is not clear at present how high preamp numbers in this format go.
What seems to have happened at first is that batches of preamp chassis were formed on the metal-bending and punching machines, stamped with numbers, and stacked in piles. They were then taken, presumably more or less at random, to the work benches, populated with components (wired up), and put back on shelves in groups: "30W.B PREAMP" sections for the Dynamic Bass, "50W.T PREAMP" for the Defiant, and so on. A similar process will have been operating for power sections (assembled on different work benches) in parallel. When it came to making up a Dynamic Bass for sale, a "30W" preamp would be taken, again at random, from the shelves along with a "30W" power amp, and the two units fitted into a waiting box (with its serial number plate).
Clearly at times, production of preamp and power amp sections ran well ahead of boxing up, ie. final assembly of the amp for sale. In some months, however, as production slowed things seem to be more in step.
The key drive at the moment, however, is the collecting of details (so far as is possible), not the forming of blanket "rules" to make it all conveniently simple (or conveniently inscrutable).
Above, a picture said to be April 1967, but actually April 1969. Note that on all the boxes something under "Vox Sound Equipment" has been taped over. From pictures indisputably taken during the JMI period, we know that what has been covered over is the legend "Jennings Musical Industries Ltd" (see below). So the shot above must be from the "Vox Sound Equipment Limited" period - and if it is indeed April, then it will be April 1969, not earlier.
Detail of Jack Jennings from "The Beacon" journal, July 1967 - a definitive date, "Jennings Musical Industries Ltd" on the boxes
Indeed, April 1969 accords pretty well with the serial numbers of the Defiants pictured - 2155 to 2159. It would be great if one of those amps pops up. For the "Vox Sound Equipment Limited" Defiants currently known, see this page.
Just to note that one of the original red CCL capacitors in the preamp of Defiant no. 2032 is dated December 1968.
At any rate, it's clear that amps were shipped out by serial number. So the significance of those numbers at least is assured.
7th June
Pictures of Foundation Bass serial no. 1165 (from July/August 1967) now added here.
2nd June (2)
A new page begun on adverts for Vox solid state amplifiers and speaker cabinets in Melody Maker magazine, 1968 - click here.
2nd June
Melody Maker magazine, 27th July 1968. A vast (17.5 x 13 inches) full-page ad placed by the new company "Vox Sound Equipment Limited" in advance of the Associated Musical Instrument Industries Fair at the Russell Hotel in August.
1st June (2)
A new Supreme in "Modern Sound" on Charing Cross Rd, advertised in Melody Maker magazine, 13th January 1968.
128 Charing Cross Road (green overdoor) is a couple of doors north of the turn into Denmark Street. Photo from Google Street.
1st June
Melody Maker magazine, 2nd March 1968. Vox - still Jennings Musical Industries - advert for the Frankfurt Fair, March 3rd-7th, 1968. A version of this ad had already been published in "Beat Instrumental" magazine, Feb. 1968 - see this page.
The advance report of the Fair in "Beat Instrumental", March 1968, has a short section on Vox: "VOX SOLID STATE. Jennings Musical Industries promise introductions to their 'Vox' range, but will be featuring their solid-state amplifiers and also their organs, for both home and group use, including the full 'Continental' range."
Frankfurt Messe, photo taken in the 1970s. Trade Hall 11 is at the rear of the complex.
The complex as it is today. Many older buildings have been replaced, but Hall 11 still exists.
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