Excelsior Americana Stereophonic High Fidelity Amplifier

davidguilbault

Perusing the Bargain Bins
Who knows anything about this amp? Thanks. David.

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Pretty cool accordion amp you have there. I wouldn't mind have that.

Bet it sounds good with guitar also!
 
nice! lots of old accordions have two pick-ups, one for the bass buttons and another for the keys, hence the dual inputs, the pickups were often a hi-z (ceramic?) microphone kinda thing. I think Exsellsior was a US brand for Italian made accordions, the amp may have been made by Harmony or one of the other Chicago factories.

Should be a kick butt guitar amp!

What kind of cookies are those on the floor? did they come with the amp?
 
The little bit of information I can find on the Internet leads me to believe that these were made by Sano in NJ.

The amp has five speakers - a 15" made by Utah (I think), two 8" speakers made by Excelsior Sound Power in NY, and two side-fired 2" x 10" speakers. (A previous owner has disconnected the two side speakers.)

There are two separate amps inside - one affixed to the bottom and one affixed to under the control panel on top. The bottom power amp has two EL34 power tubes, a 5AR4 rectifier, two 12AU7 preamps, a 6AN8 and a EL84. The top reverb amp has 4 12AU7's.

I couldn't hear the tremolo, so I replaced the 12AU7's in the reverb amp with 12AX7's and the tremolo was loud and strong. However, in idle, the amp was actually shaking and making a whomping sound. So I guess the 12AX7's are way too much gain.

There are four inputs - two for accordion (treble & bass) and two for guitar (normal & bright). Each provide a different tone.

Would really like to find a schematic for this amp.
 
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I was going to mention Hilgen or Sano.
Not many American amps used EL34s back in the 60s.


IIRC there might be a connection to a designer who worked for Ampeg.
 
I may end get an amp like this, It is pretty nice amp... that needs some work... If I do get it, I will get a schematic up pronto.
 
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