Hey Zach,
I have this nice little Danelectro amp that I bought in the late 1970s to play in my college dorm. Turns out it was a bit loud for that! I lent it to a friend for several years and recently got it back. Amazingly, it is still in very good condition cosmetically, but could use a tune-up. I would like to know what it is worth today and what is needed to get it in good working order.
Thanks,
Jim in Cincinnati, Ohio
Hey Jim,
Cool amp! It reminds me of the band the Animals for some reason—maybe because that’s how the Animals played: loud!
Danelectro is better known for their electric guitars with unique shapes and designs, but the company initially started as an amplifier company. Nathan “Nat” Daniel was an electronics enthusiast from New York who began assembling amplifiers at home. In the mid 1930s, Epiphone contracted him to make their Electar series of amps, where he built the chassis and a suitcase company provided the cabinet.
After establishing himself as an amp builder, he founded Danelectro in 1947 in Red Bank, New Jersey. Daniel then started building amps for Montgomery Ward and Sears, Roebuck and Co., which would propel his operation to a size he could hardly have imagined.
In 1954, the same year the Stratocaster was introduced, Daniel released the first Danelectro electric guitar. A majority of the guitars Daniel built were actually branded as Silvertone and sold through Sears. Airline was another house brand built by Danelectro and sold through Ward. Just think about all the kids who wanted to play guitar in the late 1950s and 1960s, and how a Sears and Roebuck catalog is where they likely found their first guitars! During Danelectro’s peak production in the 1960s, they had upwards of 500 employees and were producing 150 to 200 guitars a day!
Danelectro amplifiers were not quite as popular as their guitars, but since you needed an amp if you had an electric guitar, they are still out there. Your 15-watt Centurion was produced during Danelectro’s heyday, between 1962 and 1964, and has a 12" speaker, two channels with separate controls, and vibrato and reverb. The amp’s foundation was a 7-tube chassis with 6V6GT power tubes. Covered in an attractive dark-blue vinyl and sporting a brown grille cloth, it was very stylish for the early 1960s. Comparable models from the era were the Fender Deluxe or the Gibson GA-20. I imagine playing in a dorm room with this amp would be plenty loud!
Features for the 15-watt tube combo include two channels with separate controls, as well as vibrato and reverb.
Just like cars or any other mechanical devices, an amp needs maintenance—especially if it’s been sitting for several years. For a few hundred bucks, any reputable amp repair shop should be able to clean up and tune up this gem with new tubes, caps, and resistors. It’s also not a bad idea to upgrade the power cord to a grounded 3-prong for safety’s sake. It’s not nearly as collectible/valuable as a Fender or Gibson from the same era, but your amp is currently worth between $450 and $550 in excellent condition. That’s not bad for something considered “no frills” once upon a time.
Danelectro’s success was short-lived, and they sold to the entertainment conglomerate MCA in 1966. In 1967, the Coral line of guitars was introduced to bring focus on Danelectro’s brand, and not Sears. Even though approximately 85 percent of their sales were through Sears as a house brand, MCA decided to compete with Fender and Gibson directly by marketing to individual music shops rather than the big distributors. This proved to be a fatal blow to the company and they closed in 1969. In the mid 1990s, however, the Evets Corporation bought the Danelectro name and has been producing various guitars and amplifiers since. They’ve recently focused on an annual limited-edition run of guitars based on famous Danelectro designs.
With proper maintenance and storage (and use), this amp should continue to be a treasure for years to come, even if people tell you to turn it down!
![Jerry Cantrell Rig Rundown [2024]](https://www.premierguitar.com/media-library/youtube.jpg?id=53714787&width=600&height=600&quality=85&coordinates=0%2C0%2C560%2C0)
Diamond Pedals Dark Cloud
True to the Diamond design ethos of our dBBD’s hybrid analog architecture, Dark Cloud unlocks a new frontier in delay technology which was once deemed unobtainable by standard BBD circuit.
Powered by an embedded system, the Dark Cloud seamlessly blends input and output signals, crafting Tape, Harmonic, and Reverse delays with the organic warmth of analog companding and the meticulous precision of digital control.
Where analog warmth meets digital precision, the Dark Cloud redefines delay effects to create a pedal like no other
But by gosh, if delay—and its sister effect, reverb—haven’t always been perfect for the music I like to write and play. Which brings us to the Fishman EchoBack Mini Delay. The EchoBack, along with the standard delay controls of level, time, and repeats—as well as a tap tempo—has a toggle to alternate between analog, tape, and digital-delay voices.
I hooked up my Washburn Bella Tono Elegante to my Blues Junior to give the EchoBack a test run. We love a medium delay—my usual preference for delay settings is to have both level and repeats at 1 o’clock, and time at 11 o’clock. With the analog voice switched on, I heard some pillowy warmth in the processed signal, as well as a familiar degradation with each repeat—until their wake gave way to a gentle, distant, crinkly ticking. Staying on analog and adjusting delay time down to 8 o’clock and repeats to about 11:30, some cozy slapback enveloped my rendition of Johnny Marr’s part to “Back to the Old House,” conjuring up thoughts of Elvis trapped in a small chamber, but in a good way. It sounded indubitably authentic. The one drawback of analog delay for me, generally, is that its roundness can feel a bit under water at times.
Switching over to tape, that pillowy warmth evaporated, and in its place came a very clear replication of my tone—but with just a bit of the highs shaved off the top. With the settings at the medium-length mode listed above, I could see the empty, glass hall the pedal sent my sound bouncing down. I heard several pronounced pings of repeats before the signal fully faded out. On slapback settings (time at 8 o’clock, repeats at 11:30), rather than Elvis, I heard something more along the lines of a honky-tonk mic in a glass bottle. Still relatively crystalline, which actually was not my favorite. I like a bit more crinkle—so maybe analog is my bag....“That pillowy warmth evaporated, and in its place came a very clear, pristine replication of my tone—but with just a bit of the highs shaved off the top.”
Next up, digital. Here we have the brightest voice, and as expected, the most faithful repeats. They ping just a few times before shifting to a smooth, single undulating wave. When putting its slapback hat on, I found that the effect was a bit less alluring than I’d observed for the analog and tape voices. This is where the digital delay felt a little too sterile, with the cleanly preserved signal feeling a bit unnatural.
All in all, I dig the EchoBack for its replications of analog and tape voices, and ultimately, lean towards tape. While it’s nice having the digital delay there as an option, it feels a bit too clean when meddling with time of any given length. Nonetheless, this is surely a handy stomp for any acoustic player looking to venture into the land of live effects, or for those who are already there.
