The Steel Guitar Forum

Can anyone tell me anything about a solid state sho bud amp? it's single channel, with reverb, 15 inch speaker with a very large magnet. I can't find a model number. There are no sliders just pots for control

It's usually referred to as the S-15 model.

These are one of the sweetest and most musical transistor steel amps ever made. They don't have a lot of power, roughly 60 watts, and they also don't have a lot of output protection, so they blew quite often when players asked them to deliver more power than they had. Often loaded with a JBL D130 or K130, the high speaker efficiency helped to make them a pretty loud amp for most settings.

The circuit changed a bit in these amps, but pretty much all versions of the preamp section were the Kenneth Cain circuit. The Cain preamp design was essentially a JFET transistor version of a Fender Twin Reverb. If you see the schematic, it's VERY VERY closely resembles the Fender circuit and has essentially the very same tone control section. Some versions of the preamp schematic literally look like a Fender Twin schematic but the tubes have been replaced by JFET transistors. So, sonically, the Sho-Bud S15 will do a very Fender tone, but just a bit crisper and more JFET-Transistory sounding instead of warmer and tubey like a Fender.

Personally, I think these amps are a steal at most prices you tend to see on them, in the $400 to $600 range depending on condition and speaker. A bit heavy, but the nice tone can make it worth the lugging.

For players who are used to needing all of the 200 or so watts found in common solid state steel amps, like a NV400, Session 400, Webb, Evans, etc. the Sho-Bud probably won't deliver. But for those used to NV112's or Fender tube amps, the Bud amp may be plenty loud.


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Does it look like the one in this thread? There were a few models of Sho-Bud amps. http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopi ... h+cain+amp

I had one like this one 5 yrs. or so back. It had a "Custom" badge on it and a D130F. I think they were around 100 W. Mine had a really nice tone, but I was always leery of hammering too hard on it, particularly with big C6 grips. I treated it gingerly and ended up selling it so that I wouldn't destroy the speaker.

I had always heard that the JBL D series wasn't up to handling the power of the amp.

A friend has one that we installed a K130 in several years ago. It's been running fine since, it sounds great and we feel more comfortable with the K series' power handling capacity.

Thanks everybody for the replies, and yes Jerry it looks just like that one. I have about $85.00 in right now. All I have right now is an E9 so I don't have a problem with the low C6 sounds on it. Does anyone have a range of years it could be?