Refurbish your 5150 Head
| Date: | March 14, 2005 |  |
| Author: | Edward Gandolfi |
My 5150 was purchased second hand and was in pretty bad shape with the tolex was in horrible condition. In some places the
bare wood was starting to show through the tolex. Additionally the metal control face is not in the
best condition and the knobs (which i'll be changing) are obviously not stock.
Removing Tolex
Removing the tolex was a very easy task. Just start at the seam (i believe its on the right side, on the bottom) and
peel it off. Be careful not to tear the tolex as you will want to use the old covering as a patter to cut out the new
tolex later.
Unless your amp is in good condition underneath the tolex, I would recommend that you sand the wood box to remove the old
glue. After removing the excess glue use wood filler to fill in any holes or dings in the wood surface then sand these
areas to create a smooth surface.
Adding New Tolex
Using the old tolex as a pattern cut out the appropriate shape to cover your 5150 head. I did this by unrolling the new
tolex face down and placing the old tolex on top. You will see "notches" at the corners, this is so you can wrap the
corners tight. Using a fine Sharpie trace the edges of the old covering onto the back of the new tolex then use these
lines as a guide to cut the new covering. Don't cut the corner notches yet.
This is my first time re-covering an amp so for this part, you may have better results going about it differently. I dont
specifically remember if i sprayed the adhesive on both the tolex and the wood. It probably does not matter as long as you
allow the spray to cure for a minute or so before sticking the tolex to the wood.
Using spray adhesive I sprayed one side of the box at a time as well as the corresponding tolex then rolled the tolex onto
the box. Starting where the old seam was and work your way from there wrapping the tolex around the box one side at a time.
You may need to make small cuts at the corners (that we marked earlier) to get the tolex to wrap tight around the box. You
will want some heavy books and clamps to hold the new covering to the head as the adhesive dries.
When all the covering is applied use a straight edge to rub out any wrinkles and/or bubbles you may find. When I did mine
there were a few wrinkles that would not come out, this was due to the air temperature being about 60 degrees. The air
trapped between the wood and tolex cannot evaporate due to the low air temperature. I let the head sit inside at room
temperature overnight then the next day used a standard hair dryer to eliminate the wrinkles by going back and forth with the
dryer while rubbing out the wrinkles. Be careful not to put to much heat onto the tolex or you may burn it, hold the dryer
far enough away that it does not hurt your hand.
There was some extra adhesive visible on parts of the new tolex. Using a certain type of adhesive cleaner (note: name
coming soon) that not only cleaned the adhesive overspray but also gave the tolex as good cleaning without causing any
harm to the new tolex.
New Grill
With the box completed there are a few main components left: front grill, front wooden faceplate, plastic logos,
corner caps, and the chrome flames decal.
As shown in the picture the front grill, 5150 log and wooden face plate was spraypainted glossy black.
The wodden faceplate was made using 3/4" MDF wood.
For the 5150 logo I wanted the black plastic background to match the black backing wood so it would blend in better.
Using masking tape to cover the entire logo, make sure to press down in between the raised silver letters so the tape
makes contact with the black background, taking a razor go around the outside edges of every letter just below the silver
top and cut out the tape. This should leave you with masking tape ONLY covering the silver.
For this project the next step was to apply the chrome flames to the wood. First I designed the flame patter using
AutoCAD then sent the design to a friend that owns a sign making company and using their plotter (printer type device that
has a small blade that cuts out whatever is programmed into it) he cut the pattern out of a special plotter ready
material.
Finally ordered some chrome corner caps from Stew Mac as well as a new handle. The handle was too long so using the chrome
ends from the new handle and re-used the original black plastic handle part since it was the right size.
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