Fender Jack Socket Upgrade Mod

Most of Fenders popular mid range amps like Twin 65, Hot Rod, Blues Deluxe and Junior are fitted with cheap plastic Jack sockets.   They are really prone to breaking if gigged regularly.

A simple upgrade is to upgrade them with the vintage style metal chassis jack made by switchcraft as used on most guitars and all the old fender amps.

The nice thing about this upgrade is you feel the benefit every time you plug in and play.

Some amps like to have an isolated jack to help tame noise and this is also possible using switchcraft jack sockets and isolating washers.   This prevents multiple signal ground connections to the chasssis and helps to minimise the chance of an earth loop and resultant noise.

In the picture below you can see that socket 1 has been replaced and socket 2 is original on a Hot Rod Deluxe.

Fender Princeton Reissue

Cabinet resonance problems with the great little amps is a major nuisance. The cause is the chipboard baffle. This would have been ply in the old days but in Fenders reissue they have gone for a more affordable design choice.

You may be able to fix yours just by tightening the securing screws up a little. It’s a hard life being a combo and they will loosen off in time.

See below for an attempt to solve the problem with a little DIY cabinet rework.

Steps

Remove baffle add bracing at top. Some folks like bills used angle aluminium but this model already has had a ply brace added but it is just pinned in. Here I have added several decent screws carefully drilled in, glue and some additional brace.

Refit baffle applying wood glue and adding additional securing screws.

At the back of the amp I added a brace to reduce the rear panel resonating.

Rear brace
Great little amps
Beefed up brace screws
Amploft