Peavey T-40 - Made in the USA, with pride.

[FlatEric]

Hi. Now I've got started and I have some time to spare, I thought I would begin in this
section with some of my favourites, which along with Gibson, Fender, Guild, Rickenbacker,
Ovation etc, are made in the USA.
Hartley Peavey and Chip Todd, developed the T-40 and T-60, with a lot of thought.
These are often overlooked as Classic American instruments, but should be up there
will all the others.

Gentlemen. . .  & Ladies (I'm sure there must be some of you out there). . . . .
The Peavey T-40, in all it's glory.




How many more of you have some of these beauties??
Come on, get posting and show the world you play a T-40, with pride.

Cheers.
Flat Eric.

[jmcgliss]

Super collection. I've casually looked at ones for sale but am undecided about the dual or single pup models. 

[SKATE RAT]

a few of us here dig on the 'ol Peavey's. i have a '78 T-40 PAF. but Hartly and Chip had some other nice ones too. T-20's, T-45's, Fury's early Foundations sheet even the Patriot was kinda nice.

[Highlander]

So you quite like them...? 

I remember when they first came out and suffered some GAS at the time, but the budget these days was the same as back then... nice basses...

[Hornisse]

The T20 basses are wonderful.  I really loved mine.

[godofthunder]

 I have a black and maple T40, Great bass! I have a soft spot for early Peavey basses. I just sold a Fury fantastic bass and you can still pick them up for very little $

[godofthunder]

Here she is !

[FlatEric]

Godofthunder, Hi.
Mmm, Nice, Very nice!
I also have a black one - I am fitting a new phase switch at the mo'.
I also have a Red, early Fury.
I also have. . . . .   a 1977, pre mass production T-40, which from what I have been
told, were given to the reps to promote the new line. These had different serial numbers,
that were allocated to each of the reps in the USA, so they could track who had what
and where it was, so if a rep lost one - they would know who to blame!!
These pre-date the 8M serial numbers, from what I understand, although mine doesn't
have the line around the TR cover??
I am encouraged by the replies, let's see more support for this great instrument.
I hope to get a T-60 thing rolling in the Guitar section.

More Pics, More Pics!

Cheers.

[Freuds_Cat]

Great basses.   One day................

[godofthunder]

Flat Eric, I love your sunburst T40s! My favorite finish on these basses

[ack1961]

I have a 1981 T-40 that I just love:

[godofthunder]

How's that Fury I sold ya ?

[ack1961]

How's that Fury I sold ya ?

Scott,
It's pure magic. For a totally unassuming bass, I find myself reaching for it first everyday.
It's light as a feather, simple and fun to play. Sounds like a good, quality p-bass.

It still amazes me how inexpensive some of these USA Peavey's are. 
You took good care of it, too.  Thanks.

I've been getting the Jam Room (it used to be a Guest Room - this is much better) prepped for recording my son's band, so I've been dirkin' around with mixers, DI's, PC's recording SW, etc., and it's nice to have this Fury slung over my shoulder for hours on-end. My T-40, T-Bird or G&L would start to wear my old butt down after a while.

I know my son likes it, too.  I keep finding it tuned to DADG. I don't tell him, this way I know what he's playing...that, and fingerprints.

I'm totally bit by the Peavey bass bug now.

Thanks again,
Steve

[uwe]

I have a sienna (sierra?) gold or whatever it was called like the one in the middle with the rosewood neck in your first pic. Beautiful bass.



Hardly anybody ever mentions the trickery behind those tone knobs, namely that they enable you to change between singlecoil and humbucking mode.

http://bassoutpost.com/index.php?topic=2303.56

Post # 56:

The "tone" controls of the T-40 - each of them - are split. 10-5 does not affect treble (0-5 does), but actually activates the extra coil that makes the two pups (at ten in solely singlecoil mode) to full-fledged humbuckers. If you have the two tone controls at 5, only then the bass works with both pups in humbucking mode.

[FlatEric]

Uwe, Nice Bass - same as mine.

I posted this up somewhere else, a couple of months ago, as being a massive fan of the T-40 I like to Spread the Word.
The first one relates to the weight, when asked if it was heavy and the second the definative word on the controls and all their features.


Well, compared to a Steinberger, yes!
Compared to a Jazz or Precision, Yes.
I do have heavier, though - an Ibanez Studio that you could knock posts
into the ground with!!
I was thinking about this, earlier this year, when I opened up my '79 to
sort out an annoying crackle, I decided to strip it down, clean it up and
give it a good service.
I weighed the parts on a very accurate industrial scale.
The body was 2.15Kg - 4.73 lbs, neck 1.16KG - 2.55 lbs and all the remaining
parts were 1.45KG - 3.19 lbs. Total 4.76KG - 10.49 lbs.
When you consider that each bridge saddle weighs about one ounce and the whole
bridge, assembled, is just under 1 lb, at 15 ounces, I think that's what tipped it over
the edge! Does anyone know of a heavier bridge??
Having weighed some of the others, 10.5 lbs is about on the mark.
Does this add to the sound? Well, all things considered, I suppose it does.
What are they like to gig with?
Well, our sets are about 45 to 50 minutes and it doesn't bother me, in fact
after a while you get used to it and then going back to something lighter/smaller,
feels a bit odd.
The last two weekends I used a Jazz and an Ibanez Roadster - loved it but this
weekend I've got to whip out a couple of T-40's! 

CONTROLS
This is the official line from Chip Todd, the "T" in T-40 and all the "T" Series, and although these details refer to the T-60, the T-40 is the same.
"It has been said many times that the Peavey T-60 guitar is capable of many sounds and tones from the pickup and wiring design. The only problem is most people that own one of these instruments are not aware how it works or how to adjust anything to get those wonderous tones.
The basic layout of the instrument is two splitable humbucker style pickups. One located at the bridge, the other located at the end of the neck.
The controls consist of two sets of volume and tone controls, one for each pickup.
The pickups are split into single coil pickups by applying a ground connection to the middle of the two humbucker magnetic coils. This bypasses one of the pickup coils and the remaining coil becomes a single coil pickup.
The tone control darkens (makes the sound more bass) the pickup sound by slowly grounding out the pickup through a tone capacitor.
The genius of the Peavey wiring design is that when the tone control is turned clockwise it applies ground to the pickup center and splits it into a single coil pickup. When turned counter-clockwise the tone control removes the ground from the pickup center (returning it to a regular humbucker pickup) and then slowly applies ground to the capacitor, which darkens the tone.
Therefore using the volume and tone controls with the three position selector switch, many various pickup combinations can be achieved. The volume controls have a .001uf capacitor bridging the input and output terminals. This they call volume compensation. It allows the sound of the pickups to remain constant as the volume is reduced.
There is also a phase switch, which reverses the positive and negative connections of the bridge pickup. Pickups connected out of phase have a hollow, tinny, mouth harp kind of sound. When the phase is used, this is where the real genius of the wiring design comes into play.
First of all, when the bridge pickup is selected and set at single coil setting on the tone control, the phase switch can be used to select either coil of the pickup.
Second, when the middle pickup switch position is selected and the phase switch set out of phase, those volume controls have volume compensation. This means that as the volume control is rotated counter-clockwise, the volume is slowly reduced and the output of the pickup is passed through the .001uf compensation capacitor. The capacitor counteracts the out of phase sound characteristics and creates a rich mellow refined pickup sound. Now with the pickup selector switch in the middle position and the pickups out of phase, the volume and tone pots can be used to create many new sounds from the pickups, in addition to the many already achievable from the in phase setting".

Got that?
I have also posted (somewhere else) my take on it and when I can find it, I will list it, as it is much easier to grasp.