Any help on this one would be great. Vintage Ibanez Flying Pan - Taking offers Original Ibanez TS9 - Taking offers one day, every man shall shat himself in a way that will cause fury, confusion and finally, peace -Agentcooper You probably know about my TS history page where I have some of that info. I recently added some about some pedals that seemed like reissues but were from the 80s, check it out. H-C Effects forum member since AnalogMike at aol. Thanks You might be thinking about the Boss website that does this.
Ibanez and Maxon pedals cannot be dated by serial numbers alone. Thanks guys for the hot tips. They even used the old manual dated to confuse us more! They are a higher tech chip that will work good in higher tech equipment where you want a low noise op amp but are not the best for a tube screamer. If you want some of these chips I have several thousand slightly used ones!
In about June of '96 the reissue TS-9 was changed slightly, and finally can be told from an "original" TS-9 easily. There is a "CE" symbol on the back, which is required for selling electronics in Europe.
Original TS-808 data
Also a capacitor was added to the back of the board the only component ever used on the back of a tube screamer board. This is to help with the switching circuit and should not affect the sound. The extra capacitor is no longer used, now they changed the value of C from to 10,pF. C is between the wires labeled 3 and 4 on the back of the board. If you have a you can change it to to improve switching switching is the one thing about TS-9s that sucks! I think the new TS-9 sounds the same as the earlier reissues and last originals.
In late the largest change to the TS9 ever took place. Ibanez is now having another company make them. The new TS9s are now easy to distinguish. The battery covers had never been changed since the original TS The input jacks on the late models were terrible and tended to jam, with the plug stuck in tight. In they made them a little better. Otherwise they are about the same as the Maxon made TS9 pedals and seem to sound the same.
But the boards are more fragile, so extreme care needs to be taken when modifying them. But they should be fine, we have not had many problems with these, and the switches seem better than before. They did seem to start using them in the USA more recently. Here are the bottoms of the four different TS9s. On the right is an original with black label, easy to tell and date, if 1st digit is a 1, that would mean a VERY early TS9! Second on the right is an original silver label TS9. The 1st digit is a 3 meaning , you will see a lot of these with a 4 for These can have the earlier chips or sometimes the TA chip as used in the reissues.
These are almost impossible to tell from the 1st reissue TS9. But the Reissue TS9 will usually not have a serial starting with 3 or 4. I have reissues with a XXX and XXX number here with a capacitor made in , maybe a very early reissue from These have silver labels, an original from would probably have had a black label.
I also see a lot of TS9s with serial starting with 1 with a silver label. These are all reissues as a would be a TS or a very early TS9 with a black label. However I have seen a TS9 with serial number with a silver label. It has the JRCD chip and capacitors with date codes and resistors coated in green. So if the first digit is 2 and the label is silver you will have to open it up to date it.
I have also seen a Ts9 chip, caps dated and green resistors with the serial number and a silver label. If it's a silver label, it's hard to figure out if it's original unless the serial number starts with 3 or 4. Yes this is confusing You may find which means , etc. See below for more on dating the capacitors. Third from the right is a 2nd version reissue, with the CE symbol. All TS9s with the CE are reissues. The reissues all have the TA chip.
Note the box has bar code info, this will not be found on the original boxes. You can tell an early TS9 by the green coated resistors inside. But I have a TS that has mostly tan coated resistors and a few green ones so they were not consistent. Some late originals used the brown coated resistors also, so check the date codes on the electrolytic can capacitors. Usually the first two digits are the year, as in the pictures below: Also you can tell the original JRC chips as they are shiny and dark, while the new chips are dull and a bit grey looking.
How to telll date of ts808
Reissue TS9 board below:. In early Ibanez finally reissued the TS pedal due to popular demand. It looks fine except the color seems a bit off. See my tube screamer page for more info. Each position adds low end, increases volume, and actually decreases distortion.
The 1st mode is the same as a TS9, the 2nd is not too bad but the 3rd and 4th are too much. See our TS9DX page for more info on this pedal. It is made in Taiwan like the TS5 but in a metal case that should stand up better. There are several circuit boards inside, they seem to be generic and several different effects can be built using the same boards they are mostly empty boards! These have a HOT mode switch for extra distortion and volume, which is quite useable. The HOT mode still works after the mod, and gets a similar improvement to the tone less harsh, smoother, but still has lots of drive.
All the boards, connectors, and cables inside add a lot of complexity and there are many things to break. Also the tiny micro switches seem to be failing and we do not carry replacements.
Is there a way by serial number to date Ibanez Pedals? | Harmony Central
This pedal is the highest-end Tube Screamer ever made, to get part of the boutique market. It does not use a circuit board, instead parts are hand soldered onto a strip board like some old fuzz pedals, our Beano Boost, and many prototypes. The parts are about the same as a normal TS except I noticed they used our King Of Tone clipping diodes, which makes them a little louder and less compressed. They also have true bypass and come in a cool box.
We can do our silver or TV mod on these but can't change the chip.