Eddie

No reputable designer or company would do it KNOWINGLY but yes they did unwittingly make unsafe amps. And it was almost EVERY amp manufacturer of that era especially when based on 40'5 & 50's designs and before the general use of the "hot, neutral, and grounded" power cord (aka the 3 prong) - with a properly grounded amp folks no longer had to "lift ground" to reduce/eliminate 60 (50) cycle hum .

These early design's were simply done "in a vacuum,", that is they never considered a cascade of failures:

1) a shorted CAP and

2) touching STRINGS, while

3) TOUCHING an ACTUAL ground source or touching a "grounded" Mic or other guitar player whose OWN ground source was at a completely different electrical potential

But these designs were not done with malice and the designers were not not lazy or stupid.

Even today a clean and great sounding amp can probably trace their actual design (maybe even the entirety of it, except for some of the power supply) directly back to these OLDER designs, with very little if ANY modification to signal flow path, power supply rectification, or components.

Larry

Last edited by Larry Kehl; 01/20/18 12:46 PM.