Rose Morris Vox V15 (1981 - 1983)








Model Dimensions Weight U.S. MSRP
V15 24" x 16.5" x 8.5" ~48 lbs. $570 (1981)

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"The V15 was a concept that promised more than it delivered - it could have become the successor to the Jennings AC15, but internal layout problems prevented the achievement of the high gain and total range needed to capture the market for smaller amps, while the lack of reverb left it disadvantaged in another important way."

Excerpted from page 111 of "The Vox Story," written by David Petersen and Dick Denney, published by The Bold Strummer, 1993.

The V15 was a compact five valve (tube) 15 watt amplifier that featured two ECC83, one ECC81, and and two EL-84 tubes. It was produced by the Dallas Industries manufacturing plant in Shoeburyness, Southend-on-Sea, Essex England for Rose Morris. The amp was introduced in the 1981 Vox "Born Out of Rock" catalog and was in the Vox line for about three years until Rose Morris terminated their manufacturing partnership with Dallas Industries.

When originally concieved, the V15 was intended to be the "studio" version of the AC-30. Unfortunately, as the circuits were in development for the V15, someone at Vox forgot what makes a Vox sound like a Vox.

The original AC-30, AC15, and even the AC-10 amps all featured cathode biased EL-84 power tubes configured without an inverse (negative) feedback loop in the power amp section. Negative feedback is quite common in other brands of amplifiers and is used to "clean up" distortion in the output section. Dick Denney, the chief amp engineer at JMI Vox learned early on that eliminating the negative feedback circuit in EL-84 based Vox amps made them tonally complex and rich, even at low levels. Cranking the volume would introduce a smoothly overdriven tone that was totally unique to Vox.

Unfortunately, the V15 was designed with an inverse feedback in the output section, This stripped the amp of the characteristic chimey Vox tone. The tone of this amp is somewhat bland, in my opinion.

Had Vox included reverb in the V15, it might have helped it to find better acceptance in the market, but no reverb was included.

The Escort 50, a similarly priced all transistorized 1x12 amp introduced by Vox at the same time as the V15 found much better acceptance in the marketplace.

Two Fane 10" speakers accept the 15 watt output of the V15.



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