Ashdown Engineering is a British manufacturer of

instrument amplifier An instrument amplifier is an electronic device that converts the often barely audible or purely electronic signal of a musical instrument into a larger electronic signal to feed to a loudspeaker. An instrument amplifier is used with musical ins ...

s, particularly for bass and acoustic guitars.

History

The company was founded in 1997 by Mark Gooday, a chief engineer and managing director at

Trace Elliot Trace Elliot is a United Kingdom-based bass amplification manufacturer, and has a sub-brand, Trace Acoustic, for acoustic instruments. History In 1979, a music shop in Romford, Essex, UK, called Soundwave was building and hiring out PA sys ...

. When Gooday was let go by Trace Elliot's then parent company, Kaman, and prior to Kaman closing the doors to the UK distribution and factory facilities, he had been planning to start his own company. The company was named 'Ashdown' after Gooday's wife's family name, and the logo was constructed from this, his passion for cars and the

Austin-Healey Austin-Healey was a British sports car maker established in 1952 through a joint venture between the Austin division of the British Motor Corporation (BMC) and the Donald Healey Motor Company (Healey), a renowned automotive engineering and des ...

motor badge. Besides bass amplifiers and cabinets, the company makes effect pedals for bass players. Initially focusing on bass guitarists, in 2001 the company introduced a line of guitar amplifiers (50W and 100W stacks and combos) called Peacemaker. Later, more affordable models in 20W and 40W were added, with cheaper PCB technology. Ashdown have gone on to produce hand-wired amplifiers, and set up a separate company for this, called Hayden.

References

External links

*{{official website, ashdownmusic.com
Mark Gooday Interview
NAMM Oral History Library (2017) Guitar amplifier manufacturers Audio equipment manufacturers of the United Kingdom Companies established in 1997 Companies based in Essex