Right, and sadly this is a little known fact. Back in 1929, at the World Electrical Congress in Geneva, an agreed upon standard was created for electrical measurement. Although Germany signed the agreement, Hitler decided to make German amps more "potent", part of his plan for world domination. This wasn't discovered until after WWII and by that time all German industry was based on the principal that "amps = pressure, or force" and the more, the better. This is one reason for the difference in voltages in Europe. More volts = more pressure, or amps. The Canadian decision to adopt 247 volts was based on this principal. While America was happy with it weaker amps implemented by Jonathan Fender, Germany was cheating with the Humbucker amps. ( The Marshall amp didn't come along untill later, after the occupation of Japan). That, in a nutshell is the story of the Powver Amp, as it is still known today. Think about this, why do American electric products fail so often compared to German products? It's all in the power, or "amps". Hope this helps to clear things up!