Shure FP42
A four-channel stereo field mixer that Shure pitched as the stereo counterpart to its M267 — and the brochure copy says exactly what it was for.
Overview
The FP42 is a portable stereo production mixer, and the most useful thing about it is that Shure's own literature refuses to be vague about its purpose. The company's advertising in the mid-1980s described the FP42 as "the stereo counterpart to our M267," a four-channel unit with independent center-detented pan pots and cuing, a headphone amplifier, and adjustable limiters. That's a description written for working field crews, not for a catalog page trying to impress a hi-fi buyer, and it tells you most of what the box is: a compact front end for ENG, EFP, film, and video work.
Shure's FP line was positioned explicitly against general-purpose audio gear. The company's ads — which ran in trade publications including DB-Magazine (May 1986, p.74) — stated flatly that FP products were "built specifically for ENG, EFP, film, and video work" and were "not general audio products that 'might' work on remotes." That's marketing copy, and it should be read as such, but it does establish the design intent: ruggedness and reliability were the selling points, not measured performance figures.
The four-channel layout with center-detented pan pots is the detail that separates the FP42 from the smaller FP32, which Shure introduced as the three-input, two-output stereo ENG mixer. The FP42's four inputs and two outputs, with panning on each channel, made it a mix-down tool as much as a field preamp. Shure's advertising noted that the FP42 let operators "easily mix down stereo in your post production booth" while also simplifying mic cueing for situations like sports remotes. In practice that means the FP42 was built to do double duty: capture on location, then serve as a small stereo submixer back at the edit bay.
The headphone amplifier is a recurring feature in Shure's FP descriptions, and it matters more than it sounds. Field mixers live or die by their monitoring, and a built-in headphone amp means the operator isn't dependent on a separate box or a return feed to hear what's being captured. The adjustable limiters serve a similar real-world function — protecting a remote-to-studio feed from clipping when a level jumps without warning. Shure's broader FP literature made a point of the limiter circuitry in its line amps, describing it as "invaluable" for long-line situations, and the FP42's adjustable limiters follow that same design philosophy of protecting the signal rather than flattering it.
What the FP42 is not, at least based on available documentation, is a piece of studio furniture. Shure's FP advertising leaned hard on portability and field toughness, and the FP42 was sold as a compact unit meant to be carried. That's consistent with the way Shure marketed the line, and it's the reason these mixers turn up in broadcast and film audio kits rather than in hi-fi collections.
Documentation on the FP42 is genuinely thin compared to Shure's microphones and phono cartridges. The model appears in Shure's FP-line advertising through the mid-1980s, including DB-Magazine (March 1986, p.74) and Studio Sound (November 1987, p.51), where the FP line was pitched to field crews with the tagline about getting "closer to the action." Beyond that advertising record, the FP42 doesn't have the deep paper trail that the SM58 or the V15 series enjoy. Production years, original pricing, and full electrical specifications are not established in the available documentation, and this page does not invent them. What can be said with confidence is what Shure itself said: four channels, stereo outputs, center-detented pan pots, cuing, a headphone amp, and adjustable limiters, in a package built for field production.
For anyone considering one today, the appeal is straightforward. The FP42 is a compact stereo field mixer from a company that built its reputation on reliability, and it was designed for a job — capturing clean audio on location — that hasn't changed much since the 1980s. The caveats are equally straightforward: documentation is sparse, period reviews are hard to find beyond Shure's own advertising, and any specific performance claim should be verified against the unit in hand rather than assumed from the model number.
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