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#26097 by Starfish Scott
Sun Mar 23, 2008 2:32 am
omg. (chewing finger nails)

So what's the good news? lol

#26100 by Paleopete
Sun Mar 23, 2008 2:47 am
So what's the good news? lol


The good news is it's not MY amp... lol sorry, couldn't pass that one up.

Sorry, but I was curious and had to find out what was going on, no 4 tube amp I've ever seen had 3 power tubes and one rectifier, especially when it's supposed to have a solid state rectifier. Those with tube rectifiers also have 4 power tubes, not 3. So it didn't make sense. Nothing I've ever heard of has only 3 power tubes, they come in pairs, and only work in pairs. Even my tube stereo has 4 power tubes. Evrything else,? 1, 2, 4 or 6. Never 3...

Anyway, sorry to get you worried, but I'd really hate to see this amp finally fry something major just because you didn't know it wasn't supposed to be working that way and had no idea it had a problem.

#26152 by Starfish Scott
Sun Mar 23, 2008 2:35 pm
I have to laugh, I have been running it hard as hell for 3 years straight.

To think it's going to blow any minute is interesting to put it mildly.

Oh well, I'll have to take it in and get it cleaned in any case. They may as well see what's up with the beef while they are at it.

#26203 by Shredd6
Mon Mar 24, 2008 9:40 am
I just wanted to post this on here for JW.

Image

Jw.. This is a diagram of your preamp. And on it, I'm showing you the way I designed it for myself and my style on my mesa, and I'll give you the explanations as well.

V1- this is the most important tube slot for your preamp. I personally haven't found anything better than an RCA for this slot. A 12ax7A is a select RCA NOS tube that kills all. When I stuck the Mullard in this slot, the distortion was way too muddy, the G.E. was just a little lacking in treble. The RCA was dead nuts perfect.

V2- The G.E. 12ax7A is strong and bold in the Bass tone area. This thing thumps. When the Mullard was put in this slot it accentuated the mids of the RCA, but just didn't seem to be the right slot to put it in with the G.E. behind it. I wanted to keep things high gain in the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd stage of the preamp. The G.E. compliments the RCA really good (kind of like a scooped mid sound) when the distortion is kicked in.

V3- This is actually the second most important slot in the preamp. This slot is where you can either drive the preamp into full on power, or powered down a little. The Mullard *7025* is a lower gain tube. It's really warm and clean. I put it here so that the clean channel wouldn't be so in your face with the Bass tones of the G.E., or high strung and high powered from the RCA. It really seems to equalize everything out to a nice smooth sound.
*** Did you know*** that you can actually put a 12at7 in this slot?? A 12at7 is considerably lower in output. Where a 12ax7 is 100% output, a 12at7 is 60% output. So if you feel like your amp is too overdriven for your style, you can put a 12at7 in this slot to tame the distortion to suit your style. This is where you could make your amp sound completely different with the right 12at7.

V4- This is your effects loop. I chose a G.E. 5751 Triple Mica for this slot because your effects can be really noisy depending on what you're using. This tube is very quiet, low in micro-phonics, lower gain, very clean. You can also put a 12at7 if you want the output to be less in your face.

V5- This is your output/phase splitter tube.. I really liked the Mesa here for some reason. This ecc83 really sounds like the Mullard with more gain. I did find it to be a good tube, and it works just fine in this slot.


Anyway.. I just thought I'd give you some insight on how versatile the Mesa Preamp is, and how you can come up with a plan to tailor your amp to suit your style. This particular setup sounds awesome, and it's perfect for my style. Paired up with the SED 5u4's it's just freakin killer.

#26224 by badnomad
Mon Mar 24, 2008 3:09 pm
To go all the way back to the first post, in relation to brands of tubes, there are only two companies making vacuum tubes in the world today.....Sovtek, and some unpronounceable Chinese company. MESA, RCA, etc. all get their tubes from these companies.....some emblazoned with their own names. Generally, the Chinese tubes are lower quality than the Sovtek, and some of the Sovtek tubes vary in quality. As far as paying ridiculous prices for 'vintage' RCA, Phillips, Emerson, Sylvania, etc., I have a box full of these in various sizes, and if they haven't been used past their useful lifetimes, then in a lot of cases they have gone 'microphonic' from being kicked around for 30 years. You can occasionally find a treasure among these 'stones'......but is it worth risking a huge sum of money?

#26230 by gbheil
Mon Mar 24, 2008 3:46 pm
Ok I know I'm gonna get it for this one.
If only the Chinese and the Sovtec tubes are being manufactured, and the quality is variable, that would indicate to me that they are soon to be extinct.
So whats the point in paying out the butt for a tube amp if (possably) in the next 10 or so years you cant get a tube? Am I way off base here?

#26242 by jw123
Mon Mar 24, 2008 4:22 pm
Shredd, Thanks for the diagrahm. I think I will play with my preamp a little more before I ditch the Mesa.

#26253 by badnomad
Mon Mar 24, 2008 4:56 pm
sanshouheil wrote:Ok I know I'm gonna get it for this one.
If only the Chinese and the Sovtec tubes are being manufactured, and the quality is variable, that would indicate to me that they are soon to be extinct.
So whats the point in paying out the butt for a tube amp if (possably) in the next 10 or so years you cant get a tube? Am I way off base here?


It doesn't mean they will be extinct....Sovtek has been around for years, the have more experience making tubes, than anyone else in the world today. When the USSR folded, and solid state technology killed the huge worldwide demand for tubes, the major companies bailed, and either folded or switched over, while Sovtek saw an opportunity to supply the niche market that remained. The Chinese are relative newcomers to this market, and their products are shoddy, and don't have anything close to the quality coming from Sovteks years of experience. Tube amps are here to stay, and there will be tube suppliers to fill the demand.

#26258 by gbheil
Mon Mar 24, 2008 5:05 pm
I have to play devil's advocate here badnomad, not being experienced with musical /electronics, however I've seen this trend sound the death knell for excellent products in other areas such as industrial controls and even firearms manufacture.
If you have some more specific info (not that what you have presented is invalid) I would be interested to hear it. This all is very interesting to me and is quite relevent in a soon to be made purchase on my part.

#26259 by badnomad
Mon Mar 24, 2008 5:27 pm
I have been in electronics,(my profession), and music,(serious hobby and short profession), all my life. The most significant fact I can present, is that the tube market started to die in the '70's, and was all but gone by the early '80's, including tube-based devices, and most tube producers. There was a surplus supply around for awhile, but it's pretty much gone. Since then, tube amps, and tubes were pretty much at a constant level, but more recently, tube amps have seen a resurgence in popularity, as well as a lot of other tube-based devices such as mic preamps, pedals, etc. Throughout this Sovtek has been a constant supplier, and the Chinese obviously saw enough of a market to start producing tubes. I think that even if the demand goes back to post 1980 levels, that Sovtek will be there to supply it......it's a major industry for that area of Russia.

#26263 by gbheil
Mon Mar 24, 2008 5:47 pm
Thank you badnomad. I have to respect the oppinion of some one whom is in electronics professionally.
It may just come down to a coin toss for me between an low watt tube amp and a modeling solid state, whichever will be played either directly or via a mic through my PA both for the live mix and recording. really am leaning toward a Carvin modeling amp with three channels and a foot switch as we are working on a multiple genre set that will require me to play soft and bright clean, blues, classic rock, and metal tones.
Tis a hell of a challenge for me and I am really looking foreward to it!

#26270 by jw123
Mon Mar 24, 2008 7:13 pm
George if you use the volume control on your guitar you can set a clean tone on most amps that will break up slightly when you turn the volume up. This can cover clean and blues. If the amp has a second channel for gain you can use your distortion pedal to take this into metal territory. This can cover classic and metal. The songs youve posted I dont really hear metal fitting in there, I would think a good classic sound would do it, but thats just my 2 cents. The last couple of gigs I did I didnt even use the channels in my amp, I just set up one basic sound and roll off the volume for clean, then open it up for classic or metal and then punch in a tube screamer for leads. I did have the wah wah going and a tuner. I would recomend one of those Boss tuner pedals, when you step on it, it will mute the signal to the amp while you tune.

I am going this afternoon to try out a little Soldano combo amp. 50 watts tube. It turns out that the largest Soldano dealer in the country lives close to me and invited me over to try his own personal rig.

#26277 by HowlinJ
Mon Mar 24, 2008 7:38 pm
George,
To paraphrase what J.W. is saying to ya. "Some cats just gotta have "that tube sound" in their playin', Just like some gunners just gotta have that "ol' Parker kick" in their shootin' ". Dig? :wink:
John

#26279 by gbheil
Mon Mar 24, 2008 7:55 pm
jw123, I,m hearing ya I do use a Boss tuner right off of my wireless recever, and been doing a lot of experimenting with the guitar controls in my personal daily practice sessions and my ol buddy Howlin may be on dope due to surgury but he speaks my language. Not gonna buy anything till I can play on some different amps. Most of the pawn shops around here just have junk and seem to have one thing in common with a lot of music stores as well, that being the employee's and owners seem to be a bunch of dicks. Think I'm gonna buy a pair of boots I havent tried on they must be smokin something in the back room. I was born at night but it wasnt last night.

#26296 by Shredd6
Mon Mar 24, 2008 10:40 pm
badnomad wrote:As far as paying ridiculous prices for 'vintage' RCA, Phillips, Emerson, Sylvania, etc., I have a box full of these in various sizes, and if they haven't been used past their useful lifetimes, then in a lot of cases they have gone 'microphonic' from being kicked around for 30 years. You can occasionally find a treasure among these 'stones'......but is it worth risking a huge sum of money?


It is to me, and what huge sum of money?

First of all if you think there's a modern tube out there that can compare with a good RCA NOS, I'd like to hear it, because as far as I'm concerned it doesn't exist, and I'm not alone in that thinking. It's worth the $30-40 in my book. I only need one in my amp.

You'll also notice in the first post that I really didn't care for the modern Sovteks, Tung Sol, and Groove tubes 12ax7C. (Russian , and Chinese manufactured). The only modern tube I liked was the Mesa (Russian made 12ax7-ecc83). But it's still subjective to the listener.

I'm afraid that what's going to end up happening is that anyone who doesn't really understand anything about tubes, is going to all of the sudden think that you could buy any Tung Sol, or Sovtek, and it will sound no different than any Mesa, even though they all may be manufactured in Russia. I hope that's not what you're saying. Your explanation was just a little vague.

During the 50's and 60's re-branding and outsourcing was common. But there were still symbols and date codes left on the tubes to identify who the manufacturer was. (ie: the diamond on the bottom of a Telefunken, or the octagon shape surrounding the letters of an RCA.)

The G.E. 12ax7a in my #2 slot is labeled "kinsman", but by examining the way the "12ax7a" was written on the tube, I knew it was a genuine G.E.
Image Image


Due to the fact that it was labeled "kinsman", the tube cost me $7.. 1/2 the cost of my modern Mesa ecc83. So where exactly did I "risk a huge sum of money"???

With a little knowledge and education, you really don't have to. This is a beautiful sounding tube, it's not 'microphonic', just one little badass. ( Incidently, I bought a lot 4 of these, so quadruple the badassness for me, right?)

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