Mesa tubes?

  • Thread starter Thread starter ecktronic
  • Start date Start date
Mesas are, in fact, fixed bias. And they've FINALLY started to bias the rectos a bit hotter in the last few years.

I've heard if you're going wiith Mesa tubes, the STR-440 6L6's are the way to go. Not sure what Mesa ships with these days, but a couple guys I know are endorsed by Mesa and were kinda "meh..." about their tubes until they triied these, and then were sold. On one hand, they are endorsed and thus you may want to take that with a grain of salt... But on the other, they both swap the stock V1 for a Tung-Sol on every Mesa they get their hands on, so if switching would really improve their tone I suspect they would.

Incidently, if you're not running a Tung-sol in V1, seriously, give it a try. I'm afraid I didn't record before/after clips, but it really opened up the amp...

For non mesa tubes, I've been using JJ's, though I haven't yet switched them in my new-ish Rectoverb yet. I threw a high gain set in my Nomad as well as a set of JJ EL84's. I also grabbed a low gain "blues" preamp set as I don't use THAT much gain, just to compare them, and I found that I preferred the high gain set for lower gain playing. They made the overall gain range of the amp more musical, whereas the lower gain set was a bit crunchier and didn't "sing" the same way.
 
boingoman said:
Tight-matched power tubes= not a big deal, and a new thing. The standard pretty much forever was 25%. 5-10% is great. It's not gonna get much better than that, and it's not necessary anyway.

Amp components= +/-10%, +/-5% in the output section.

Truth is, amps really don't care about sloppy tolerances. Neither should anyone else.:) Just worry about the sound.
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IMO... this is not necessarily true... while it is relitively new to match them... it was a concern early on as evidenced by the fact that fender originaly had a balance adjust for the bias (called it hum balance)... yep that one that got modded to an overall bias adjust... and it does make a diff in terms of lasting... i've personnally rechecked bias on some clients amps after 2-6 months and found matched sets to still be matched to a large degree... you are correct though in some respects about tolerences... in the old days matched tolerences for resistors and caps in particular were all over the place... but nowadays amps are being built with much tighter tolerences especially in the so called boutique models and this attention to detail is why you can now purchase an amp and expect it to sound reasonably close from box to box... where before you would have been an idiot to not try the specific amp you were buying...
 
jonnyc said:
You won't have to rebias your amp if you get your tubes from eurotubes either. At least this was what I was told when I wrote them concerning a tube swap for my Mesa DC3. Besides, aren't Mesa's fixed biased.
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Ok, so I'm guessing that Eurotubes test and pre-sort the tubes into ranges that will suit the Mesas, much like the Mesa labelled tubes.

And yes, they are "fixed" bias, but bias-wise, it's the opposite to what you would think it implies. Fixed bias amps need to have the bias checked and adjusted accordingly when changing power tubes. It's cathode biased amps that don't (broadly speaking)...
 
Mesa and biasing--

Some of their products are fixed-bias, some are cathode- or self-biasing. They are not all the same.:)

Fixed bias amps want the same value tubes put in each time, or the bias changed when using tubes with different plate current. Cathode- or self-biasing amps are pretty flexible.
 
yes, both Dougstubes and Eurotubes both do testing before they ship em out. They test for matching on power tubes to ensure your getting your 4 (or 2 ) power tubes within that 5-10% tolerance range, and are matched as close as possible.

same with preamp tubes too. Doug (dougstubes.com) will match the a/b triodes sides of a preamp tube if you want a "balanced tube" or even test it for gain if you want a more aggressive preamp tube.

He puts a sticker on each tube box showing the test results so you know what your getting...........on both power and preamp tubes.
 
Another big thumbs-up for doug/dougstubes.com from me! The first time I emailed him, I told him what sort of sound I was looking for from my Mesa Triple Rec, and within 15 minutes he called back with a detailed recommendation that I eventually purchased and was extremely happy with!

Since then my preferred tone has changed, and thus I bought a Marshall instead, but you can be 100% sure that when my Marshall needs re-tubing, I know exactly who I'm gonna call :)
 
exactly! thats what i like about doug.......his customer service, and you actually get to talk to 'doug'. Not some random customer service rep who stares at a computer screen reading of descriptions of the items, as you ask them questions.....

hes down to earth, and is not there to just "sell you"....he is trying to help you find the tone you want, based on what you tell him your looking for......and he KNOWS HIS STUFF!!!!

plus he carries most major current production brands (and some NOS)......so he is not biased in anyway to sell you a particular brand, his recomendations are honest, and he he is all about customer service.
 
IMO... there's little need to match preamp tubes... from one to another or one side to the other... unless it's going into a high end stereo unit where side to side can be an issue... the reason being in guitar amps the stages happen sequentially... so it's pretty much irrelevent if the next stage is exactlly the same gain... BTW i dont remember ever seeing a tube tested where a twin triode wasn't pretty close anyway...
 
true........but if you really know your amo schematics and how the tube layout affects you amp, it could be quite helpfull.

for example....im some amps....the tube slot (V3) a/b side could be controlling 2 completly different things. Triode A of the tube could be for the clean channel, and troide B could be for the reverb send.........or something of this matter. If you wanted a cleaner "clean channel", you could get an unmatched preamp tube that has a bit lower gain in triode A side, and a different reading in the B triode.

But this is if you really know your amp, and have its schematics on what circuts/tubes controll what perameters.

Plus, in a Phase inverter tube, you could get matched triodes so both sides of the preamp tube are pushing out exactly the same current/gain, thus the power amp tubes (if matched) are getting the same push equally......and all of the power tubes are getting the same amount of "juice".

but thats on a whole nother subject.......some people say a matched tube in the phase inverter spot matters, some say it doesnt. I wont get into that subject.
 
FYI, Ruby doesn't "make" tubes. If you say Sovtek, Svetlana, Tesla, and Chinese you have pretty much covered the gamut of tube manufacturers. Everything else is simply relabeled. And they dont make it easy to tell or to find out where the tubes you are buying were made.

Seems strange to hear someone say this:
Ritzy said:
For new production a lot of people like JJs and Winged C tubes...
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and this:
Ritzy said:
The Mesa/Sovtek stuff (if they're indeed still using Sovtek) is pretty much the bottom of the pile...
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in the same breath......

Who do you think makes JJ's? Russian tubes have a very different, much better sound than any Chinese tubes, but you are a better man than me if you can honestly hear a difference between Sovtek, Svetlana, and Tesla.

The only real question here is whether you are getting Chinese or Russian made tubes. Anyone who has heard them both side by side will never buy Chinese made tubes again...... if you dont want either of those, then you must buy NOS. That is the ONLY way to get tubes made somewhere other than Russia or China.

Someone above mentioned the RCA blackplates, those are awesome sounding tubes! But they have a tendency to be more microphonic at full gain. Sylvanias are good. You CAN hear the difference. But you'll pay for it.
 
soundchaser59 said:
FYI, Ruby doesn't "make" tubes. If you say Sovtek, Svetlana, Tesla, and Chinese you have pretty much covered the gamut of tube manufacturers. Everything else is simply relabeled. And they dont make it easy to tell or to find out where the tubes you are buying were made.

Seems strange to hear someone say this:


and this:


in the same breath......

Who do you think makes JJ's? Russian tubes have a very different, much better sound than any Chinese tubes, but you are a better man than me if you can honestly hear a difference between Sovtek, Svetlana, and Tesla.

The only real question here is whether you are getting Chinese or Russian made tubes. Anyone who has heard them both side by side will never buy Chinese made tubes again...... if you dont want either of those, then you must buy NOS. That is the ONLY way to get tubes made somewhere other than Russia or China.

Someone above mentioned the RCA blackplates, those are awesome sounding tubes! But they have a tendency to be more microphonic at full gain. Sylvanias are good. You CAN hear the difference. But you'll pay for it.
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soundchaser59,

There was nothing strange at all about my statements which you quoted (above). JJ and Winged "C" are two completely different tubes from completely different manufacturers. And IMO, the bog-standard Sovtek stuff is basically crap.

You're over-simplifying things a lot with your explanation. There's more to it than that...


Electro Harmonix and Sovtek are both owned by an American corporation called New Sensor and are made in the Xpo-pul factory (a.k.a. the Reflektor plant) in Saratov, Russia. But they are not identical tubes; The EH are differently designed tubes which are not simply re-badged, bog-standard Sovteks.

New Sensor also owns the Svetlana name in the US and Canada, and also makes Svetlana labelled tubes in the Xpo-pul factory. Like the Electro-Harmonix tubes, the Svetlana labelled tubes are a fairly recent creation (not the same brand as the Svets of old) and are made according to their own unique design and production. However, they are "Svetlana" in name only...

Then we have JSC Svetlana, which is a Russian company and unrelated to the "New Sensor" Svetlana. JSC Svetlana are the manufacturer of the "original" Svets, but have lost the rights to the Svetlana name in the US and Canada to the New Sensor Corporation. SED is a division of the JSC Svetlana company who makes tubes under the Winged "C" name in the Svetlana factory in St. Petersburg, Russia.

There are more examples:
  • Tung-Sol also fall under the New Sensor umbrella, but I'm also quite certain that these again aren't simply relabelled Sovteks.
  • Groove Tubes largely relabel tubes from other manufacturers, but I think they do make a few of their own (in the US I believe).
  • JJ (formerly Tesla) tubes are made in the Slovak Republic, and again, are completely unique.
  • Similarly, the Chinese are not all dead on the same tube: Shuguang, TAD, Valve Arts... there are differences.

Sure, there are only a few countries in which tubes are being produced, but you can't put them all in the same pile according to that country. Some of the differences between them may be minute, other times they'll be greater, and a lot of the time you're simply pitting one crappy tube against another. But there is a lot more to it than "a tube is either Chinese or Russian and that's it".
 
And for the record, I think a lot of the Chinese stuff is better than Sovtek. Some of the Chinese tube types are actually some of the better of the new production. But at the end of the day, choosing between these two is like picking the lesser of two evils (IMO of course).
 
Ritzy said:
And for the record, I think a lot of the Chinese stuff is better than Sovtek. Some of the Chinese tube types are actually some of the better of the new production. But at the end of the day, choosing between these two is like picking the lesser of two evils (IMO of course).
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not so sure of this... i can remember buying a large lot of chinese 6550's where 1/2 were roached out of the box....
 
My Preference in a 6L6 tube is the Winged SED's ... second place would probably be the Tungsol Re-issue 5881's (Like them a lot as well! )

Sovtek pre's IMO are at the bottom of the pyle....all except for the LPS any way...that one show's signs of life in certain applications..

I don't care about any "rating" systems for power tubes... no matter what amp I'm playing,...if it gets new power tubes, it gets the bias checked ...it's the only way to be sure ;)

Bryan - You still pushin' those Ruby's huh!?!?! :D :p

Rick
 
I haven't ordered a set yet to try out,...but since we carry them at GC,...my cost on them should be very minimal ;)

....did I tell you I scored a 1969 Super Reverb this weekend!?!? ...... 250 bucks!!! (SilverFace) ...SWEEEEEEEEEET!

Rick
 
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