Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

schecterplayer

schecterplayer

New member
I just picked this thing up yesterday, it's a 60 watt Boogie Mark IIB, two channel with reverb and graphic eq. It was really filthy when I bought it, chassis was full of dust and the knobs were all sticky and crackly, but a couple hours with a scrub brush, soapy water, and a can of contact cleaner and it almost looks brand new. Only one small tear in the tolex and
one broken eq slider (which is still functional)
What do you guys know about these amps? It's definitely built like a tank, heaviest 1x12 combo I've ever lifted.
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Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

Nice score dude! Those things rip. They arent as aggressive as the C+'s but they are very warm and very dynamic amps. Nice
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

First impressions: the clean headroom on this thing is astonishing, with the volume cranked on the clean channel using humbuckers the amp is just getting mildly overdriven. It's a great clean tone with a surprising amount of bass for such a small amp. I think it's going to be a great platform for pedals for sure. It has most of the original tubes in it (Mesa rebranded Amperex) and a couple old Tung-Sol 12AX7s. Obviously was never used very much.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

I've played a Mark II and a Mark IIB. My observations:

- They are LOUD

- They are heavy (i.e. mass)

- They tend to have ridiculous amounts of bass and low mids, and you NEED the graph EQ to tame that.

- They are very difficult to dial in, much more so than modern Mesa's. The shared EQ controls on the two channels are a bit of a pain sometimes.

- They have less gain on the lead channel than I expected (but I know the IIc+ has more).
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

ratherdashing said:
I've played a Mark II and a Mark IIB. My observations:

- They are LOUD

- They are heavy (i.e. mass)

- They tend to have ridiculous amounts of bass and low mids, and you NEED the graph EQ to tame that.

- They are very difficult to dial in, much more so than modern Mesa's. The shared EQ controls on the two channels are a bit of a pain sometimes.

- They have less gain on the lead channel than I expected (but I know the IIc+ has more).
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This is true... They are a tweakers amp. You have to be willing to sit down and take your time with the amp and unlock its secrets. I didnt have much of a problem with the bass and mids but i mostly kept the bass control between 0-2.5 and the mids from 2-4.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

As has already been said these are definitely amps for people who are wanting to sit down and really fine tune their tone.

It takes a while but when you get it to that sweet spot for your playing and I guarantee you will if you put the time in its total heaven.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

Keep the bass knob under 2, more like 0.5, and don't go much higher on the graphic than you have it in that pic. Use the manual for recommended settings, tweak from there, and remember Randall's race car analogy, extreme settings will not work very well.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

It does take a bit of tweaking to get the clean and lead channels balanced right, but I didn't really have a problem getting a good sound out of either one of them individually. I think what confuses most people is that the first gain control is shared between the two channels, so it's best to think of it as a single channel amp with a foot switch able extra gain stage and master volume.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

Oh yeah, don't put Vol 1 above 8 at high volumes, unless you're into squeal city.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

I love the build quality. I had always heard good things about Mesa Boogie quality, but this is the first one I've ever seen in person. The amp chassis is shock-mounted on springs inside the cab so it's isolated from shock and vibration, all components are chassis mounted, switch craft jacks and Sprague caps all around. PC board is extremely thick with nice fat traces. Now I really want to check out some modern Mesa amps, I'd kind of dismissed them as mostly metal amps but if they still build them anything like this thing it probably won't be my last one.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

The strange thing about this amp is that it has three different footswitch plugs, and all of them are different. There is a mono 1/4" plug for the channel switch, a stereo 1/4" for boost and the graphic eq, and an RCA plug for a reverb switch. I think I might try to make a 4-button switch with a breakout cable, should be a reasonably fun little wiring job. Had they just not invented the 4-button switch in 1980?
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

Had a mk2c in high school. Absolutely a great amp. They are loud as bombs and the cleans and OD sounds were great. Obviously, like you said, the construction is tip top notch. Great score. If you don't mind what did it set you back?
As a side note a kid I jammed with at the time had an SOB, which was like the "no frills" boogie at the time. I remember that SOB sounded incredible and he got a great brownish sound out of that thing.

Sweet score buddy!
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

I paid $500 for it, it was an awesome enough deal that I couldn't really turn it down even though I wasn't really in the market for a new amp, my old combo is a bit underpowered but it served me pretty well.
 
Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

That was only possible because I work for a guitar store and a customer traded it for merchandise at sale price and I bought it off the store for cost plus a little. Also the pots were all gunked up and scratchy so I think the owner must have thought it was broken. Those kinds of deals don't come along every day, and when they do my boss usually takes them home before I get a shot haha.
 
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Re: Just Bought a Mesa Boogie Mark II (new amp content!)

Awesome is apparently some pretty dense stuff, I've never encountered a 1x12 this heavy before, it weighs almost as much as an AC30.
 
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