The Most Hearty EL84's

[Agileguy_101]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Okay, I'm not intimately familiar with every Mesa amp, so I should have said most instead of none.

Anyway, I was under the impression that Cathode biased means the bias is determined by a bias resistor, not a pot, which would mean it is non-adjustable. Fixed bias was always explained to me as adjustable (IE it has a bias pot)

 

[Monsta-Tone]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

I'm all coffee'd and candied up (got 3 little kids and I can't possibly let them eat all of that horrible candy by themselves....), sorry.
Mesa is the worst when it comes to explaining bias. Too much marketing hype and not enough reality.

 

[Hurricane]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Mesa's bias is fixed. It will have to be modified to have bias voltage set with a potentiometer (modified to be adjustable bias).

Wow - I would not get a tube amp if it didn't have an adjustable bias pot . Puts Mesa amps on my " No Get " list now .

Shouldn't surprise me , planned obsolescence seems to be the constant now-a-days .

I play old stuff , real old tubes mostly but I do have a few other beater amps so maybe I would get a Mesa for a Beater amp if it was had cheap .

Still seems $hitty on a amp like a Mesa with the kind of $s you pay and not get a bias pot to trim the bias from tube brand to tube brand when you have to swap out an old pair .

Easy man :

HR

 

[Edgecrusher]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Wow - I would not get a tube amp if it didn't have an adjustable bias pot . Puts Mesa amps on my " No Get " list now .

Shouldn't surprise me , planned obsolescence seems to be the constant now-a-days .

I play old stuff , real old tubes mostly but I do have a few other beater amps so maybe I would get a Mesa for a Beater amp if it was had cheap .

Still seems $hitty on a amp like a Mesa with the kind of $s you pay and not get a bias pot to trim the bias from tube brand to tube brand when you have to swap out an old pair .

Easy man :

HR

There you go thats the internet way to do it... Make sure and scratch a company off your list cause you read something on the net without really understanding whats being said. What agile said isnt 100% correct you can have fixed bias both with and without a bias pot. There are many classic fender amps that have fixed bias and no trim pot inside. Its not about planned obsolescence at all. Most brown face fenders that I can think of have a fixed bias with no trim pot same with the first reissues of the 59 bassman. Some of the Peavey classics have fixed bias with no trim pot. The point is even these can be biased by soldering in the correct value resistor to bias the amp. Its slightly more difficult than a bias pot but is far from impossible.

This is not a now-a day planned obsolescence thing my 61 fender princeton has no bias pot and was built decades before that idea reared its ugly head. If you care to educate yourself Randall Smith has written a paper on why he does the things this way you can find it on his website. Some agree some dont agree but the man does have his valid reasons and I would be more willing to accept that randall has his finger on the pulse of things than a internet forum does.

 

[James Rock]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Definately JJel84s I change mine every 6 months because I think i should not because I lose tone and my amp runs really hot (cathode biased). TAD el84s are meant to be long lasting as well and Ei's are meant to sound good but die fairly quickly in hot biased amps (like AC30s).

 

[Edgecrusher]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Definately JJel84s I change mine every 6 months because I think i should not because I lose tone and my amp runs really hot (cathode biased). TAD el84s are meant to be long lasting as well and Ei's are meant to sound good but die fairly quickly in hot biased amps (like AC30s).

The sad truth is that none of the EL84s made right now are really durable. 6 months for tubes is pretty sad.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Thanks for the replies.

I'm really just looking for sturdier tubes with this thread. I have a whole other thread in which I *****ed about it and looked for answers, and I'm done. I've been over this with Mesa, and – long story short – I am "buying" their story for now, which is basically, "The amp checks out. Tubes today are ****. We are not very surprised this is happening. There are some thoughts within the company of moving to JJs." It was looked at twice by the manager/qualified tech of 20 years at the Mesa/Boogie shop. They've opened up the amp twice now, and gone through it point by point, while on the horn to the Mothership just to make sure. The last time, they left it on for days at a time, playing it hard to see if the problem showed up. It didn't...but I'm preparing for the next time.

 

[Monsta-Tone]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Thanks for the replies.

I'm really just looking for sturdier tubes with this thread. I have a whole other thread in which I *****ed about it and looked for answers, and I'm done. I've been over this with Mesa, and – long story short – I am "buying" their story for now, which is basically, "The amp checks out. Tubes today are ****. We are not very surprised this is happening. There are some thoughts within the company of moving to JJs." It was looked at twice by the manager/qualified tech of 20 years at the Mesa/Boogie shop. They've opened up the amp twice now, and gone through it point by point, while on the horn to the Mothership just to make sure. The last time, they left it on for days at a time, playing it hard to see if the problem showed up. It didn't...but I'm preparing for the next time.

It sounds like they are trying to take care of you. They probably ended up not being able to charge Mesa for any of their time but still chose to try and make things right.
There are a couple of guys out here that are pretty unscrupulous but Mesa keeps using them.
Get yourself some JJ's and save the Mesa tubes for warranty work. Don't forget the dampeners.

Hurricane,
Out of the thousands of amps I have worked on in the last 12 or so years, not one Mesa was ready for the trash. They are built like tanks. I do not agree with some of the directions that they choose, like having 27 ldr's in am amp with only 2 channels, but they really do build a fine product and I have done many gigs with no backup. Just keep a spare set of tubes on hand and you are ready to rock!

I have, however, seen many modern Fender and Marshall amps that were only a few years old and ready for that great amp graveyard in the sky. There is where the "Planned Obsolescence" lies. I have actually almost stopped working on amps completely due to the Marshall TSL and the Fender Blues/Hot Rod series of amps. There are a lot of them out here, the majority of them are breaking down, and they are all a pain in the ass to work on.

The flip side of that is that I worked on Mesa amp number 074 a few weeks ago. The owner had sent it to a Mesa tech on the Big Island to get rid of a squealing sound. The guy charged him $200, shipped it back with no packing materials and wondered why it was damaged in shipping. I had to straighten out the chassis, spot weld the end plate back on, and then figure out what the squealing was. The original problem was a bad preamp tube. I only charged the guy $120 for all of that, plus I showed him that the amp had reverb. The guy thinks I walk on water now, truth is, his amp is very easy to fix and maintain. Had he simply read his manual, he could have saved himself about $300.

 

[glassman]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Just my two cents here...

I keep going back to the Sovtek EL84M for durability. It's pretty much the only EL84 that I can say that I've never had an issue with. I like the JJs too but have had a few issues over the years...seems to vary batch to batch.

With a Mesa amp, you're not going to hear much if any difference between one set of tubes versus another so I'd buy based purely on durability. If you do hear a difference, it's the different currents two sets of tubes may be running at and not a particular brand.

As for the lack of a bias adjustment in a Mesa amp, I personally support it. Sure I've modded enough of them over the years to get some extra tube life but for a gigging player that doesn't want to (a) carry a backup amp to every gig and (b) doesn't want to be on the phone with a tech early the next morning to get his amp going again before the next gig, the Mesa approach makes sense. Plug and play...and you get the tone the amp was intended to have. For those who want to venture outside the Mesa "box", then a bias mod might be a good idea. But if you're adding a bias pot to an amp just because you think you might need a bias adjustment, well, you're listening to the wrong people.

 

[Hurricane]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

There you go thats the internet way to do it... Make sure and scratch a company off your list cause you read something on the net without really understanding whats being said. What agile said isnt 100% correct you can have fixed bias both with and without a bias pot. There are many classic fender amps that have fixed bias and no trim pot inside. Its not about planned obsolescence at all. Most brown face fenders that I can think of have a fixed bias with no trim pot same with the first reissues of the 59 bassman. Some of the Peavey classics have fixed bias with no trim pot. The point is even these can be biased by soldering in the correct value resistor to bias the amp. Its slightly more difficult than a bias pot but is far from impossible.

This is not a now-a day planned obsolescence thing my 61 fender princeton has no bias pot and was built decades before that idea reared its ugly head. If you care to educate yourself Randall Smith has written a paper on why he does the things this way you can find it on his website. Some agree some dont agree but the man does have his valid reasons and I would be more willing to accept that randall has his finger on the pulse of things than a internet forum does.

====================================================

To be clear on this :

I would not want to get a tube amp these days with out a calibrated bias potentiometer if I was ( and I do ) using a tube amp a lot . If I left the impression that there were no tube amps built with out them I stand corrected thank you .

Sometimes you end up some where strange on the road away from home and need some tubes and you settle for what's available .

Contrary to popular believe I was not schooled on guitar amps via the net . I don't claim to be an electronic engineer either .My experience learning about amps was great in a service center and I learned a lot in 7 years , still learning as I live today with the help of the net . In that shop many a guitarist ended up there having that mod put into there amps to be able to use more varieties of tubes .

I am aware of " fixed " bias resistors in amps too and they work fine too .

In my life's work experience in an electronic service center once a long while back what I was used to seeing were big theater Altec Lansing - Avery Fisher - Marantz - Bogan commercial tube amps and other big time stuff , all the good stuff had calibrated bias pots . The times that guitar amps came in were few over all at first , but in time the place got a reputation for fixing anything in the electronic world of sound . Funny , stuff like Randal and others like it were really cheaply made in comparison and many had shoddy wiring and workmanship . Even some of the Fenders many love were a electronic bomb and truly dangerous things that did electrocute some folks . There are some old guitar amps that sound absolutely great but construction wise they can be dangerous at times , with that in mind you have to be careful .

I see not only calibrated tube amps available these days with bias pots , but also with the ability to change from EL84s to 6550s If your shelling out major cash these days for a tube rig , you had better get your $s worth too is my take .

Thanks for your input .

Easy .

Hurricane Ramon

 

[Hurricane]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Hurricane,
Out of the thousands of amps I have worked on in the last 12 or so years, not one Mesa was ready for the trash. They are built like tanks. I do not agree with some of the directions that they choose, like having 27 ldr's in am amp with only 2 channels, but they really do build a fine product and I have done many gigs with no backup. Just keep a spare set of tubes on hand and you are ready to rock!

==========================

They sound great , not knocking them . It's just I have my preferences I guess . Durability is the biggest factor to me . I have some old stuff that's beat up ass hell but still pumping .

HR

 

[Edgecrusher]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

I see not only calibrated tube amps available these days with bias pots

You realize the reason you see this is not cause the amp itself is "better" in some way but out of necessity due to the variability of modern tube supply. Years ago no one thought of biasing amps it wasnt needed the high quality of tubes made that possible then tube quality went to hell and it became a fact of life. You may have confused when I mentioned Randall Smith to be of Randall amplifiers this isnt true Randall Smith is the man behind Mesa Engineering/Mesa Boogie. His stuff is true pro class quality I can name you 2 dozen manufacturers of lesser quality that include a adjustable bias. If durability is one of your factors scratching mesa off the list is silly.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Any thoughts on these? They're house branded '80's Russian tubes that supposedly meet 7189 specs. A lot of self promotion about tubes that are really just EL84M equivalents, or really worth $62 shipped for a matched set (nearly 3x the price of EL-84Ms)?

http://www.thetubestore.com/Preferred-Series-7189-Premium-EL84

The Website's EL84 review page: http://www.thetubestore.com/EL84-Tube-Review.

 

[Hurricane]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

You realize the reason you see this is not cause the amp itself is "better" in some way but out of necessity due to the variability of modern tube supply. Years ago no one thought of biasing amps it wasnt needed the high quality of tubes made that possible then tube quality went to hell and it became a fact of life. You may have confused when I mentioned Randall Smith to be of Randall amplifiers this isnt true Randall Smith is the man behind Mesa Engineering/Mesa Boogie. His stuff is true pro class quality I can name you 2 dozen manufacturers of lesser quality that include a adjustable bias. If durability is one of your factors scratching mesa off the list is silly.

=====================================================

Never knocked it's sound ( cause I think they sound great ) or the durability . Just no bias pot

HR

 

[LReese]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Yep - Mesa's are built like a tank. I scoffed at the fixed bias at 1st - it locked you into using their tubes. Not anymore.

Have to say I'm a little leery of the MKV's. Seems to me that its built a little more flimsy, might not be the case.

Love the size of the package of the Marks. A lotta amp in a small package - that you think might be made of lead.

 

[nedcronin]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Those preferred tubes from that link have a 6 month warranty, heck I'd give them a shot. They are NOS tubes and the price is reasonable IMO.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Re: The Most Hearty EL84's

Any thoughts on these? They're house branded '80's Russian tubes that supposedly meet 7189 specs. A lot of self promotion about tubes that are really just EL84M equivalents, or really worth $62 shipped for a matched set (nearly 3x the price of EL-84Ms)?

http://www.thetubestore.com/Preferred-Series-7189-Premium-EL84

The Website's EL84 review page: http://www.thetubestore.com/EL84-Tube-Review.

I guess they're pretty much the same as the Russian 6P14P-EV's you can get pretty cheap off ebay. They sound great & nothing kills them..

I prefer the non-"EV" (plain "6P14P's") for their tone though, they're warmer, rounder, fatter and sweeter....best sounding EL84 out there at the moment for me... and they're dirt cheap too.