michaelmellner
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- Sep 30, 2012
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Hi all. I have been following the topics about the use of EL34s in my mesa 290. I have a pre 2000 one (Mesa checked it ouot for me with the s/n), blue pilot light.
Mesa provided me the position where the E34L should go. in my case they go to the sides. I bought a JJ kit for the 290 and put it just minutes ago. FYI, the previous kit was a ruby 6L6s.
I had an amp technician with me while changing them and he could do some generic measurement which though are saying something.
For example: the rubys showed a measurement of 30 milliamps while the 6L6 JJ showed a 37 milliamps current passage.
The E34l, though where surprising: they showed a measurement of 10 milliamps which practically tells us they virtually don't work.
My mesa don't have the chance to switch for the use with e34l or 6l6. there is none inside the amp. so all I could do was to put the tubes as mentioned above.
as for sound............unfortunately i cannot do a real comparison with the previous tubes since I turned on the amp after putting the JJs. I notice though that the volume has going down (probabily because the E34L are almost not working). this thing though has a huge advantage: To get the same volume I had before, with the rubys, I must turn the 290 up to 12 hours. with these volume the amp rally starts to take life. Prior the volume was so ridiculous that no club would allow me to keep it at such level.
Now, the mesa is somewhat warmer due to the fact that I can have its volumes high enough.
since the volume is turned fairly up, I got another advantage. prior to the tube changement I always had the deep extent on. it is a nice feature but the thump is so huge that with low strings it makes the guitar unusable.
with the new tube set up, with the volume at 12 oclock, I had to turn the deep extent off but to my surprise the sound was excellent. All I had to do, to compensate the loss of deep was to add some bass to my pre amp (a kemper profiler).
Overall, my tech said that he found not usefull to use the el34 if they work so low in milliamps. maybe the 290 with the el34/6l6 switch can make the el34 work.
The sound though is very good because, as said, the amp is brought to life with the volume set high.
in the next days I will test the 290 by taking out the el34 and put some of my previous rubys back in their places to see if there is a change. my rubys are praxctically new because I put them in my 290 and barely never used it but since the last year on.
of course, the 6l6/el34 has a definite earlier breakup compared to all 6l6, but this is due to the fact that the volume has dropped. my tech says that my 290 erogates now something around 50-60 watts per channel. it is a rough estimate that he promised he will make sure by testing it with proper instruments.
that is all.
hope this report can help.
all the best
michael
Mesa provided me the position where the E34L should go. in my case they go to the sides. I bought a JJ kit for the 290 and put it just minutes ago. FYI, the previous kit was a ruby 6L6s.
I had an amp technician with me while changing them and he could do some generic measurement which though are saying something.
For example: the rubys showed a measurement of 30 milliamps while the 6L6 JJ showed a 37 milliamps current passage.
The E34l, though where surprising: they showed a measurement of 10 milliamps which practically tells us they virtually don't work.
My mesa don't have the chance to switch for the use with e34l or 6l6. there is none inside the amp. so all I could do was to put the tubes as mentioned above.
as for sound............unfortunately i cannot do a real comparison with the previous tubes since I turned on the amp after putting the JJs. I notice though that the volume has going down (probabily because the E34L are almost not working). this thing though has a huge advantage: To get the same volume I had before, with the rubys, I must turn the 290 up to 12 hours. with these volume the amp rally starts to take life. Prior the volume was so ridiculous that no club would allow me to keep it at such level.
Now, the mesa is somewhat warmer due to the fact that I can have its volumes high enough.
since the volume is turned fairly up, I got another advantage. prior to the tube changement I always had the deep extent on. it is a nice feature but the thump is so huge that with low strings it makes the guitar unusable.
with the new tube set up, with the volume at 12 oclock, I had to turn the deep extent off but to my surprise the sound was excellent. All I had to do, to compensate the loss of deep was to add some bass to my pre amp (a kemper profiler).
Overall, my tech said that he found not usefull to use the el34 if they work so low in milliamps. maybe the 290 with the el34/6l6 switch can make the el34 work.
The sound though is very good because, as said, the amp is brought to life with the volume set high.
in the next days I will test the 290 by taking out the el34 and put some of my previous rubys back in their places to see if there is a change. my rubys are praxctically new because I put them in my 290 and barely never used it but since the last year on.
of course, the 6l6/el34 has a definite earlier breakup compared to all 6l6, but this is due to the fact that the volume has dropped. my tech says that my 290 erogates now something around 50-60 watts per channel. it is a rough estimate that he promised he will make sure by testing it with proper instruments.
that is all.
hope this report can help.
all the best
michael
