3 Channel Dual Rec Tone question

[hollow soul]

i was playing my 3 ch dual rec tonight before i start playing about with power and preamp tubes. going to try some 6V6's and some other things.

The orange channel seems way more muddy to me than the clean and hi gain channels.
on any voicing, i cant seem to get the tone clear. its just full of lows and its horrible. i played with it for ages and i couldnt get it to a state where id use it without turning the treble up fully and having the presence really high.

is it just me? is something wrong with my amp? i dont have this problem at all with the other channels...
i just know some people refrain from using the red channel and get enough gain out the second. maybe im not playing loud enough.

thoughts.
Rob

ps. im new here!
also, if anyone wants to sell a 2 channel dual rec, say hello!

 

[jdurso]

i was playing my 3 ch dual rec tonight before i start playing about with power and preamp tubes. going to try some 6V6's and some other things.

The orange channel seems way more muddy to me than the clean and hi gain channels.
on any voicing, i cant seem to get the tone clear. its just full of lows and its horrible. i played with it for ages and i couldnt get it to a state where id use it without turning the treble up fully and having the presence really high.

is it just me? is something wrong with my amp? i dont have this problem at all with the other channels...
i just know some people refrain from using the red channel and get enough gain out the second. maybe im not playing loud enough.

thoughts.
Rob

ps. im new here!
also, if anyone wants to sell a 2 channel dual rec, say hello!

what are your settings... most importantly where are your mids and gain

 

[hollow soul]

Presence 2 o'clock +
gain between noon and 3 o'clock
master at 9 o'clock
bass at 10
mid around noon, just a bit less or just a bit more
treble 1 or 2 o'clock.

ive played about. just cant seem to dial it in. just get really really thick tones.

 

[mikey383]

That's where CH3 comes in. I've found the red channel to have less low end than the orange channel. Mesa says it's supposed to be the same, just more presence on the red channel, but my ears tell me the orange has more low end and low mids.

 

[hollow soul]

im glad its not just me.
going to try the 6V6 tubes in the dual rec tonight. maybe play with some KT88s too

 

[droptrd]

I personaly think the orange channel is very hard to get a good sound out of. Its kind of a worthless channel for what I do. I have better luck when i use brighter, twangy guitars like strats and tele's.

 

[mikey383]

I personaly think the orange channel is very hard to get a good sound out of. Its kind of a worthless channel for what I do. I have better luck when i use brighter, twangy guitars like strats and tele's.

I had that same problem with my 3 channel. I mainly used the orange channel for a dirty tone.

 

[hollow soul]

i thought it was just me being dumb as far as dialing in channels goes.
im looking forward to getting home from work so i can play with tubes.
I use the red channel mainly but i find it sounds much better at volume than playing quiet on any channel.
i also have a KT88 driven JCM 800 2205, and a Soldano Avenger. but i think the mesa is becoming my favourite.
might sell the others.

 

[hollow soul]

so.
just thought id make a post.
6V6's werent the JJ's i ordered. they where Tung Sol and didnt like the mesa.
the GZ rectifiers where cool.
ecc83 gold pins in v1 & v5 and average ecc83's in the other positions brought the gain under control for me.

tried getting some KT88's i had laying around to work but that wasnt so good. made some foul rasping noise when i turned the clean channel up.
tried some 5881's and then ended up going back to the mesa 6L6.

id like something to bring the bass under control. maybe i'll send back the tung-sol's and try some el34's or something

 

[njsurf]

I find the exact opposite. I like orange channel more than the red. It seems more organic than than the red channel with less fizz. I use it on vintage with treble around 2, mid around 12 and bass around 10 with presence fairly low and the gain setting varies from song to song. I never go past 2 for the gain.

Hope this helps. Good luck

 

[siggy14]

6V6's I would imagine made it less bright as they smooth out the tone more. In general JJ's are dark tubes so that will probaly not help your cause. I Love the power amp JJ's, but the pre-amps I can get away with, but prefer other tubes there.

The most simple solution for you as it sounds like you want orange to sound like red, is just order the presense pot from mesa and then you will make it sound the same. Very simple swap out, unsoder the wires, put the new pot in and soder it back up, since the pots are still handwired it is an easy job.

so.
just thought id make a post.
6V6's werent the JJ's i ordered. they where Tung Sol and didnt like the mesa.
the GZ rectifiers where cool.
ecc83 gold pins in v1 & v5 and average ecc83's in the other positions brought the gain under control for me.

tried getting some KT88's i had laying around to work but that wasnt so good. made some foul rasping noise when i turned the clean channel up.
tried some 5881's and then ended up going back to the mesa 6L6.

id like something to bring the bass under control. maybe i'll send back the tung-sol's and try some el34's or something

 

[hollow soul]

I was just reading the manual again and came across that bit about ordering presence controls. I think i might try it!
I didnt really WANT the orange channel to sound like the red, i just wondered if it should be as muddy as i thought it was.

after the preamp tube change there is less fizz in the red, and the clean is awesome. maybe i just need to get used to driving the controls a bit more.

I had my bias rite across the output tubes when i was mucking about. the outer pair seem a lot cooler when idle then the inner tubes. the tubes are matched and it doesnt matter which socket a particular tube is in. the same result occur. the difference can be substantial, like +10mA and maybe a few more maybe +18mA. i wouldn't have thought that was right.

thanks for all the help by the way!

 

[hollow soul]

I find the exact opposite. I like orange channel more than the red. It seems more organic than than the red channel with less fizz. I use it on vintage with treble around 2, mid around 12 and bass around 10 with presence fairly low and the gain setting varies from song to song. I never go past 2 for the gain.

Hope this helps. Good luck

im going to try these settings and see what happens!

 

[hollow soul]

Got the JJ 6V6's today.
put em in, checked the bias, all fine as long as i dont use silicon rectifier, but the GZ34 rect tubes are better than the 5U4's so thats cool. the 6V6's idle at about 24mA in my dual rec.

sounds awesome!!!!!!
the tone is more balanced and i do exactly what i want with it. i also played with the suggested orange channel settings and made some progress.

im now more happy than ever with my dual rec.!!

thanks everyone!