DUAL RECTIFIER 2 CHANNEL TOO LOOSE

[kissmyaxe]

Hey guys, I just purchased a dual rectifier 2 channel and i'm having a ***** of a time getting a good tone out of this thing. HUGE sound, it's got all the potential to sound amazing BUT I obviously don't know what i'm doin' with this thing. First off, how do you tighten this thing up? Palm muting is futile at the moment, and the leads have nothing to them. I turn up the gain to compensate for the lack of distortion but then it just gets all chingy and ear piercing. if I turn down the treble and bring up the bass a little to get a beefier sound on those highs then my rhythms have too much bass behind them. I've turned the Mids right down, it seems to have helped a bit but I'm still missing something. From what I hear, these amps are very touchy and a millimeter of change can drastically change the tone of the amp. I was using a Triple XXX before, I had a great tight sound to with but went Mesa because I was curious if it could big up my sound. Anyways, any help would be greatly appreciated, I'm a Mesa Virgin haha. Style of music I play are anything from Saosin to Avenged Sevenfold to Robben Ford. Thanks guys.

 

[Elpelotero]

oof....I hate to break it to you, but you're going to have a tough time getting it to sound exactly like you want it to. By nature, these amps are very loose and are not smooth on leads. You can tweak for hours and improve a lot, but you still won't be able to take that natural sound out of the amp.

Your best bet right now is to get a MaxonOD808 pedal and plug it in before the preamp. In other words, into the input jack. It will tighten it up considerably and give you smoother leads. That's probably about as tight as it will get.

Turn the mids UP by the way. They tighten it up. Turn the bass down below 12 noon and don't crank the gain more than around 2:00 or you'll get mush. Also try using the vintage mode on channel 2. Many people like it a lot.

If none of this works, try returning it before the 30 days are up, assuming you bought it from guitar center.

A Mark4 or Stilleto will cover your needs much better for the style you're trying to do.

 

[kissmyaxe]

ya i just bought this via ebay so it's not returnable, i may try what you suggested however. you're right about the stillettos, wow, i was listening to those clips about 4 posts up and holy **** that is a very nice sound. thanks for the feedback. much appreciated.

 

[mrd]

Try everything at noon (including volume), turn the mids down to around 9:00 to 10:00 oclock, and back off the gain to about 11:00 or 11:30. Silicon diodes, clean boost up front.

If that isn't tight and huge then I don't know what is.

 

[LUCRETIA]

try el34s+boost pedal.Might tighten the recto.

 

[JOEY B.]

Channel Cloning- Red to Vintage. This makes both presence controls active. Cutting the mids will only make the already weak lead tone worse. Back in my Recto days, I used a compressor in the loop, and a V-twin out front set for clean boost for that over the top single note lead sound. 8) Good luck man!

 

[Elpelotero]

I agree...on a recto, you can't cut the mids to get it tight.

 

[LnTh]

lots of mids, much less bass than you think, easy on the gain (12:00, 1:00), silicone rectos, bold power. Modern mode is tighter than the vintage but also harsher.

I've never been a fan of lead sounds in rectos without an outside eq (that's why I'm looking for a second amp just for solos)

Pretty much it.

 

[kissmyaxe]

what would you guys suggest for a good EQ to use along side these rectos. i've been messing with it for the past 4 days, i'm really trying to balance the scale, but no matter what i'm doing, the leads are, sorry to say, GARBAGE, i'm quite disapointed at the moment with this amp. I'm gonna try switching out the tubes to EL34s, see if they make a difference at all. the only thing that is impressing me so far with this amp is the sheer MASSIVE sound, I turn the master up to 10 oclock and my house starts to shake haha. i'm not a big fan of adding confusion to the mix (i.e. EQs, Compressors, Effects). I like nothing but raw amp sound with nothin' helping it out, maybe a reverb pedal or delay, but it's very rare that i do that. i should also mention i'm using a marshall jcm800 1960A cabinet with it. thanks guys, the replies are greatly appreciated

 

[ibanez4life SZ!]

Does the cab have V30s or the GT-75s? I've found the GTs don't go well with Rectos at all.

I had a very similar situations a year or so ago. Owned a recto, and always had the same exact problems...sounded huge, but it was just too loose, and the leads were just horrible.

Long story short, I tried everything, and then ended up with a Mark IV, and I'm in heaven.

 

[mrd]

Might wanna try a different cab too. I've never liked Mesa gear with Marshall cabs too much.

 

[jhguitar1]

You might want to try switching out the rectifier tubes. According to Doug's tubes, the GZ34's run at a higher voltage and will tighten the amp up but give it a different feel. I am going to try a pair in my Roadster. Honestly, I don't think my amp has a terrible lead tone. I used to own a Dual Rec and the Roadster blows it away. Just my opinion though.
I also tried the Roadster with a Marshall cab and it sucked the life right out of the amp!!!!!!! Don't use a Marshall cab with a Rec.

 

[leather_face666]

Try setting your gain at around 12 o'clock, mids at around 2 or 3 o'clock and bass and treble at 12 o'clock. Tweak your sound as you desire with the prescence control and work out from there. Then get an EQ pedal to boost the gain for leads and set it with a shallow bass cut and boost up the upper mids. Tweak as it sounds best to you. Remember to use Silicon Diode rectifiers and set the Variac switch to Bold.

You should also keep in mind the room and the volume you are using it at. The louder the more boomy and if in a small room the flubbier the amp is gonna sound. Still the Recto is pretty darn tight while at the mid gain setting and looses clarity as you ramp up the gain. Controls also loose effectiveness thus the lack of tightness.

 

[Monkey Rocket]

i put an MXR 6-band eq in the loop and loved the result

 

[EMGguitarist]

What kind of sound are you looking for? I've got a 2ch dual myself and even though I've only had it roughly a week, I've already found my sweet spot. Silicon diodes, red to vintage, i run it like this
ORANGE RED
vintage clean (blues but its cloned)
Gain: 3 oclock 10-11 oclock
Treble 2 oclock 2-3 oclock
Mid: 10 oclock 11-12 oclock
Bass: 4 oclock 2 oclock
Pres: 10 oclock 9 oclock
Rev: 8 oclock 10 oclock
Master: sounds better the louder

I find that for some reason, channel one is not as loud so i run my high gain on that one so i can push it for more gain and be easier on the ears and the volume difference onto channel two really helps to push the cleans without breakup. When I play metal that doesn't have any cleans to it like Pantera and stuff like that, I run channel two on vintage with a tad more mids and presence to really fatten up the tone for smooth searing leads. If you have an echo/delay, try running a single echo with a time of like 8ms. Thats a little something I do to give it a boost one channel one if channel two is set to cleans. Feel free to PM if ya need... Hope this helps! What kind of tone are you trying to get anyways?

 

[123thefirst]

It's the pickups... Rectos or Recto-related amps will take smeary, bassy tones and only amplify those characteristics, not compliment them.

 

[kissmyaxe]

Well I play a lot of types of music, but what I like is a low end smooth sounding punchy distortion without having the mids dialed back to last year. I don't want it saturated with distortion either, I wanna dial back that gain a bit, let's say 1 o'clock at the most and still have an amp who's heart still seems like it's beating. the Dual is dying on me back there. I'm playing with with the Master at the very most 10 o'clock, I'll back it off from there occasionally because it's **** loud haha. I've been using a Boss Compressor with it to tighten up the sound but I find I'm just turning up the sustain to keep the sound there and at that point it gets fizzy. I'm using a Gibson Les Paul Classic and I also use a Gibson Explorer. Believe it or not my old Peavey XXX had the punch and tightness that I liked but came up short on the Big Sound that my Mesa now gives me. But the Mesa falls short on what the Peavey gave me haha, can't win for losing I guess. haha

The sounds I'm goin' for is sometimes a Jimmy Eat World Futures album sound and sometimes I like that Dream Theater type of sound when I'm feelin' some Metal.

The more I read about these amps, the more I hear that they're **** near impossible to dial in properly. Some guys play them for YEARS and can't dial them in properly yet. But I'm not one for givin' up so... anymore advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[jarroldj]

This might seem like overkill for you, but what i do (i own both a Peavey Triple XXX and a Mesa Triple Rec) is run both of them together. Lots of tonal possibilities. It dont thing id ever gig with that setup but its **** fun to practice with, one half stack on each side of my drummer.

 

[kissmyaxe]

ya that is haha but thanks for the idea. i just thought about this the other day. Which in all of your opinions is the superior amp, the 2 channel rectifier or the 3 channel, could the 3 channel have the crunch i'm looking for?

 

[jarroldj]

Well i love my Triple Rec, but i do see your point on the XXX having some tighness to it that i could see how someone would prefer it. Im not much of a lead player so the mesa is all me. I play metal, but more of a nu metal than opposed to faster metal, so the triple is king in that respect. I have hopes of tightening mine with an overdrive and i have a set of EMG Zakk Wyldes for my les paul. Im hoping that will get me to where i want to be. The Peavey is a **** good amp and served me well, but as of right now its just a spare amp for when company comes over.