ED Dissapointment

[rabies]

btw, do the electra dyne or RA-100 have recto tubes? or only the Mark V?

that's one reason I liked the V: low wattage with recto. I need to steal one of those...

 

[screamingdaisy]

btw, do the electra dyne or RA-100 have recto tubes? or only the Mark V?

that's one reason I liked the V: low wattage with recto. I need to steal one of those...

The ED doesn't have a tube rectifier, although they've built some natural sag into the amp so it's not super stiff either.

 

[toneocaster]

Amazes me that so many don't get the "ONE channel, 3 mode" thing. Really does.

Birdy, I'm all ears? I get what it does, I just can't make my ED do it, not to my liking anyway! Help me understand why my Hot Rod Deluxe works and sounds great between all 3 modes and the ED falls short? I did notice this afternoon that when I turn the treble all the way up, there's a very distinct "kinda" treble to "ice pick in the forehead". From about 4:00 to all the way up the treble screams. Maybe I have a defective amp?

 

[YellowJacket]

Amazes me that so many don't get the "ONE channel, 3 mode" thing. Really does.

Birdy, I'm all ears? I get what it does, I just can't make my ED do it, not to my liking anyway! Help me understand why my Hot Rod Deluxe works and sounds great between all 3 modes and the ED falls short? I did notice this afternoon that when I turn the treble all the way up, there's a very distinct "kinda" treble to "ice pick in the forehead". From about 4:00 to all the way up the treble screams. Maybe I have a defective amp?

Birdy cheats!! He has a 6L6 loaded ED 2 x 12 combo and an EL-34 loaded ED head which he runs with a Marshall 1960ax (greenback) cab and an attenuator.

In my experience, the ED does what it does extremely well but it sounds like you are trying to make it do something that it doesn't do well?

I find that it works well with both my Gibson Les Paul and my Godin LG, both of which are 24 3/4 scale darker sounding instruments. I found that the clean tone sounds great and isn't so sensitive to EQ adjustments, which allows me to really dial in the dirt the way I want. I tried a Strat with the Electra Dyne and I didn't personally like it much...

Generally, I'd say that if you like the tones that Mesa designed the amp to do, you'll find all the channels work out OK. It is when you want extreme and very different settings between channels that you run into the most trouble. **IF** you want to spend money to make the amp work out for you, I suggest the following: 1) Look into a pickup / electronics upgrade. The Electra Dyne is very sensitive to pickups so if you get one with a good clean tone and another with a good drive tone then it will help immensely. 2) Investigate speaker options. Depending on what you need, you might find a v30 much less muddy.

 

[primal]

Amazes me that so many don't get the "ONE channel, 3 mode" thing. Really does.

Birdy, I'm all ears? I get what it does, I just can't make my ED do it, not to my liking anyway! Help me understand why my Hot Rod Deluxe works and sounds great between all 3 modes and the ED falls short? I did notice this afternoon that when I turn the treble all the way up, there's a very distinct "kinda" treble to "ice pick in the forehead". From about 4:00 to all the way up the treble screams. Maybe I have a defective amp?

Maybe the ED just isn't for you.

There was an ED at Guitar Center in Raleigh that definitely did not sound like mine. I think it may have had a bad preamp tube. I don't know. But I know had mine sounded like that one I never would have bought it.

So it is possible something something is up with yours. But maybe not.

Point is you should not have to fight with an amp as much as you have to get it to sound the way you want.

Regarding shared controls being a buzz kill, when I plug into it, it sounds the way I expect it to. And it sounds better then any other amp for what I like. There is a compromise with the shared controls, but for me the sound outways the compromises

 

[YellowJacket]

Point is you should not have to fight with an amp as much as you have to get it to sound the way you want.

Regarding shared controls being a buzz kill, when I plug into it, it sounds the way I expect it to. And it sounds better then any other amp for what I like. There is a compromise with the shared controls, but for me the sound outways the compromises

Agreed. I can get a fantastic tone for clean, blue, and red with my axes, regardless of the limitations. Sure the lows 'can' be a bit boomy but once you add a bass guitar into the mix, you can afford to pull the bass dial back as much as necessary since the bassist will fill in any holes the guitarist leaves.

The other thing to consider is pickups and electronics. These really are critical factors in getting an axe to cooperate with any boogie amp. For instance, I would never use a scooped sounding pickup with my Dual Recto. Mid boost / bass cut pickups are best for that head. The Electra Dyne is somewhat the same, although more vintage sounding pickups work very well with it. The more pronounced mids make it more versatile for classic tones.

For the sake of discussion, lets all list the guitars we are using as well as the pickups / electronics:

Godin LG: (Solid Mahogany guitar with rosewood fingerboard and a bolt on neck. 24 3/4 scale)
Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pro (neck) Seymour Duncan Custom Custom (bridge) (Pots and Caps are stock and the 5 way switch was replaced with a 3 way one)

Gibson Les Paul Standard Premium Plus 2002: (Solid Mahogany body with maple top and mahogany set neck. Rosewood fingerboard and 60s profile neck)
BareKnuckle Rebel Yell set with CTS 500k audio taper pots and Mojotone Paper in Oil 0.22 uf caps.

Cab:
Oversized 2 x 12 based off of Mills Mach212B design. Hellatone 60 (v30) and c90.

 

[toneocaster]

Just by chance at last nights gig, the guy who owned the ED originally came by. At the break I cornered him and told him of my ED problems. He assured me that it was probably just a bad preamp tube(s). He offered to stop by the house and give it a listen, so I'll try replacing the 3 hi-lo preamp tubes and I'll let y'all know if that fixes it.

 

[YellowJacket]

Ya, flubby and muddy tone could definitely be caused by an angry preamp tube.

 

[jeffp]

Fender AM strat ...Lace sensor Hot Gold w/hot bridge.....2x12 Rectifier Closed back w/G12-65`s..........good idea about lising guitar, pickups, cab & speakers too please!...jeffp

 

[YellowJacket]

How are the g12 - 65s?? **curious**

 

[jeffp]

so far SWEET!...i only have a couple hours at the most on them. My turn on call at work again. How long does it take to break em in?..I can tell you i noticed a difference right away. And now it seems even better. Next week i`ll be able to put more time in.

 

[dodger916]

so far SWEET!...i only have a couple hours at the most on them. My turn on call at work again. How long does it take to break em in?..

From the Celestion website: http://professional.celestion.com/guitar/features/drdecibel/index.asp

"How do I break in my speakers?

Important Note! Before breaking it in it's advisable to "warm up" the speaker gently for a few minutes with low-level playing or background hum.

Break in a speaker with a fat, clean tone: turn up the power amp volume to full, and control the level with the preamp gain. Use a level that will be quite loud, but not painful in a normal size room.

Have the bass and mid up full, and the treble at least half. On your guitar, use the middle pick up position (if your guitar has more than one pick up) and play for 10-15 minutes using lots of open chords, and chunky percussive playing. This will get the cone moving, and should excite all the cone modes and get everything to settle in nicely. The speaker will continue to mature over the years, but this will get it 95% of the way to tonal perfection in the shortest time."

 

[screamingdaisy]

I can tell you from experience that that Celestion quote is bullshit.

In general, the speakers I've broken in have taken around 5 to 7 hours to break in, with another 40 to 80 hours of what I'll call "maturing".

I've had some speakers take longer... and others sounded broke in straight out of the box.

 

[dodger916]

I can tell you from experience that that Celestion quote is bullshit.

How so?

 

[screamingdaisy]

How so?

In general, the speakers I've broken in have taken around 5 to 7 hours to break in, with another 40 to 80 hours of what I'll call "maturing".

I've had some speakers take longer... and others sounded broke in straight out of the box.

 

[dodger916]

How so?

In general, the speakers I've broken in have taken around 5 to 7 hours to break in, with another 40 to 80 hours of what I'll call "maturing".

I've had some speakers take longer... and others sounded broke in straight out of the box.

I agree that speakers take many more than a few hours to mature, but I think their advice to start off at lower volumes and then use cleaner, louder, full-tone chording as a means of initial break-in makes sense.

 

[screamingdaisy]

I agree that speakers take many more than a few hours to mature, but I think their advice to start off at lower volumes and then use cleaner, louder, full-tone chording as a means of initial break-in makes sense.

The initial question was how long does it take to break speakers in.

The answer provided in the Celestion quote was 10-15 minutes.

I'm not questioning the method, simply the timeline.

 

[jeffp]

you`re both right. I really can`t wait to put some time into it. After just 2-3hrs tops The two 65`s sound REAL GOOD in the 2x12 Recto cab! I knew the speakers were good. But i didn`t know how they would sound in this cab w/closed back and all. I think it got what i was looking for in classic rock!Seems to ALL match up pretty good. More in a week.jeffp

 

[YellowJacket]

The people demand clips.

 

[jeffp]

i have no way of doing that right now. sorry. we`ll try to figure something out.