Help me chose an used Mark V

[NeoRamza]

Hi! After years of waiting I'm about to buy a Mark V 90. I don't have much options available around so I'm currently limited to two options:
1. This first one is an April/2010, still with the silver back cage. It seems to be in mint condition besides the year.
2. The second one the seller said it is 2011 maybe 2012. Already have the black cage. Still have all original tubes except for the rectifier one. The seller says it is its only unoriginal characteristic.

What worries me about the first one is that it may not have the new board and upgrade Mesa did on CH3 mid 2010.

What worries me about the second one is that besides the seller says it is all original, it have a strange peeling painting coming off on the back (see attachment). Is that normal or is that an indication that the amp has gone through some issue?

Am I being too picky? What would you do? Hope you guys can help.

 

[rarebitusa]

So from what I recall reading the original design for Ch 3 has a bit higher gain but somewhat harsher. Word has it Mesa made a revision around 2010 to reduce the gain and some of the high end on Ch3 especially related to Mark IV mode. I have never seen details around the specific circuit changes, would be great to know about them.

Is this a show stopper these days? TBH dunno I wonder. There's been alot of players with various solutions to address Ch 3 harshness pre/post 2010... if you should feel that is a problem. Is the Ch 3 harshness a universal take from the players, to me it doesn't really appear so. But you certainly will find those posts that outline that as a major issue to them. TBH you'd have to play it yourself to really know.

The paint peeling... cosmetic. Possibly an indication it was in some varying environments, perhaps left in a garage. Or maybe just a poor prep day at Mesa back then.

Mu question is... is one a better deal then the other

 

[tbonesullivan]

I wonder if they had LEDs or glow in the dark tape stuck on there before or something. As long as they were well taken care of, really shouldn't matter which one you choose. There are a lot of Mark V's out there that have never left the house and never really been driven hard.

LIke the one in my basement LOL.

 

[DECEMBER]

Blemishes are to be expected on 12+ year old gear. The price should be appropriate for not being mint. I'd totally buy cosmetically blemished used items to get a lower price.
I recently bought a used Mark V. Ordered online from an established guitar store selling with many good reviews on Reverb. It was visibly in perfect condition, with the older footswitch with aluminum edges, but it had all kinds of problems. High-pitched noise, low frequency hum, and the Tweed setting sounded like it had a shorted connection somewhere - broken, garbled distorted sound. It still had the 12+ year old original tubes... I replaced them all and the noise was reduced but not gone and the Tweed was still sounding broken and with a high-pitched whine. I had to return it.
Bought the next one from Guitar Center so I could get cheaper overnight shipping and the 45-day return policy. This one has the newer all-black footswitch and cost almost $400 more. When I first plugged it in it was all messed up - noise, volume drop when FX loop engaged, then no signal at all when FX loop bypassed. It also had 12 year old original tubes. I replaced them all and everything has been working fine for about 50 days now. It's past the return window, so I'm keeping it. UPS actually took 5 days to deliver it, so I got a refund for the overnight shipping, and GC gave me $120 back because I had to buy new tubes for it.
I wish I had the option to buy one in person, but the only Mark available in town is a new VII for $3500. The V ended up costing me about $1920 after the partial refund. If you have options you can try out first, just make sure to plug in and thoroughly test every channel and every voicing, every wattage setting... turn the EQ, reverb, and FX loop on and off on every setting. Flip the diode/tube and pentode/triode switches on the back... just test everything, every setting, every switch, every knob. And it's a good idea to have a full set of replacement tubes on hand as soon as you get the amp. 12 year old tubes won't have much life left and old/bad tubes cause all kinds of issues that make the amp seem broken. Even if they're not bad, the amp will probably sound better with new tubes. Sellers list them as having all-original tubes, as if that's a good thing... all that tells me is that they neglected the amp and probably haven't played it for years. There's nothing special about the original tubes, especially if they're that old, so there's no reason to keep them in it. They're just Mesa-branded 12AX7's and 6L6GC's with an SPAX7 in V1. I've had EHX, JJ, Ruby, Tung Sol, and MB tubes and they all sound the same. The only one that has a noticeable difference in tone is the one NOS RCA 12AX7 I have.
It's a great sounding amp. Should be the last amp I ever buy.

 

[NeoRamza]

Thank you all for the answers. Maybe it wasn't clear on my post, but I can't test them before buy. I guess the points I made about which one to get is not what I should be look at, right? With only this differences I think I should just stick to the most reliable seller.

 

[rarebitusa]

I guess the points I made about which one to get is not what I should be look at, right? With only this differences I think I should just stick to the most reliable seller.

Yea, a reliable seller is a deciding factor for sure.

 

[notyalcer]

That missing paint looks to be on the thin plywood spacers and the side brace that are part of the head cab construction. The chassis snugs up against them, and the actual metal chassis looks fine in the photo. No signs of water damage. I wouldn't worry about that missing paint.

 

[MarkV User]

Knowing very little about the actual changes in these amps over time I’d like the 2010 amp or the one that has been on for fewer hours if you can guess.

I bought mine new in 2013 and never liked it until I put a lot of work into it. These amps are very complicated to work on. If you have to recap it eventually then it will be unpleasant—more so than with other amps.

Not all Mark V amps sound good. They may have a distinctive sound that is recognizable and hard to dial out. Some have unnatural high frequencies. Some of them sound amazing. And you can probably make any of them sound great if you put in enough work.

 

[skoora]

I wouldn't buy one online unless there was a return policy. I had a 2009/10 model since new which I only sold less than a year ago and apart from V1 gettin a weird noise artifact (fixed with new tube), I never had a single problem with it and ran the same 34's in it for all that time tuned up pretty loud with an attenuator. The only common issue I had (as in common with many MK V's) was the poor pin connection in the foot switch which would sometimes have FX loop on/off not work until I wiggled the cable.
All that being said, with everything going on in those amps, I wold need some security in buying without trying.

 

[NeoRamza]

I'm glad to announce that I pulled the trigger on the 2010 one. Bought online without testing before. I had no other option, besides not buying one.

It just arrived yesterday and I could only use it for like an hour yet. It was enough to check if all switches and knobs was working, and everything is fine. The amp is in great condition for a 14y gear, even the footswitch. The handler is pristine, so it was probably used just at home/studio.

I still didn't get the opportunity to play it loud, but I am impressed by how good this amp sounds at bedroom volumes. I wasn't expecting that. I even have a couple of attenuators for this, but I still didn't tried it on this amp yet.

No idea if it has the 2010 circuit upgrade. The ch3 sounds really good, so I'll not bother to check this, at least not now. But if I eventually do, I'll post here to let you know.

Thanks everyone for helping me on this decision.