Mark V:35 Tube Swap

[Ulle]

Hi
I`m the happy owner of a Mark V:35 head. Best amp I ever owned, but a little bit to high gained for my playing style.
I use a Gibson Lucille and a couple of pedals in the train. TS 808, Timmy ect.
Has anyone tried to swap the 12AX7 tubes to lower gain tubes AU7 or AT7. I love the Crunch channel but It isn`t usable because I is hard to dial on the gain pot. The sweet spot in my opinion is at allmost zero gain. I mostly use the FAT mode with a Timmy in the chain. I think to swap the V1 or V2 to a high quality NOS lower gain tube to let me dial the gain pots up in a more controable area.

My old Triaxis was very easy to dial in on both crunch and dirt channels, and I believe that the Mark V use almost same gain stage setup.
The Triaxis had a low gain Tube in V1 to.

Any thoughts, suggestions and experience are velcome.

Best Regards from Denmark

 

[Bluzen]

Hi
I`m the happy owner of a Mark V:35 head. Best amp I ever owned, but a little bit to high gained for my playing style.
I use a Gibson Lucille and a couple of pedals in the train. TS 808, Timmy ect.
Has anyone tried to swap the 12AX7 tubes to lower gain tubes AU7 or AT7. I love the Crunch channel but It isn`t usable because I is hard to dial on the gain pot. The sweet spot in my opinion is at allmost zero gain. I mostly use the FAT mode with a Timmy in the chain. I think to swap the V1 or V2 to a high quality NOS lower gain tube to let me dial the gain pots up in a more controable area.

My old Triaxis was very easy to dial in on both crunch and dirt channels, and I believe that the Mark V use almost same gain stage setup.
The Triaxis had a low gain Tube in V1 to.

Any thoughts, suggestions and experience are velcome.

Best Regards from Denmark

Hello, I'm in the same situation. Did you ever come up with a solution to rolling back some of the gain? Thanks.

 

[user 21540]

12AY7s are a better replacement for 12AX7s as they draw the same sort of current. ATs and AUs will work but are usually used as driver tubes in circuits such as for reverbs and tend to draw more current.
https://killerrig.com/12ax7-vs-12at7/
Another option is the 5751 which has 30% less gain than a 12AX7.

 

[Ulle]

Hello, I'm in the same situation. Did you ever come up with a solution to rolling back some of the gain? Thanks.

Hi Bluzen. I`m sorry for this late answer. I have tried various combinations of 12AU and 12AT tubes in V1 V2. The amp sounds nice but feels lazy an doll whatever I do so I`m back on 12AX. I use the FAT mode and crunch it up with a pedal instead. I run 4 cable method and is about to mod the amp to be remote switched between FAT and Crunch, to use the crunch channel as dirt channel.