Official TriAxis Tube Thread

[MesaGod666]

Hey fellas. Been a while since I've posted a decent topic. I found that there is so much scattered information on this board regarding tubes for the Triaxis. So, I'm hoping you can help me out a bit and share with me your thoughts getting good tone using different tubes.

I recently had my TriAxis retubed with all JJ's (unbeknownst to me...I had JJs only in the V2 & V4 and stock Mesa's in the V1, V3, V5 slots...all rating matched of course). I really like the JJ's in the V2 and V4. I found that the JJ's sound darker than the stock Mesa's giving you room to get a nice squishy tone with a tight low-end, but I don't think they sound as good for V1 & V3 because they break up much earlier making it difficult to garner a nice chimey clean sound. I'll probably go back to matched stock Mesa Ruby's in the next day or two, but I'm interested in trying other tubes like Sovtek, Tung-Sol, Groove Tubes, and other preamp tubes to experiment a bit.

What are some of your experiences? Please feel free to link/copy from other posts on this topic as well. I'm interested in consolidating as much of this information as possible for reference.

 

[Jackie]

I like a JJ in V4, because it makes the Lead 2 Tones nice and round, soft, also tames Lead 2 Red somewhat in terms of highs. Adds some drive though, I had to lower my Gain/Lead Drive 2 by around 0.5 or 1, depending on the sound. It really makes a very focused, rounded tone.

For V1, I like TungSol, cleans up Red and makes bass on Green&Orange more usable. It's funny that it was USELESS in my Marshall (turned it into a harsh bright mess), but in the Mesa, it makes the mids silky, the highs just right and the bass is more controlled.

For V2, I like EH 12AX7, this is becoming one of my favorite 12AX7s, it's well defined, more open, yet not overly bright with a very nice but very slight low mid bump and less bass - result is BALLZ with clarity and slightly less fizz/unwanted gain. Also makes clean nice and warm but still defined, rounds Lead 2 some more.

So for now, I have

V1: TungSol 12AX7
V2: EH 12AX7
V3: Sovtek 12AX7WA for now, will try EH as soon as I get it (supposedly one gain stage from Lead 1 Red is V3B, but otherwise it's fine)
V4: JJ ECC83
V5: Sovtek 12AX7WA (actually I find this tube very quiet in terms of noise and it has nice balance so I'll keep it here)

In the 2:90, I have JJ for the driver (slams the signal nicely), and TungSols for clarity. Might try EH at some point but probably won't bother since I have to take it apart to change them and it sounds good as it is.

How I got here, my tube rolling experiment.

As far as brands go, don't buy Groove Tubes. Groove Tubes just re-labels tubes and sells them for more than you get from other brands with the same quality sorting. For example a Chinese 12AX7 from TAD is cheaper than GT in most cases. A "Russian" GT is the same as a Tung or EH, but is more expensive. I might be wrong but that's my knowing. There are only 3 factories after all (Russia:New Sensor - TungSol, EH, Sovtek, Svetlana/SED; Slovakia:JJ/Tesla, China: Shuguang).

 

[bluestometal]

I've ever used a full set of JJ ECC83s in my Triaxis but I was thinking to swap some tube to better shape my tone and put some lower gain/quiter tube here and there and see if I came up with something I prefer, for sure I'll put a quiter tube in V5 (I use the fx loop) and try the same in V1, V2 and maybe V3.

 

[daveg62]

Just got my used triaxis the other day. I tried just about every tube I have lying around here and ended up with this combination which really sound 100% better than what was in there.
v1 - raytheon 12ax7 blackplate nos
v2 - nos mullard short greyplate britan
v3 - sylvania 12at7/wa nos
v4 - rft 12ax7 nos
v5 - tungsram 12ax7 nos