Road King II Sound

[smashingchicago]

I recently broke out my RKII and noticed that the sound is very weak -- it sounds like it's set on "spongy", but it's not. I recently replaced all the tubes and no difference. It certainly does not sound tight at all. Any ideas on what the problem might be?

 

[Boogiebabies]

Make sure your shorting jack is plugged all the way into the second bank of speaker jacks. Also check to see if your loop mix knob is at least at 12-1:00.

 

[smashingchicago]

I did check all that. The gain just doesn't seem to be very powerful at all and it's a very loose sound. When I use my Ibanez overdrive pedal, it improves, but the native sound (without a pedal) really seems weak.

 

[TheSon]

Ha...
I see where you are coming from ...
from experience and a lot of reading on here, it seems that it depends on any or all of the following:

place you're in,
where it's placed there-in,
wall voltage,
cab and speakers,
guitar wood,
guitar pickup,
guitar setup,
string condition,
cable quality,
volume played at,
all before you consider its settings

Many say stuff like "for $??K I expected more" and I think I was like that initialy, but the more I have perservered with it the more I see that Mesa is like the hottest of chicks; high mainatainence (to setup), highly expensive, highly tempramental, but when you get it right, **** is it sweet...

Most things in life that are higher spec and more expensive need more attention, experience and skill to get optimum results... so why should it be different with amps ... if you want plug and play with great results every time I think thats not Mesa's style. maybe a few examples like lonestar or stiletto can be like that but by the same token, they could never sound like a recto at the top of its game.

keep it for a while and mess around with everything... if one time it sounds awesome, cool, but dont expect it to be there still next time and place round, expect to have to jorney there again, and hopefully, that gets quicker each time.

 

[smashingchicago]

You could be right, it might just need alot of messing around with, but I think that would apply more to getting the "right type of sound". My issue is that gain seems pathetically weak and is that possibly a bad component in the amp? How can you tweak to get more gain and more bite. I played around with a Mesa F-50 at guitar center and it sounded chunkier and more bite than my RKII.

 

[CoG]

quick stupid question, you're not trying to do this at bedroom volume, are ya?

 

[mrd]

I'm playing my Road King right now with old as **** power tubes and it still sounds amazing.

Run two cabs into it man, it opens up the sound somehow, even beyond the fact that it's louder, it lets the amp breathe or something. Whenever I think the RK sounds crappy or weak or anything, I plug in another cab into the "B" speaker jack and set all the channels to speaker A+B and suddenly it sounds deep and rich and awesome.

Right now I'm playing channel 3 modern with EL34s. Loop off, volume is only at about 8:30, presence 1 oclock, bass, mid, treble all at 12 oclock, gain at 1 oclock... I'm getting a great tone.

 

[phyrexia]

Are you using the GT8 with it?

Have you tried different guitars with it? Speaker cabs?

Is this something that happened suddenly or has it been like this all the time?

How old is your house?

FWIW spongy doesn't make the amp sound much less gainy. Just lowers the output and changes the feel a little.

 

[funkmaskin]

It sounds like something is wrong with your amp. I have a roadking 2 head and no matter what guitar I use or if I use 1 or 2 speakers, the gain never sounds weak. I have only tried it with v30 closed back cabinets so I can only speak from that experience, but still....
Dont know what it could be tough.

 

[TheSon]

Yeah, if the gain doesnt sound like its in the same general ball park as most mesa amps then perhapse a pre-tube issue but you said you replaced them all and no difference so get it sent back from whence it came.

 

[konstantine RK]

GT8 and a mesa to me seems unecessary unless you can leave all the distorted presets out.

 

[scottkahn]

Here are some things to check out:

Did you just replace power tubes or did you replace the PREAMP tubes? It could be that you have a defective preamp tube. Those can last decades, but occasionally problems do show up, even in new amps.

Did you replace the power tubes with genuine Mesa/Boogie tubes in MATCHED pairs? The only way to guaranty that it sounds "right" is to at least start with the right tubes. If you're experimenting with other brand tubes, you may not get the sound you've come to expect from the amp.

Your RK II has 6L6 and EL34 tubes. Have you explored the different settings on your channels for the progressive linkage? Do a test on channel 3 or 4, which are the same.

On the rear, are you set to 2x6L6, 4x6L6, 2xEL34, or 2+4? Start with either 2x6L6 or 4x6L6 on the back, with Recto Tracking set for tube (that's another tube that may have gone south, too).

Turn the loops OFF. If you only have one cabinet, make sure the selector is set for Speaker A and you have the grounding plug in the other speaker jack.

On the front, on Channel 3, set it for Raw or Modern. Make sure your Presence knob is at 12:00. The channel Master volume -- put it somewhere around 11:00-12:00. Set the amp's OUTPUT volume knob at around 10:00-11:00. You should be able to get monstrous classic Dual Rectifier tone with these settings.

If you're not getting monstrous tone, switch the rectification switch on the back to Diode instead of tube -- this will help see if you blew one of your rectification tubes.

What speaker cabinet are you playing this through? And do you have the right ohm settings between the back of the amp and the cabinet?

If all this fails, Mesa/Boogie has great support -- call them on the telephone during PST daytime business hours Monday through Thursday.

Scott

 

[mcsdude]

I had this happen to me once at practice when we were practicing at one of the band members houses that we never practiced at. I just could not get any juice and initially thought I had tubes going bad. I brought it home and plugged it in and it was fine. We've never practiced at that spot again and I never had that trouble ever again. Makes me think there was something to do with the electricity. Have you tried different outlets or taken the amp somewhere else and plugged it in?