Road King Trip (cabs and stuff)

[Rubik's Revenge]

Hey there people, first post here,

I recently just got my second Mesa/Boogie amp, a Road King I, great amp, I got a Orange PPC412 and the tones are nice out of it, but I feel sometimes it is a bit too dark for the RK.

Should I trade my Orange for a Mesa cab? or is just a matter of knowing the amp better?

Also, could the RK owners help me with this big amp in achieving a good sound?

Give your knowledge here guys, this is a enormous amp and a help is much appreciated by me and other people from here...no mods no more spend of money, just pure tone out of it, what you say?

 

[knotts]

I'm not familiar with the Road King, but I have a Roadster and I replaced the stock V1 preamp tube with a Tungsol to get more clarity and definition out of the amp. It made a huge difference. I would imagine that it's much the same. You say you have RKI and I'm not sure how hold it is but just retubing it could help bring it to life as well.

 

[Rubik's Revenge]

I'm not familiar with the Road King, but I have a Roadster and I replaced the stock V1 preamp tube with a Tungsol to get more clarity and definition out of the amp. It made a huge difference. I would imagine that it's much the same. You say you have RKI and I'm not sure how hold it is but just retubing it could help bring it to life as well.

I just retube everything when I got it.

it works really well but I think is a really low amp

I think the preamp of the road king is the same as the roadster

 

[knotts]

I thought my Roadster was dark as well. I put a Tungsol 12ax7 in the V1 position in place of the Mesa branded tube. It took away the dark character which made all the difference for me. Did you retube it with Mesa tubes?

 

[BluesAndBooze]

Speaker change!!
Either swap out the Celestions and move them on from the Orange or get an empty 4x12 cabinet and move on the complete Orange PPC412.
Get 4 x Eminence Delta Pro 12's and then you'll know how good your head really is. The speakers don't colour, have a look on Eminence site for their specs, they are not listed as a guitar speaker they are in the Pro Audio range. Phenomenal air movement and projection, each is a 400watt speaker.
Get used to your amp and the tone you want just your amp to give and let the Delta Pro 12's push it out. Plus at the moment they are an unsung hero at a low price. They like a closed back cabinet!
I put them in my sons Randall, one in one of my Lonestars and 4 in my Road King cabinet, total transformation of each. I spoke with Mesa about it and the only concern they had was to use an 8 bolt fixing instead of 4 because of the weight of them, they're like the old Electro Voice, heavy.
If your still worried about top end brightness Eminence do a Commonwealth 12 that has a metal dome, still heavy high powered, with a little more edge. They are very much like an original JBL E120, I've one in another Lonestar.
More dramatic than a valve change and people will happily buy used speakers. Check them out on YouTube.
Good sound hunting
:mrgreen:

 

[VanWreckto]

The Orange PPC412 in also one of the darkest sounding cabinets around. A Mesa Trad. size 4x12 would serve your amp better I think.

 

[tomprs]

I would sell the Orange and buy a Mesa cab. Orange cab just don't sound good with Mesa high gain heads: these cabs are very dark, very dry sounding and the highs are unpleasant to my ears. I LOVE my dual rec through my new traditional (stiletto) 4x12 cab. Punchy as hell, defined and warm I would say.

Hope it helps, although I'm talking about the Dual Rec and not the Road King.

Tom.