Hi I just joined this board to see if i could find a used roadster. I have read quite a few reports concerning broken amps. Is there a problem with the roadster being to complex?. I have tried one and loved the whole thing .Why is everyone replacing tubes i have gigged a marshall for ten years with the same tubes and it has been treated roughly,thrown in the van no cover etc.Marque gigs dew, generators the whole thing I so much want this amp but am slightly taken aback by some of the problems some of you are getting .I would welcome some info .regards starsky
roadster/king reliability
- Thread starter starsky1
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jdurso
Well-known member
starsky1 said:
This question came up not too long ago and the best explaination is people are more inclined to post a topic if something goes wrong with their amp than when everything is going fine. So you will find quite a lot of issue related topics. Also consider half of the Roadster posts either deal with the infamous switching "pop" or the slight lag in switching channels. At the end of the day, the Roadster is a highly reliable amp and is built like a tank. You're always going to get a few lemons here and there and most of those "lemon's" issues are actually tube related which is the trade off we make when we play tube amps. One bad tube can cause the most irretating issues in the best built amps out there. So if you love the TONE of the Roadster, go for it... it's one of the most reliable amps I've had and in my two years with it i haven't had any problems.
As for changing tubes... i think what you'll find on this board is people from all walks of "tonal" life per say. We all like different tones but what joins us is the Boogie sound and characteristics which no tube can really change. So one guy might like el34s where another likes 6l6s where another likes kt77s. A lot of us here like to experiment just for the pure interest of seeing what kind of tones we can get out of our amps. i just recently started to experiement with different NOS preamp tubes for two reasons... one to elarn more about how the preamp works with each tube slot and how different tubes would create drastically different tones out of the same amp. My other motive was to try and get the best sound i could without leaning on external gear (Eqs and ODs). For the most part I've met both goals and love my current tube configuration. i guess the point I'm trying to make is some of us vest our time in different aspects of our amps.... and some of us are really off the deep end.
At the end of the day though, the Roadster is an incredible amp, built like a tank, is super reliable and on top of that you get the awesome 5 year warranty. I would take Mesa's reliablility and build quality any day of the week over almost every other builder out there... especially Marshall... you can break them just by looking at them the wrong way.
zakkfaerum
Well-known member
jdurso said:
Great post man!! I've had 2 Roadsters and they are very sweet. I may very well pick up another one. I've been playing Mesa amps for at least 7 or 8 years now and I've never had a problem. They truly are built like tanks!!
It's funny you bring this up because this weekend I dropped one of my amps off with a tech.
Nothing was wrong with it. I had just picked up a used Mark IV and wanted a tech to go through and service it.
While him and I were talking he mentioned he is an authorized repairman for Marshall as well as a bunch of other amps.
He said he has also seen his fair share of boutique amps as well.
He said without question the boogies are the best made amps he has ever worked on. He said like me, most people are bringing there boogies in for service, while with most other amps it's to fix something.
+1 on Jdurso knowing what he is talking about!
Nothing was wrong with it. I had just picked up a used Mark IV and wanted a tech to go through and service it.
While him and I were talking he mentioned he is an authorized repairman for Marshall as well as a bunch of other amps.
He said he has also seen his fair share of boutique amps as well.
He said without question the boogies are the best made amps he has ever worked on. He said like me, most people are bringing there boogies in for service, while with most other amps it's to fix something.
+1 on Jdurso knowing what he is talking about!
jdurso
Well-known member
you guys are making me blush 
In all seriousness though, most of what I know has come from who i associate myself with (most of my friends are musicians or work int he music industry) and this forum. There is so much knowledge and experience on this board and almost everyone here has a great, objective attitude. Take guys like Chris McKinley or Rocky, they have such great information and know how to present, far better than me I think. I tend to rant and use elipses, because I tend to write like I talk which tends to have many side tracks if its something I'm exceited about. Anyway I can't take all the credit... i just want to keep learning and experimenting
In all seriousness though, most of what I know has come from who i associate myself with (most of my friends are musicians or work int he music industry) and this forum. There is so much knowledge and experience on this board and almost everyone here has a great, objective attitude. Take guys like Chris McKinley or Rocky, they have such great information and know how to present, far better than me I think. I tend to rant and use elipses, because I tend to write like I talk which tends to have many side tracks if its something I'm exceited about. Anyway I can't take all the credit... i just want to keep learning and experimenting
jdurso said:you guys are making me blush
In all seriousness though, most of what I know has come from who i associate myself with (most of my friends are musicians or work int he music industry) and this forum. There is so much knowledge and experience on this board and almost everyone here has a great, objective attitude. Take guys like Chris McKinley or Rocky, they have such great information and know how to present, far better than me I think. I tend to rant and use elipses, because I tend to write like I talk which tends to have many side tracks if its something I'm exceited about. Anyway I can't take all the credit... i just want to keep learning and experimenting
+1. Chris is the man. The guy knows more than God about EQ.
Thanks so much to all of you who replied,I am new to this forum. I bought a roadster and love it. there is a placibo effect from using a beautifull amp. the only issue i have is the noisy reverb hum.?but this will not matter at all in a noisy pub. regards starsky
