I recently purchased a Road King II V.1 Head new at L&M in Calgary Alberta.
This head actually arrived at the store new in February of this year.
The head was on Sale at $2699.00.
The history on the head was it had a previosu owner for a month upon which time it broke down. The descrition for the breakdown was... blown plate resister replaced cause was like a bad tube... all power amp tubes replaced.
As you can see this amphad some issued and this is likely why the origional owner brought it back.
As far as the store and warranty this item was still consdered a "new item". I took the amp home and through some discussion here ( many thanks ), some discussion on the phone to Mesa, and a few hours dialing in I found some great tones and overal really like this amp.
I had some concerns so L&M decided to order a brand new head for me.
The head came in thursday. I brought it home and unboxed it and it turns out that it is a Road King II V.2 There are some minor changes like input/ output and mute for a tuner. Instead of a aluminum bar protecting the tubes there is a cage now which has plastic mounts... it's really quite flimsy... it will stop a hand from getting burned but offer little in the way of a physical barrier for the tubes. I still have the first one as I wanted to compare and I have till tuesday to make a decision. To add I noticed theat the 6L6 tubes to not fully insert into the tube sockets as the socket screws are in the way. Did Mesa change thier sockets or tubes???
All in all I like the new feature changes for the tuner ins place of the Ext Switching. However I'm not sold on the new tube cage... I can see those plastic clips becoming brittle and trouble some down the road. I'm also not sold on the 6L6 tube issue eventhough there are spring style tube grabbers to prevent the tube from vibrating out.
Now comes the fun part... I set both heads up to the settings I recently dialed in and like and on channel one there is no noticable difference... two likewise BUT... on 3 & 4 there is a very noticable difference in tone and volume.
The V.1 head sounds muscular, dimensinal whereas the V.2 two head sounds whimpy.
Could this be a result of a different tube being used or has the cicuitry changed that much.
The master volume on V.1 louder at lower settings on the dial.
Is there a break in period for the V.2 head???
Can I expect it to just get better with time???
So given the circumstances I'm looking for advice on which head I should keep?
Thanks
This head actually arrived at the store new in February of this year.
The head was on Sale at $2699.00.
The history on the head was it had a previosu owner for a month upon which time it broke down. The descrition for the breakdown was... blown plate resister replaced cause was like a bad tube... all power amp tubes replaced.
As you can see this amphad some issued and this is likely why the origional owner brought it back.
As far as the store and warranty this item was still consdered a "new item". I took the amp home and through some discussion here ( many thanks ), some discussion on the phone to Mesa, and a few hours dialing in I found some great tones and overal really like this amp.
I had some concerns so L&M decided to order a brand new head for me.
The head came in thursday. I brought it home and unboxed it and it turns out that it is a Road King II V.2 There are some minor changes like input/ output and mute for a tuner. Instead of a aluminum bar protecting the tubes there is a cage now which has plastic mounts... it's really quite flimsy... it will stop a hand from getting burned but offer little in the way of a physical barrier for the tubes. I still have the first one as I wanted to compare and I have till tuesday to make a decision. To add I noticed theat the 6L6 tubes to not fully insert into the tube sockets as the socket screws are in the way. Did Mesa change thier sockets or tubes???
All in all I like the new feature changes for the tuner ins place of the Ext Switching. However I'm not sold on the new tube cage... I can see those plastic clips becoming brittle and trouble some down the road. I'm also not sold on the 6L6 tube issue eventhough there are spring style tube grabbers to prevent the tube from vibrating out.
Now comes the fun part... I set both heads up to the settings I recently dialed in and like and on channel one there is no noticable difference... two likewise BUT... on 3 & 4 there is a very noticable difference in tone and volume.
The V.1 head sounds muscular, dimensinal whereas the V.2 two head sounds whimpy.
Could this be a result of a different tube being used or has the cicuitry changed that much.
The master volume on V.1 louder at lower settings on the dial.
Is there a break in period for the V.2 head???
Can I expect it to just get better with time???
So given the circumstances I'm looking for advice on which head I should keep?
Thanks
