Stock mesa tubes suck ???

[seajay]

I had them in and really liked them playing at home... Went out for play the first gig with them and my sound was dead. I changed my strings that weren't that old and it helped a bit. Then the second time I played like I was dealing with very flat sound again... then I got piss off and put my old mesas in and everything came back to life.

What tubes? :?:

 

[Tweeked]

I too have had good luck with Mesa tubes.I had one failure
and it was replaced under warranty.I really think it's
luck of the draw with tubes in general.I ve had good luck and
failures w/Mesa, JJ's Sovtek ,Svetlanas etc.Some are good and some fail
It's tough to generalize about any brand of tubes.

my .03

 

[GIG4FUN]

This is a tough topic. It's a matter of trust. Find a supplier you trust to delver what you asked for. To keep them honest ...difficult but can be done. I have considered the sound/durability to be my guide but it would be nice to have all of that stuff they show you in their advertising pitch to run yours through!

I have bought my tubes from the same guy for many years. He's kind of like my doctor. If something is wrong, he gets with me on it. You need to really find a trust level in some way and stick to it and move on to other things like.... turning the amp backwards maybe... hahaha

 

[MetalMatt]

Mesa tubes are very capable tubes. I like what I hear/get from them. If I'm going to be finicky about my tone, the only time I'm going to care is if I'm recording. I don't need a tube to sound fantastic when the sound man can't get the mix/sound right in the first place. With tubes being a menstrual case to begin with I just need a tube that works and works consistently. Having a 6 month warranty doesn't hurt either. When my warranty runs out on my RK I will try other tubes, but Mesa will always be my "in a pinch" tube.

Just my two bits.

 

[Newysurfer]

I'm not sure the Chinese Mesa tubes are crap either but I can tell you that it made a significant improvement to my 5:50 when I swapped the Mesa tubes for those recommended by Doug at www.dougtubes.com.

I got a combo of Tung Sol, Sovtek, JJ's and SED's (for the power amp) tubes and these increased gain, reduced amp hum/hiss, improved smoothness & overall tone. Big success & worth every cent of $100 :lol:

I'd never go back to the standard Mesa tubes now.