tonymckenziecom | 4 years ago

The Mesa Boogie Triple Rec as they are known remains a rock icon of the last 20 years or so. I'm refurbishing this one and PART Two shows everything I found about tubes and bias and shows a bias modification along the way.

What you will learn:
How good are Mesa Boogie tubes or valves?
What is the price of a full set of tubes?
Was this amplifier modified?
Are Mesa Boogie tubes easy to fit?
Were there any problems found?
Did you carry out other modifications?
What was the warranty on tubes?
Do I need to be qualified to do this work?

Intro to the amp I refurbish: https://youtu.be/bfYDAR43Ols
Part One: The Power Transformer: https://youtu.be/qYprumTY4Fo
A closeup of a Road King II: https://youtu.be/ZKutLcVOGXQ

This used triple rectifier amp was bought from Reverb and I have already converted the amp for 240 volts operation in part one of the video series. Here we show and discuss everything about the tubes or valves, the 6L6GC, the 12AX7 tubes and the rectifier tubes. Also shown is a bias modification carried out to the amplifier before I bought it.

After fitting the original tubes, I check the bias measurements, then fit new tubes and check again. Lastly I adjust on this amp the final settings with the modified bias adjuster. Also fitted are the rectifier tubes and five 12AX7 pre-amplifier tubes.

This series of videos covers an updated transformer to 240 volts and also tube replacements, the question of biasing and showing a modified amp being biased as well as other things to know if you are going to refurbish a triple rectifier, but also any other Mesa amp. On later videos in this series I'll also be covering some cosmetics that will help make your amplifier really look the business.

I have an engineer (Phil Smith) and also great support from the authorized Mesa Boogie dealer 'Rob' based near Leicester in the UK. His information is available in the video.

So if you want that genuine real rectifier tone that is unique to Mesa Boogie then this series is the one to watch - I show some of the problems I encountered while carrying out the refurbishment. I also did give a score for the tubes from Mesa Boogie.

All parts were bought by me personally - an ordinary user of this amplifier and I was not given anything - it's a totally genuine review of what I bought and did to improve the amp. As an ordinary user my experience with any buying is exactly what yours might be.

If you are not a qualified engineer that has experience of working on tube or valve amps with up to 500 volts inside then do NOT attempt these modifications as there are very high voltages inside all valve and tube amplifiers, but you are more than welcome to watch what I did with my amplifier.

Visit www.tonymckenzie.com for more incredible reviews or my YouTube channel

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#mesaboogierectifier #tubesandbias #biasmodifications #whyusemesatubes