That MKII B has the very popular post phase inverter fx loop / reverb mod done by Mike B at boogie. Very cool amp and the mod fixes a few things that were done right in the MK II C's
Greg would benefit from keeping the presence knob down, that and the treble and gain can get out of hand if not balanced correctly. They have the best reverb out of all of the boogies to me and can sound so black face clean. I had one for a long time and wanted to get this mod done but couldn't find anyone local who knew what to do.
Thanks for the heads up on this. I don't give this back to Greg until Friday, so I might open her back up and draw out the mods on a schematic since I cannot find one online anywhere detailing this mod. I know it has to do with moving the effects loop from the current V2B position and changing that stage from a cathode follower to a normal gain stage, but I don't know much else. The only other place to put the effects loop would be one stage later, right before the EQ junction and post front panel Master Volume. I'll try to confirm that if I have time to get back in there. Factory mods would also explain some of the flying leads, the 1991 service RA#, and what appeared to be newer Mesa branded power caps already changed out. Probably will be a Part II.
@@TheGuitologist that would be awesome if you mapped that out, You'd be doing a lot of amp owners a huge favor, techs too!! I know this mod also increases the gain a little, tiny sacrifice on the clean channel but great for the lead channel. And gives it another master volume and better control over the volume and gain of the two modes. I bet if you needed Mike B would talk to you about any questions. Makes me want to buy my amp back and mod it. I see these mods on Mk ii's for sale and it's always nice if a buyer gets one that's already been done, I think it costs about $600 if they do it. They automatically charge about 2-300 to go through the amp first and bring it up to par then about that much more for the mod. I wish they would share their circuits and mods like we see on Fender and Marshall, I know they are pretty protective of their designs. ;-)
@@TheGuitologist Looking forward to part II, but yeah, they certainly stuff too much crap per square inch than any other brand that I have personally worked on. I've worked on a good number of Boogies over the years (Starting with a Mesa Studio 22 - that I scrimped and saved for in high school- that unwittingly turned into a veritable training camp of sorts for Boogie repairs) and the biggest pain in the ass, for me at least, was a tremoverb that hummed like the dickens. Talked to Mikey B at Boogie on more than a few occasions, and there seems to be a practice of them picking their pre-amp tubes for lowest hum. I finally solved the issue and it wasn't the pre-amp, but after soldering in an un-soldered heater wire that I discovered, the problem went away. I'd spent hours in that amp and it was weird that I hadn't noticed it sooner than I did.
@@scottjamable That was the annoying thing with 2 series, it was pain trying to balance clean and lead channel and still had o good sound on both channels.
I inherited a Mesa Blue Angel Dual Rectifier in great condition from my brother who passed two years ago, today, coincidentally. Thanks bro. And, I'm just an ol' country drummer with a few guitars sitting around that I should learn to play but I enjoy Brad's work, his easy going style and his playing. Thanks man!
@@lordhotdawg9902 RIP English Language; it’s almost like you are trying to tell us something m’lord. I can fill it in me bones. Alas the nod I experienced from my last fix hath won me over. Fair the swell !
@@6nosis Here is a tough concept, perhaps people in non English speaking countries use the internet too? Maybe those non native speakers also enjoy this channel and Mesa?
My favorite quote came from Greg Martin. I was at a clinic with him and Andy Timmons. They asked Greg what his favorite effect was and he said my cord. Great answer.
Reverb vibrato, chorus, tremolo, and delay appear on more songs than they don't. Maybe not so much vibrato and trem these days. Find me a song not played on an acoustic that's 100% dry with no effects at all, I'll wait.
I think its great that Brad gets to work on such a high profile guitarists amp. Especially a Boogie knowing what he will find inside. This was a great video. Thanks Brad......
@@TheGuitologist I have several older Mesa amps. They’re pretty damn robust. And when you do “have” to work on them, send them back to Mesa. Mike Bendenelli will make them as good as new. Done.
I left Port Arthur and moved to Austin in 87 with my best friend Devin Weber. We sold steaks and seafood door to to door for his gung-ho Zig Zeigler esque oldest brother Gerald. Gerald made millions pumping up sales guys to venture out to Belton and nowheresville to sell his wares. At night we jammed because Gerald played guitar and so did I and Devin is a bass player. Overnight he ended that career and started building amps under his wife's maiden name Kendrick. He did the same thing with amplification as he did with steak/seafood sales. Pioneered in an unorthodox manner that was always interesting. This vid took me back to those days. Thanks man.
I remember them well, he also serviced amps, etc. Those are the old school Austin days when Ray Hennig's shop was on South Lamar, and he had a wall of 50's Fenders and Gibsons...probably millions of dollars today.
@@daleyoung87 The way the components are arranged, crammed together and often over top of others appears to be done by someone with very little experience. Those who have worked on many amps can tell the difference at a glance, even from a distance, and it is considered very poor design.
@@daleyoung87 . If You ever worked on amps You would get it! Ergonomically Mesa's are impossible to work on, and so messily kluged together. What can be done in 5 minutes on a pre 1983 Fender takes about two days on a Mesa Mark II-II etc (unless it is just basic easy stuff). Please notice , the missing land and jumpered over wire @11:40 (upper left 1/3rd of view);,.. thats because when You try to replace a component the circuit trace delaminates.. God forbid you have to remove a board. You literally have to disassemble the whole thing, including taking out at least 50 parts that block access to whatever You have to get at. The remarkable thing is: You can mod a Fender Twin R or Super -R so that the input end is virtually the same as a Mark I-II or III (minus the 5 band graphic EQ), and get the Fenders, to do a nice Mesa sounding OD, with Master Vol, etc, and they can be just as easy to work on as the original Fender.
a great vid and restore, thanks for posting.... I recently had my 1984 MARK IIC+ gone over closely by my tech, with direct guidance from M.B. at MESA (he signed the amp originally) - the results are amazing... a gorgeous restoration was had!!
TOURED 20 YEARS WITH MY EARLY 80'S CLASS 2C..........................AT LEAST 250 GIGS A YEAR ,STILL SOUND GREAT WHEN I RETIRED 4 YRS AGO....I REPLACED TUBES EVERY YEAR.....
@@TheGuitologist You should take a crack at my Acoustic 165. All PCB with traces the width of a human hair millimeters from ground, etc. Like the Yamaha CS-80 of guitar amps.
Hey brad, love your opening. That HBO jingle brings back all kinds of happy memories of the early to mid 80s, from my friends and I sitting down to watch the feature presentation to cuddling under a blanket with my girlfriend with only the light from the tv screen.
Interesting video. You always do really interesting videos. I used to own a Mesa Mark IIA (which they were originally just called a Mark II back in 1979 when I bought it). I really liked the amp and one mystery I have until this day is when I first got the amp (directly from Mesa...the only way to buy them back then) the amp had a very sweet clean channel. What it did was you could push it into to a sustaining overdrive sound and also there was a lot of note bloom in the clean channel blooming into sustaining harmonics. At some point (around 4-5 months after getting the amp) I deciding to take the Eminence speaker out and replace it with an Altec that I had handy, (I couldn't afford the upgraded EV speaker from Mesa at that time), well what ever happened along the way, I don't know, as I lost that over driven capable clean channel and lost the very pleasant note bloom it would exhibit. Even after returning the Eminence in the amp, it still never came back. I did eventually, put an EV12L in there, (like you could buy from Mesa) but never did get that really sweet over drive and sweet note bloom from the clean channel again. Just a mystery to me what happened. Most Mesa amps I was aware of just had a really clean first channel without the over drive and note bloom, so I guess mine was a model where the components just worked together perfectly. I really can't explain it... All The Best, Phil NYC Area
Over the past 16 years I have owned a few older Mesa models, a 110 Subway Rocket, a 112 Nomad 55, a 410 Nomad 55, a 112 Mark IV and a 112 .50 Cal, the only one I really liked was the Subway Rocket, the Mark IV wasn't too bad but it was a beast! I'm not an amp guy but being proficient with a soldering iron I replaced all the control pots on the .50 Cal and it was a factory rats nest, it's really crazy how dependent the controls are on each other and how much one effects the other, I do regret selling the Subway Rocket, for such a small amp it had more balls gain and tone wise over the other ones except the Mark IV. The sad part is that Mesa has to keep coming out with new models and discontinued the older ones that were truly their best amps!
Mesa has done a lot of innovating over the years, I'll give them that. The Mark Series are great sounding amps when you dial them in. They take some getting used to if you're coming from the world of Fender and Marshall stuff. The later stuff I don't think I'd want to ever rely on if I was on a world tour. That's just me.
You're amazing, Rab. Thank you for your continued support over the years. Hope you and the wife are doing well. Here's hoping we don't have another full YEAR of lockdowns to deal with.
@@TheGuitologist Much appreciated, B. All fine, over here in Somerset, UK (although I will always remain a Scot, sans SNP ...). As for the 💉 farce/farse ... [insert text here]. All of it to you and your Darlings, Izzy (spl?) and Ivy! Maybe we'll meet soon enough, one of these old afternoons. Rab 🔊
I love my Mesa amps. Mark 1 2003 reissue, a 1996 Heartbreaker and a 1989 Studio Calibre 22. The 22 is a much overlooked amp. Amazing little beautiful sounding amp. In terms of dependability and organized design, easier to work on layout, and amazing sound, Soldano takes the cake! I use a Reverbosonic along with my Mesa amps. All killer amps, but Soldano is built like a tank and never needs major repair.
I thought the point of PCB's in valve amps was to tidy up hand-wired mess. MB seem to have used it to make things considerably worse. Impressive. Always an education watching your amp videos Brad, many thanks!
To be fair, this one may have been worked on several times in the past. Looks like it was at least worked on in 1991, maybe even by the Mesa factory. But still...just messy as Nick Nolte's hair in a police photo.
Don't they (manufacturers in general mind you not just MB) also do this to compact things down a bit? With so much preamp level processing and tone shaping going on...??
Also those old amps still have nylon pcb supports that detoriate over time for stacking and securing purposes. When the shipment gets jarred like my mark iii no stripe did it dislodged the lead from the power board containing the caps and basically opened the standby circuit. It was the most quiet noise free amp I have ever owned. Since I resoldered it , it is super noisey especially with the lead drive turned up. What did I do wrong? Was it maybe a metal bands fault?
Between the beastly transformer and birch ply chassis, it adds up. But I think that’s part of the magic. I’ve had my Boogie combo 23 years and it’s worth the extra muscle. :-)
I'm so glad I took my Boogie to an expert. It only took him a couple days to go through the whole thing and get it back to me RIGHT. He was the 2nd guy I took it to. The 1st Guy didn't have a clue. Took 2 wks and didn't fix a thing. My bad cause I was told who to take it to, but I started thinking, bad idea, he would be so busy it would take forever. When I got it back it went immediately to the right guy. Now that I know him everything will go to him. Always gotta find the right guy. 1 thing I never stated is mine is a 85 S O B. 60/100 watts, Reverb, 12L speaker. IMHO what makes mine easy is only 7 knobs on front 0 on back. No crazy stacked circuit boards.
@@TheGuitologist yes you had a nice tone in the playing at the end, I’ve never been able to play one so I cannot personally testify on their tone in person. Would like one tho especially a lonestar. Also enjoyed your dummy load vid nice to see more of the amp tech vids from you. Speaking of which.. what happened to “when you don’t know what the fu@k your doing ask an amp tec??” 🤣😂
Played through a Studio .22 years ago. Was on the back line at a music festival in Mississippi. Great tone. Couldn’t afford one at the time and now they’re hard to find.
@@TheGuitologist well, no. I spell my name with one L. And I don’t build amps. Or repair them. And I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. But I do work for Gibson. Nice video, by the way. I can see why you don’t like to work on Mesa Boogies. And thanks for the reply.
Love my studio .22 bought it new in ‘ 87 had a .50 caliber head but it didn’t have the EQ it did crank with a Marshall 4x10 bottom...my Mk III BLEW TUBES and was sooooo heavy....peace...let’s see what Gibson does with them...
I absolutely LOVE Mesa amps! I have never had to do anything to the ones I have owned except change the tubes & clean the pots! Maybe a cap replaced, but nothing serious, EVER! Built like a tank, & tone for DAYS!! I have a late 80's Studio Caliber 20 watt combo. No slider EQ. Just a solid, loud, 20 watt 2 channel amp that sounds freaking killer. I also love old Marshall amps too. I have several of those that I would never sell. To each his own, I guess!! Rock on, man!
I’ve owned many amps in my 57 years. Fender, Hiwatt, Ampeg, Vox, the only ones that have given me problems are Marshall, and Mesa. Though I love Marshall’s.
I had a very experienced amp builder and tech say that for whatever reason Mesa boogie “went around their ass to get to their elbow” to get to the same end result of having a higher gain amp. It seems other circuits get the same job done and are much easier to work on. I’ve owned about 5 boogies and loved them but due to finicky nature went to a high quality gain pedal and a twin
In my humble opinion, You are absolutely correct, except I hate working on Mesa's and I WON'T do it anymore. I have worked on 100's in the past but only a handful in the last 20 years. I think perhaps the hummy vol pot is a function of: maybe it was originally 1 meg and now has drifted up higher in value, plus it would help to shield the center lead of that pot on its way to the next signal grid. You could probably get by in there with a 500K pot and the consequently lower impedance would help it to be less susceptible to picking up noise. When i clean or lube pots, although its a major pain, i usually put the amp upright with the pot openings facing the floor over the edge of the desk so whatever drips off, ends up on the floor rather than back in the pot. A small mirror helps to accomplish that.
On those I swap out the innards with an Epiphone Junior. Really drops the noise floor. Only downside is my recycle guy pays next to nothing for old Mesa guts.
I have an ‘83 like this, but with cream tolex. It absolutely rips with a 5751 in the V1 position and a Celestine alnico cream in it. Those Mark IIs are killer amps!
When I saw that "new" pot that was added to the back of the chassis and how close it is to the power transformer I thought "HUM". It's easy for 60 or 120 cycle hum to get into a circuit from power transformers or rectifiers so be aware if you put a pot or and input jack to close to them. been there - done that.
Brad, have you considered widening the scope of your channel to include guitar playing tutorials? It would be instructive to hear how you taught yourself and maybe help others do the same.
I bought a MkIV brand new, the year they released the model, and it gave me nothing but trouble to the extent that I had it replaced by another which promptly started doing the same thing. It was great with new power valves but it would gradually become increasingly thin and lost the punch, fatness, and eventually became extremely microphonic. There was literally no one in Ireland back then who was able to fix it and I sold it and swore off Boogies until I bought a Triaxis around 7 years ago
Got smashed with the KHH in Bloomington Indiana back in the 90s after one of their shows. We'd bumped into Fred the drummer in a second hand /vintage shop . He was amazed we recognised him as we were a metal band. Got invited to the show later that night, after the show we passed a bottle of jack around until it was gone , maybe 7 mins lol. Then we took them to the BlueBird to see a metal band and they all moshed in the pit with us. Respect KHH ✊🏻 Btw, I'm from the U.K. but was playing in a U.S. metal band at the time. Great days.
@@declassified1 wow, old school vibes here. I came up in the 90's punk rock and hardcore scene in Indy. Was into metal before that...oddly enough, was also a big Headhunters fan. =)
One of the bands I played drums in, the guitar player had that amp (with a speaker mod). It was an outstanding sounding amp but it's never worked reliably for more than a couple months at a time.
@@trillrifaxegrindor4411 It was new when he bought it. It was fine for a couple of years but the longer it was around, the more problems it had. I'm not even sure it's in use anymore. He bought another new one though. *shrugs*
Did I hear some good ole.....Black Betty riff in there?................awesome Boogie amp. Thank you Brad and also say thanks to Mr.s Martin for letting you video the encounter.
Im currently working on one of these but the 60/100 watt version. Came back after the first time cause the caps started smoking. Replaced all the caps and resistors in the power section and now the power switch is smoking. Damn things are a house of cards!
Smoking the power switch!? Sounds like that needed a cleaning. Probably some carbonized material in there causing a resistance across the switch terminals.
@@TheGuitologist I tried cleaning but then it start randomly popping and crackling sound. And then smoked again. Just ordered 2 new switches.. figured better safe than sorry and just replace both since they are cheap. I will say , this is the dirtiest amp I've ever worked on so most of the problems have been caused by filth and it was ordered on reverb and dropped during shipping so I had to glue the cabinet back together and all the fun stuff that comes with that.
I'm sorry that my Boogie contributed to your hatred... but i've been super ultra mega happy with it. And honestly I never run the gain anywhere near that high. The clean pre on ten gives everything the "edge of breakup" baseline, and the lead channel on about 3 atop that is awesome sauce.
Great video! Please keep us updated on Greg's opinion when he gets it. Its one of my peeves when I get a customer's amp and cannot find anything wrong with it for the most part. Some customers may interpret normal noise as abnormal. Its great if there is a chance to test the amps on location if its possible to get rid of the possibilities of bad wiring on site or bad cables like you said Brad. The guts of this amp look like a novice tinkerer's mess. Not only is it poor construction service wise but it also seems there was no thought on how things were laid out in terms of noise and temperature. BTW what is that funky heatsink doing there? Great choice on the 12au7, it also seems the cleaning had a positive effect too. Awesome playing at the end!
Found Brad searching info about my traynor super reverb I've had for 30yrs. Killer amp! Didn't know how great they are built. Wouldn't trade it for a Marshall JTM.
Dude I feel for you. I've been in and out of the biz the last time was in Tampa every time i had a Boogie or 5150 the owner would be with a customer and they would here my F bombing in the back G D ing at the top of my lungs.
Yeah, I get you Brad. I had a customer bring in a SimulClass 2:90 recently, where they had broken off the 8 ohm output off one of the Amphenol jacks at the back. What a nightmare getting that two story Amphenol connector out. Would have been much nicer if they had used good old Switchjack plugs for sure. Customer was running that power amp with a TriAxis preamp that somebody had had fun "fixing" and as a result it was sending 230V up your arm if you happened to touch the chassis while it was running. And somehow the LDRs in that puppy had gone bad too. Unnecessarily complication for sure.
Early Boogie was not ready for the demand/production. Thats why they're made that way. There also not very simple. They were using new design strategies (amplification) for high gain. They just weren't production masters, just innovators (well Randy was).
@@reav3rtm Mine (Strategy 400 Stereo), has a very early serial number. I lived within 25 minutes of Mesa for nearly 30 years. I know many of the employees (in the office and some in production).
Mark Ii B 60/100 W probably an 1979_- 80 piggyback .This amp has been a pleasure to band with , all around beast with any guitar plugged into it . .Thanks for the most informative vid , enjoyed the demo as well ...
It's funny you say that because I just sold my old hand wired fender twin reverb 2 and the my old 69 Bassman head to fund the purchase of a USA built Peavey 6534+ head unit and boy am I glad I did !!!! The Fender's were NEVER loud enough to play with my drummer 😉 he's like really really loud !
@@auntjenifer7774 that's something wrong in your place, maybe acustics problems? You have to insulated better your room or your drums with something right .
The bane of High Voltage circuits are PC Boards. Nothin like Point to Point wiring! I worked on a .50 Caliber that just would not cooperate. Great video!! Thank you.
What's with all these Mesa amps needing repairs; I've had Peaveys for decades without any problems, and they're far less expensive. And all I've ever had to do with my 65 Vox AC15 is change the power tubes. PRS and Mesa, overpriced and overrated. My Myers SE arrived with the pickup selector not working and the tone pots scratchy; PRS quality control has taken a dive.
I think it’s certain models, and possibly unknown variables of individual piece history. I’ve owned a few Mesa products, and never had issues with any of them. Having said that, I’ve also owned a few Peavey products that were well made and dependable.
I was gonna count the Marshall and Fender repair videos, but stopped at 20. The only decent Peavey I have left is a 5150 combo. Fell off the back of the the pickup bed and left out in the rain for 5 minutes. Still works, can't get a pure clean sound, great for classic rock and metal with a boost, handles are in the stupidest spot, but a work horse if you only need one sound with a few different flavors.
I've owned two Mesa amps. A mk iii and a non-multi watt Dual Rectifier. Hated them both. Both were similarly noisy. Did I mention that I hated them? I'm just a Marshall guy deep down, I suppose.
I’m getting a Mesa boogie mark 2a basically getting restored lol . Who ever put their fingers in it had no clue what they were doing. I’m so excited to get it back. In it’s 42 years has never had a proper cap job
That MKII B has the very popular post phase inverter fx loop / reverb mod done by Mike B at boogie. Very cool amp and the mod fixes a few things that were done right in the MK II C's
Greg would benefit from keeping the presence knob down, that and the treble and gain can get out of hand if not balanced correctly. They have the best reverb out of all of the boogies to me and can sound so black face clean. I had one for a long time and wanted to get this mod done but couldn't find anyone local who knew what to do.
Thanks for the heads up on this. I don't give this back to Greg until Friday, so I might open her back up and draw out the mods on a schematic since I cannot find one online anywhere detailing this mod. I know it has to do with moving the effects loop from the current V2B position and changing that stage from a cathode follower to a normal gain stage, but I don't know much else. The only other place to put the effects loop would be one stage later, right before the EQ junction and post front panel Master Volume. I'll try to confirm that if I have time to get back in there. Factory mods would also explain some of the flying leads, the 1991 service RA#, and what appeared to be newer Mesa branded power caps already changed out. Probably will be a Part II.
@@TheGuitologist that would be awesome if you mapped that out, You'd be doing a lot of amp owners a huge favor, techs too!! I know this mod also increases the gain a little, tiny sacrifice on the clean channel but great for the lead channel. And gives it another master volume and better control over the volume and gain of the two modes. I bet if you needed Mike B would talk to you about any questions. Makes me want to buy my amp back and mod it. I see these mods on Mk ii's for sale and it's always nice if a buyer gets one that's already been done, I think it costs about $600 if they do it. They automatically charge about 2-300 to go through the amp first and bring it up to par then about that much more for the mod. I wish they would share their circuits and mods like we see on Fender and Marshall, I know they are pretty protective of their designs. ;-)
@@TheGuitologist Looking forward to part II, but yeah, they certainly stuff too much crap per square inch than any other brand that I have personally worked on. I've worked on a good number of Boogies over the years (Starting with a Mesa Studio 22 - that I scrimped and saved for in high school- that unwittingly turned into a veritable training camp of sorts for Boogie repairs) and the biggest pain in the ass, for me at least, was a tremoverb that hummed like the dickens. Talked to Mikey B at Boogie on more than a few occasions, and there seems to be a practice of them picking their pre-amp tubes for lowest hum. I finally solved the issue and it wasn't the pre-amp, but after soldering in an un-soldered heater wire that I discovered, the problem went away. I'd spent hours in that amp and it was weird that I hadn't noticed it sooner than I did.
@@scottjamable That was the annoying thing with 2 series, it was pain trying to balance clean and lead channel and still had o good sound on both channels.
I inherited a Mesa Blue Angel Dual Rectifier in great condition from my brother who passed two years ago, today, coincidentally. Thanks bro. And, I'm just an ol' country drummer with a few guitars sitting around that I should learn to play but I enjoy Brad's work, his easy going style and his playing. Thanks man!
Thanks for the kind words and for watching, David.
The old Mark series.... some of the finest amps ever made in my opinion
Oh man, the Mark III...and to think how many I bought and sold for around $600 on Harmony Central back in the day...
I was interesting in trying to find one . I’m glad I got some certification on these amps before I went searching
@@lordhotdawg9902 RIP English Language; it’s almost like you are trying to tell us something m’lord. I can fill it in me bones. Alas the nod I experienced from my last fix hath won me over. Fair the swell !
@@bjhvapes2703 got mine for 500 out of a store in Sacramento.
@@6nosis Here is a tough concept, perhaps people in non English speaking countries use the internet too? Maybe those non native speakers also enjoy this channel and Mesa?
My favorite quote came from Greg Martin. I was at a clinic with him and Andy Timmons. They asked Greg what his favorite effect was and he said my cord. Great answer.
Reverb vibrato, chorus, tremolo, and delay appear on more songs than they don't. Maybe not so much vibrato and trem these days. Find me a song not played on an acoustic that's 100% dry with no effects at all, I'll wait.
Do you believe in life after Love?
The one thing about a really great guitar repairman is "I hate working on these amps but I'll do it!" Love your videos man!
I think its great that Brad gets to work on such a high profile guitarists amp. Especially a Boogie knowing what he will find inside. This was a great video. Thanks Brad......
"It keeps playing the wrong notes!" Hahaha, glorious!
I own 3 of these boogies. 76 and 2 early 80's. Needless to say I love em.
They're fine until you have to work on them. :D
@@TheGuitologist
I have several older Mesa amps.
They’re pretty damn robust.
And when you do “have” to work on them, send them back to Mesa. Mike Bendenelli will make them as good as new.
Done.
@@leosun8469 indeed! My MKIII has NEVER failed me in the 30+ years I've owned it.
@@dan_perry Incredible. I don’t know what’s more impressive. The fact you’ve owned it for 30 years, or it’s been rock solid for that long.
Mesa - the BMW of guitar amps.
An amp for frustrated morons with small dicks?
@@dennismoes7281 Now Dennis don't go projecting again :).
Service schedule will kill ya’...
"It was great for the first ten gigs or so then I had to pay 400$ for a new input jack and..."
I left Port Arthur and moved to Austin in 87 with my best friend Devin Weber. We sold steaks and seafood door to to door for his gung-ho Zig Zeigler esque oldest brother Gerald. Gerald made millions pumping up sales guys to venture out to Belton and nowheresville to sell his wares. At night we jammed because Gerald played guitar and so did I and Devin is a bass player. Overnight he ended that career and started building amps under his wife's maiden name Kendrick. He did the same thing with amplification as he did with steak/seafood sales. Pioneered in an unorthodox manner that was always interesting. This vid took me back to those days. Thanks man.
I remember them well, he also serviced amps, etc. Those are the old school Austin days when Ray Hennig's shop was on South Lamar, and he had a wall of 50's Fenders and Gibsons...probably millions of dollars today.
Nuthin like a PRS thru a Boogie on a rainy day !
Have a prs ce 24...just found and bought the amp I let go 30 yrs ago. Mark III blue.
And Brad.
EBMM Majesty for me, but like the CU24, too.
Except a PRS through a super lead with a 4 x 12 loaded with greenbacks lol!
That board looks like a high school class project. I finally “get it” concerning Mesa.
And most of the participants were drunk.
I don't get the comment. Mesa made some great stuff.
@@daleyoung87 The way the components are arranged, crammed together and often over top of others appears to be done by someone with very little experience. Those who have worked on many amps can tell the difference at a glance, even from a distance, and it is considered very poor design.
@@daleyoung87 . If You ever worked on amps You would get it! Ergonomically Mesa's are impossible to work on, and so messily kluged together. What can be done in 5 minutes on a pre 1983 Fender takes about two days on a Mesa Mark II-II etc (unless it is just basic easy stuff). Please notice , the missing land and jumpered over wire @11:40 (upper left 1/3rd of view);,.. thats because when You try to replace a component the circuit trace delaminates.. God forbid you have to remove a board. You literally have to disassemble the whole thing, including taking out at least 50 parts that block access to whatever You have to get at. The remarkable thing is: You can mod a Fender Twin R or Super -R so that the input end is virtually the same as a Mark I-II or III (minus the 5 band graphic EQ), and get the Fenders, to do a nice Mesa sounding OD, with Master Vol, etc, and they can be just as easy to work on as the original Fender.
The world needs more boogie specialist. Especially if tube amps are going to keep being a thing. Boogie is amazing Randal is a genius
a great vid and restore, thanks for posting.... I recently had my 1984 MARK IIC+ gone over closely by my tech, with direct guidance from M.B. at MESA (he signed the amp originally) - the results are amazing... a gorgeous restoration was had!!
Who can do the Mark IIC Simulclass to C+ mod?
@@jrockofages5413 not sure who can, call Mesa and ask.
TOURED 20 YEARS WITH MY EARLY 80'S CLASS 2C..........................AT LEAST 250 GIGS A YEAR ,STILL SOUND GREAT WHEN I RETIRED 4 YRS AGO....I REPLACED TUBES EVERY YEAR.....
" Mess of Boogie .."
My fave was when Brad called it “messy booger” in the Russian accent. Flex !!
Absolutely!
The reason I've never owned a Boogie is because I've always liked my amp techs.
That board looks like what I see in my nightmares after I've been soldering stuff all day.
This is one of those where the more it gets repaired, the worse and worse it will get.
@@TheGuitologist Could you imagine fixing it, then realising you hadn't quite soldered one of the lower components properly.
@@TheGuitologist You should take a crack at my Acoustic 165. All PCB with traces the width of a human hair millimeters from ground, etc. Like the Yamaha CS-80 of guitar amps.
@@alecboyyes that's why you test EVERY solder connection before moving on to the next. Soldering without the DMM handy is asking for trouble.
I had one for almost 30 years, best combo amp of tha 80' and 90's.
You have my complete sympathy! I had one where the current kept finding alternative paths on the circuit boards. Grrr.
Me too. I did a 4-part, hair puller series on one doing that.
I'm glad you were up to task to take on another Mesa, i wasnt sure you would. Nice job! You sure made the amp Boogie in the end!!! Cheers Brad!!
Ahh, the messy booger. Thanks for another excellent video!!
Glad you enjoyed it.
Interesting seeing the different wave forms for the different channels 😊
Ah,,,, Boogie,,, the nemesis of amp techs and all involved.
Just got my first native sons guitar strap and I love it just bought another one
FLEX IT TO PIECES!!!!! Before it’s too late!
Hey brad, love your opening. That HBO jingle brings back all kinds of happy memories of the early to mid 80s, from my friends and I sitting down to watch the feature presentation to cuddling under a blanket with my girlfriend with only the light from the tv screen.
god damned,thats a fine sounding amp....one of the best driven tones,period
Those are some good licks, Brad! And I just saw your video on Blackstar. I was just about to buy one. Thank you!
I know Steve and Greg.. Super nice guys and they've got tons of great stories from over the years..
Good vid Brad ...It sounded really good at the end ... Nice PRS ...
I agree. Sounds really good for overdriven tones.
I need the Greg Martin Blues Mod on my amp! Greg is the Man!
Man...that thing is a MESS in there...Messa-Boogar! Nice evaluation and great job bringing it back to full voice. Love watching good techs.
Badass results man. Sounds nice.
Interesting video. You always do really interesting videos.
I used to own a Mesa Mark IIA (which they were originally just called a Mark II back in 1979 when I bought it). I really liked the amp and one mystery I have until this day is when I first got the amp (directly from Mesa...the only way to buy them back then) the amp had a very sweet clean channel. What it did was you could push it into to a sustaining overdrive sound and also there was a lot of note bloom in the clean channel blooming into sustaining harmonics.
At some point (around 4-5 months after getting the amp) I deciding to take the Eminence speaker out and replace it with an Altec that I had handy, (I couldn't afford the upgraded EV speaker from Mesa at that time), well what ever happened along the way, I don't know, as I lost that over driven capable clean channel and lost the very pleasant note bloom it would exhibit. Even after returning the Eminence in the amp, it still never came back.
I did eventually, put an EV12L in there, (like you could buy from Mesa) but never did get that really sweet over drive and sweet note bloom from the clean channel again. Just a mystery to me what happened. Most Mesa amps I was aware of just had a really clean first channel without the over drive and note bloom, so I guess mine was a model where the components just worked together perfectly. I really can't explain it...
All The Best,
Phil
NYC Area
Oh yeah! Bring it on, Brad!
Had one of these on my bench couple of month ago for "just a" a cap job. Kinda drove me nuts.
Over the past 16 years I have owned a few older Mesa models, a 110 Subway Rocket, a 112 Nomad 55, a 410 Nomad 55, a 112 Mark IV and a 112 .50 Cal, the only one I really liked was the Subway Rocket, the Mark IV wasn't too bad but it was a beast!
I'm not an amp guy but being proficient with a soldering iron I replaced all the control pots on the .50 Cal and it was a factory rats nest, it's really crazy how dependent the controls are on each other and how much one effects the other, I do regret selling the Subway Rocket, for such a small amp it had more balls gain and tone wise over the other ones except the Mark IV.
The sad part is that Mesa has to keep coming out with new models and discontinued the older ones that were truly their best amps!
Mesa has done a lot of innovating over the years, I'll give them that. The Mark Series are great sounding amps when you dial them in. They take some getting used to if you're coming from the world of Fender and Marshall stuff. The later stuff I don't think I'd want to ever rely on if I was on a world tour. That's just me.
Thank you once again, Brad. A small PayPal donation just sent to you from my State Pension (👍), with much appreciation.
Stay free, B. Rab 🍻 😎 🎯
You're amazing, Rab. Thank you for your continued support over the years. Hope you and the wife are doing well. Here's hoping we don't have another full YEAR of lockdowns to deal with.
@@TheGuitologist Much appreciated, B. All fine, over here in Somerset, UK (although I will always remain a Scot, sans SNP ...).
As for the 💉 farce/farse ... [insert text here].
All of it to you and your Darlings, Izzy (spl?) and Ivy!
Maybe we'll meet soon enough, one of these old afternoons. Rab 🔊
Amp sounds fantastic!
had one back in the day... boy do I miss that thing
I love my Mesa amps. Mark 1 2003 reissue, a 1996 Heartbreaker and a 1989 Studio Calibre 22. The 22 is a much overlooked amp. Amazing little beautiful sounding amp. In terms of dependability and organized design, easier to work on layout, and amazing sound, Soldano takes the cake! I use a Reverbosonic along with my Mesa amps. All killer amps, but Soldano is built like a tank and never needs major repair.
Same as working on a modern car. Pain in the ass.
Im at work so i cant really watch right now. But im gonna give it a like for the algorithim
Thanks for supporting the channel.
I thought the point of PCB's in valve amps was to tidy up hand-wired mess. MB seem to have used it to make things considerably worse. Impressive.
Always an education watching your amp videos Brad, many thanks!
To be fair, this one may have been worked on several times in the past. Looks like it was at least worked on in 1991, maybe even by the Mesa factory. But still...just messy as Nick Nolte's hair in a police photo.
Don't they (manufacturers in general mind you not just MB) also do this to compact things down a bit? With so much preamp level processing and tone shaping going on...??
Also those old amps still have nylon pcb supports that detoriate over time for stacking and securing purposes. When the shipment gets jarred like my mark iii no stripe did it dislodged the lead from the power board containing the caps and basically opened the standby circuit. It was the most quiet noise free amp I have ever owned. Since I resoldered it , it is super noisey especially with the lead drive turned up. What did I do wrong? Was it maybe a metal bands fault?
Bendinelli is GOD -----> ...
Remember lugging one od those up and down stairs.
Loads heavier than they look.
cheers
👍✌😎
Between the beastly transformer and birch ply chassis, it adds up. But I think that’s part of the magic. I’ve had my Boogie combo 23 years and it’s worth the extra muscle. :-)
Yep. It's like they took all that lead shielding they left out of the moon missions and stuck it inside Mesa amps instead..
Love your lead playing at the end of this, Brad.
Thanks for your vids bud I absolutely love watching
Your intro bslapped me with nostalgia lol. My step dad was obsessed with recording movies from HBO on VHS.
Mesa amps are an exercise in OVER COMPLICATION. My Fav amp is the SJV that I built... it's simple, and sounds awesome.
I have two Boogies, one is a Tremoverb , Studio 22 Plus both great amps, My amp tech didn't complain when he recapped it...great amps!
I'm so glad I took my Boogie to an expert. It only took him a couple days to go through the whole thing and get it back to me RIGHT. He was the 2nd guy I took it to. The 1st Guy didn't have a clue. Took 2 wks and didn't fix a thing. My bad cause I was told who to take it to, but I started thinking, bad idea, he would be so busy it would take forever. When I got it back it went immediately to the right guy. Now that I know him everything will go to him. Always gotta find the right guy. 1 thing I never stated is mine is a 85 S O B. 60/100 watts, Reverb, 12L speaker. IMHO what makes mine easy is only 7 knobs on front 0 on back. No crazy stacked circuit boards.
Awesome video Brad. Love these kind of videos. Also sick playing at the end there man. Keep rocking
Love my Mesa boogie studio.22! Best amp ever. Worth fixing. Can’t be replaced… over 20 years old and no worries….
I've never seen inside a Mesa of that age until today. Holy shit man, staring into that is a real trip.
Looking forward to this as they look crazy complicated inside. Tho I’m sorry for any head mash this gave you Brad I know you love these!
I like the lead tones you can coax out of them with some fiddling. The cleans are just ok. Depends heavily on the speaker.
@@TheGuitologist yes you had a nice tone in the playing at the end, I’ve never been able to play one so I cannot personally testify on their tone in person. Would like one tho especially a lonestar. Also enjoyed your dummy load vid nice to see more of the amp tech vids from you. Speaking of which.. what happened to “when you don’t know what the fu@k your doing ask an amp tec??” 🤣😂
Played through a Studio .22 years ago. Was on the back line at a music festival in Mississippi. Great tone. Couldn’t afford one at the time and now they’re hard to find.
There he is! Randall Smith!
@@TheGuitologist well, no. I spell my name with one L. And I don’t build amps. Or repair them. And I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. But I do work for Gibson. Nice video, by the way. I can see why you don’t like to work on Mesa Boogies. And thanks for the reply.
Love my studio .22 bought it new in ‘ 87 had a .50 caliber head but it didn’t have the EQ it did crank with a Marshall 4x10 bottom...my Mk III BLEW TUBES and was sooooo heavy....peace...let’s see what Gibson does with them...
@@RandalSmith Gibson now OWNS Mesa Boogie! Shhhhh!
@@cantyouhearmeknocking1961 I know. I work for Gibson.
I absolutely LOVE Mesa amps! I have never had to do anything to the ones I have owned except change the tubes & clean the pots! Maybe a cap replaced, but nothing serious, EVER! Built like a tank, & tone for DAYS!! I have a late 80's Studio Caliber 20 watt combo. No slider EQ. Just a solid, loud, 20 watt 2 channel amp that sounds freaking killer. I also love old Marshall amps too. I have several of those that I would never sell. To each his own, I guess!!
Rock on, man!
I’ve owned many amps in my 57 years. Fender, Hiwatt, Ampeg, Vox, the only ones that have given me problems are Marshall, and Mesa. Though I love Marshall’s.
Tasty licks as usual sir!
Another Cool informative Video, and a Great Jam at the EndRocking!
Keep Rockin!
I had a very experienced amp builder and tech say that for whatever reason Mesa boogie “went around their ass to get to their elbow” to get to the same end result of having a higher gain amp. It seems other circuits get the same job done and are much easier to work on. I’ve owned about 5 boogies and loved them but due to finicky nature went to a high quality gain pedal and a twin
In my humble opinion, You are absolutely correct, except I hate working on Mesa's and I WON'T do it anymore. I have worked on 100's in the past but only a handful in the last 20 years. I think perhaps the hummy vol pot is a function of: maybe it was originally 1 meg and now has drifted up higher in value, plus it would help to shield the center lead of that pot on its way to the next signal grid. You could probably get by in there with a 500K pot and the consequently lower impedance would help it to be less susceptible to picking up noise. When i clean or lube pots, although its a major pain, i usually put the amp upright with the pot openings facing the floor over the edge of the desk so whatever drips off, ends up on the floor rather than back in the pot. A small mirror helps to accomplish that.
I stood in the middle of the street naked and the cops said I'm getting an indecent exposure .....thanks bud 😄😄😄😄🤘🤘
On those I swap out the innards with an Epiphone Junior. Really drops the noise floor. Only downside is my recycle guy pays next to nothing for old Mesa guts.
This is so wrong it's right again.
I have an ‘83 like this, but with cream tolex. It absolutely rips with a 5751 in the V1 position and a Celestine alnico cream in it. Those Mark IIs are killer amps!
When I saw that "new" pot that was added to the back of the chassis and how close it is to the power transformer I thought "HUM". It's easy for 60 or 120 cycle hum to get into a circuit from power transformers or rectifiers so be aware if you put a pot or and input jack to close to them. been there - done that.
I love your retro intros.
Brad, have you considered widening the scope of your channel to include guitar playing tutorials? It would be instructive to hear how you taught yourself and maybe help others do the same.
Over time, I have come to appreciate my Silvertone Twin Twelve head much more!
Brad loves nothing more than working on Boogies.
I bought a MkIV brand new, the year they released the model, and it gave me nothing but trouble to the extent that I had it replaced by another which promptly started doing the same thing. It was great with new power valves but it would gradually become increasingly thin and lost the punch, fatness, and eventually became extremely microphonic. There was literally no one in Ireland back then who was able to fix it and I sold it and swore off Boogies until I bought a Triaxis around 7 years ago
Man i could listen to you play all day long very nice
Love the vids
Later
Yes! I love old Mesa Boogies :D
Got smashed with the KHH in Bloomington Indiana back in the 90s after one of their shows. We'd bumped into Fred the drummer in a second hand /vintage shop . He was amazed we recognised him as we were a metal band. Got invited to the show later that night, after the show we passed a bottle of jack around until it was gone , maybe 7 mins lol. Then we took them to the BlueBird to see a metal band and they all moshed in the pit with us. Respect KHH ✊🏻
Btw, I'm from the U.K. but was playing in a U.S. metal band at the time. Great days.
Who was the metal band at the bluebird? The bird man of Alcatraz?
@@surfthejapstrat7010 yup , from Indy , good guess man
@@declassified1 wow, old school vibes here. I came up in the 90's punk rock and hardcore scene in Indy. Was into metal before that...oddly enough, was also a big Headhunters fan. =)
@@bjhvapes2703 Wardog Underground was my band , same here Indy was boss in the 90s ... 🤟
Looks like a really fun amp to play, lots of features!
One of the bands I played drums in, the guitar player had that amp (with a speaker mod). It was an outstanding sounding amp but it's never worked reliably for more than a couple months at a time.
seems odd,they usually run for several decades without a single issue.your friend got one in a state of disrepair obviously
@@trillrifaxegrindor4411 It was new when he bought it. It was fine for a couple of years but the longer it was around, the more problems it had. I'm not even sure it's in use anymore. He bought another new one though. *shrugs*
Did I hear some good ole.....Black Betty riff in there?................awesome Boogie amp. Thank you Brad and also say thanks to Mr.s Martin for letting you video the encounter.
It’s funny, in the early 80’s the rich guys had Boogies and us poor folk played plexi’s.
I have both.
An old plexi will always beat the hell out of a Mesa. No comparison
Im currently working on one of these but the 60/100 watt version. Came back after the first time cause the caps started smoking. Replaced all the caps and resistors in the power section and now the power switch is smoking. Damn things are a house of cards!
Smoking the power switch!? Sounds like that needed a cleaning. Probably some carbonized material in there causing a resistance across the switch terminals.
@@TheGuitologist I tried cleaning but then it start randomly popping and crackling sound. And then smoked again. Just ordered 2 new switches.. figured better safe than sorry and just replace both since they are cheap. I will say , this is the dirtiest amp I've ever worked on so most of the problems have been caused by filth and it was ordered on reverb and dropped during shipping so I had to glue the cabinet back together and all the fun stuff that comes with that.
This is only my second boogie and I have vowed to never touch another one.
I'm sorry that my Boogie contributed to your hatred... but i've been super ultra mega happy with it. And honestly I never run the gain anywhere near that high. The clean pre on ten gives everything the "edge of breakup" baseline, and the lead channel on about 3 atop that is awesome sauce.
Heheh...nah, you’re cool Leah. You can bring it any time. I changed V1 for a 12AU7, so the controls will be way different from yours.
Great video! Please keep us updated on Greg's opinion when he gets it. Its one of my peeves when I get a customer's amp and cannot find anything wrong with it for the most part. Some customers may interpret normal noise as abnormal. Its great if there is a chance to test the amps on location if its possible to get rid of the possibilities of bad wiring on site or bad cables like you said Brad. The guts of this amp look like a novice tinkerer's mess. Not only is it poor construction service wise but it also seems there was no thought on how things were laid out in terms of noise and temperature. BTW what is that funky heatsink doing there? Great choice on the 12au7, it also seems the cleaning had a positive effect too. Awesome playing at the end!
I plan on doing a bit more shooting when I drop it off, so maybe we'll get a Part II.
When you first plugged in your guitar the tone was awesome
I sold a mesa dc3 to get a Traynor reverb master. Since then, every amp i have owned have been early 70s traynor point to point .
Some of the best made amps ever, hands down!
Found Brad searching info about my traynor super reverb I've had for 30yrs. Killer amp! Didn't know how great they are built. Wouldn't trade it for a Marshall JTM.
Dude I feel for you. I've been in and out of the biz the last time was in Tampa every time i had a Boogie or 5150 the owner would be with a customer and they would here my F bombing in the back G D ing at the top of my lungs.
Yeah, I get you Brad. I had a customer bring in a SimulClass 2:90 recently, where they had broken off the 8 ohm output off one of the Amphenol jacks at the back. What a nightmare getting that two story Amphenol connector out. Would have been much nicer if they had used good old Switchjack plugs for sure. Customer was running that power amp with a TriAxis preamp that somebody had had fun "fixing" and as a result it was sending 230V up your arm if you happened to touch the chassis while it was running. And somehow the LDRs in that puppy had gone bad too. Unnecessarily complication for sure.
Got a fender mustang amp for Christmas two years ago and love it .
Early Boogie was not ready for the demand/production. Thats why they're made that way. There also not very simple. They were using new design strategies (amplification) for high gain.
They just weren't production masters, just innovators (well Randy was).
Too bad that quality prevailed all the way to Mark IV at least. I am praying mine doesn't ever break. So far so good.
@@reav3rtm
Mine (Strategy 400 Stereo), has a very early serial number. I lived within 25 minutes of Mesa for nearly 30 years. I know many of the employees (in the office and some in production).
Try jumping the effects loop. If the buzz goes away, try cleaning up the fx loop jacks and tube sockets, or leave it jumped.
Mark Ii B 60/100 W probably an 1979_- 80 piggyback .This amp has been a pleasure to band with , all around beast with any guitar plugged into it . .Thanks for the most informative vid , enjoyed the demo as well ...
The way I would go about fixing that amp is to sell it and use the funds for a deluxe or vibrolux .
It's funny you say that because I just sold my old hand wired fender twin reverb 2 and the my old 69 Bassman head to fund the purchase of a USA built Peavey 6534+ head unit and boy am I glad I did !!!! The Fender's were NEVER loud enough to play with my drummer 😉 he's like really really loud !
@@auntjenifer7774 that's something wrong in your place, maybe acustics problems? You have to insulated better your room or your drums with something right .
The bane of High Voltage circuits are PC Boards. Nothin like Point to Point wiring! I worked on a .50 Caliber that just would not cooperate. Great video!! Thank you.
What's with all these Mesa amps needing repairs; I've had Peaveys for decades without any problems, and they're far less expensive. And all I've ever had to do with my 65 Vox AC15 is change the power tubes. PRS and Mesa, overpriced and overrated. My Myers SE arrived with the pickup selector not working and the tone pots scratchy; PRS quality control has taken a dive.
I think it’s certain models, and possibly unknown variables of individual piece history. I’ve owned a few Mesa products, and never had issues with any of them. Having said that, I’ve also owned a few Peavey products that were well made and dependable.
How are all of their certified techs going to put food on their table?
I was gonna count the Marshall and Fender repair videos, but stopped at 20. The only decent Peavey I have left is a 5150 combo. Fell off the back of the the pickup bed and left out in the rain for 5 minutes. Still works, can't get a pure clean sound, great for classic rock and metal with a boost, handles are in the stupidest spot, but a work horse if you only need one sound with a few different flavors.
That's because you purchased a SE and not a CU24.
I think you mean that the Cort factory has had a drop in QC.
I've owned two Mesa amps. A mk iii and a non-multi watt Dual Rectifier. Hated them both. Both were similarly noisy. Did I mention that I hated them?
I'm just a Marshall guy deep down, I suppose.
I’m getting a Mesa boogie mark 2a basically getting restored lol . Who ever put their fingers in it had no clue what they were doing.
I’m so excited to get it back. In it’s 42 years has never had a proper cap job
Love the cinemax or hbo intro. I remember getting up and clicking that box by the tv. Damnit
Glad you're doing repair videos again. Most useful advice for any guitar equipment techs (amateur and pro).
Awesome info and awesome playing!
Amp sounds great and awesome playing
2:50 The Pablo Cruise Mod? I've gotta know more about that.
I have an Magnatone M10 which makes this amp look easy to work on.
Magnatones aren't that bad to work on, plus their vibrato sounds great!