jazzyvee Posted February 10, 2013 Share Posted February 10, 2013 I have just encountered a problem with my mesa boogie head. I did a gig with it on Friday and it was fine no problems. Today i was just starting my practice session and initially the volume was fine, then all of a sudden it dropped to about 50% volume, started crackling and giving a distorted sound then a few seconds later it was back up to normal sound. I wondered if it was due to battery going flat so tried another bass that has fresh batteries in and the same thing happened after a few seconds of playing. Any ideas? Jazzyvee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebassman Posted February 13, 2013 Share Posted February 13, 2013 Sounds like a dodgy valve, have you tried swapping them out? Cheers Thebassman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzyvee Posted February 17, 2013 Author Share Posted February 17, 2013 I got some information about my mesa boogie amp from a guy who makes/repairs and modifies valve amps and apparently the old mesa boogie amp I have is one of the earlier ones, ( it has two inputs whilst the new ones have one input and a switch for active/passive basses. Anyway the problem apparently is in the send and return circuit and he advised me to check this by bypassing the internal switches by plugging a short patch cable between the send and return jacks. I did that and bingo, got a full clean signal again. So this means I will need to open the back and clean the contacts on the jacks or just keep the patch cable. I never use effects so that wont be a problem. Jazzyvee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hutton Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 Yep. That's what happened on my old Walkabout head. I took it back to the shop where I bought it. They couldn't trace the fault and so gave me a newer model with the one input switch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzyvee Posted February 18, 2013 Author Share Posted February 18, 2013 How long did have yours before it got replaced? I have had mine almost 10 years so unlikely they would replace it now for a newer model. Jazzyvee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 The fix you mentioned earlier will almost certainly sort it. Common blip with the older models.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hutton Posted February 21, 2013 Share Posted February 21, 2013 [quote name='jazzyvee' timestamp='1361203775' post='1982689'] How long did have yours before it got replaced? I have had mine almost 10 years so unlikely they would replace it now for a newer model. Jazzyvee [/quote] Good point. As I recall mine was only about 6 months old when it started going tits up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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