batsbrew
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fried a tube.
first time in about 15 years!
LOL
man did it stink.
i kept smelling something like burning plastic....
and finally i snuck a peak behind the amp head, and it was redplating!
LOL again.......
it was hot as hell, hadn't completely given up the ghost, but was already in the death throes.
i was recording..... and had the amp jacked to about 50% power, with an attenuator in line....
i should have been running the fan, but i wasn't.
i kept thinking to myself "amp sounds like @ss tonight, wazzup?"
and then the smell was the giveaway.
i gotta say, the mesa branded tubes, have been very good to me.
i've never tubed with ANYTHING but mesa tubes, and over the last 32 years, tube wear has been phenomenal.
ok, off to buy tubes at lunch today......
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digi2ns
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/01 11:32:49
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Ahh man that stinks or sux, which ever way ya wanna look at it LOL
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batsbrew
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/01 12:20:27
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yes, it stinksucks  but i haven't retubed in several years, guess i gotta pony up
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batsbrew
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/01 15:24:43
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got my new ones.
firing em up soon...
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michaelhanson
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/01 15:48:14
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I can't remember the last time I fried a tube either. Has to have been a good 15-20 years ago.
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Bristol_Jonesey
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/01 17:02:54
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I fried an electrolytic capacitor (inserted wrong way <doh>) fixing a video monitor last year.
I'd forgotten what an unholy stench (and BANG!) they make
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Bub 
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/01 17:31:27
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I still have the original tubes in my 100 Watt Mesa Dual Rectifier Tremoverb 2 x 12 combo. Still sounds awesome and I used to play out with it. I got it in the mid 90's iirc.
post edited by Bub - 2013/03/01 17:35:13
"I pulled the head off Elvis, filled Fred up to his pelvis, yaba daba do, the King is gone, and so are you."
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Guitarhacker
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 09:25:11
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Most of the tubes I fried were in the project amps I built. Bias set wrong by a few volts. I start playing and it's sounding good, all is fine at the low volume..... crank it and shortly the tubes look like light bulbs and the sound is distorted...... the fuse kicks out and smoke is coming from the amp..... tubes were fried.....
I think I fried one tube is a factory amp... a Carvin. But, the envelope had a crack in it and O2 was getting in there. A 2 tube power section doesn't run well on one tube. No spare in the gig bag...so I had to run all the way to town on a Friday night to find a tube.... that was luck that I actually found one.
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trimph1
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 09:36:45
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I blew one out of a linear amp once...just once...a 4CX1000A...stink city...eeewwwww...
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The Maillard Reaction
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 10:00:04
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Mesa are usually biased to run "cold". They don't red plate very often. The factory bias settings allow for a wide range of plug and play possibility.
I've seen power tubes do some weird things but I have rarely seen one red plate without some issue elsewhere in the circuit being part the cause.
If this new set of tubes burns down in the next couple of weeks you may want to measure the bias current and determine if the bias supply has aged to a point of deterioration.
It may have just been a tube dying all by itself... or the tube may have been killed by a bias supply issue that has yet to be diagnosed.
Or it could be the Palmer has finally started frying the output transformer and the tubes are displaying the symptom.
Keep an eye on it.
best regards,
mike
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Zonno
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 10:53:05
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chuckebaby
Shouldnt this be posted in "the Hardware forum" ??
discussing tubes in the coffee house?
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batsbrew
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 16:27:51
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the palmer has absolutely nothing to do with the tube failing.
simply running an amp hard, does that.
the palmer does not directly effect the way the amp works.
it would do the same thing if i ran it the same way without the palmer.
you are thinking of the Weber Mass Lite attenuator i run the mesa into.
the palmer is strictly a full signal-to-line level device.
again, the weber has nothing to do with the way the amp works.
this is a misconception about attenuators, that they harm the amp.
they are only a load...
the only thing that harms amps, is load imbalance, or running it hard...
as it is, the new tubes sound awesome.
and since they were about 10 years old, and had the weber in line with the setup for about 5 of those, i'd say that's a resounding success story.
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craigb
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 17:13:22
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I haven't fried a tube in about 30 years though I have had a pre-amp tube go bad (developed an annoying tick sound). Mostly this is because I haven't been anywhere that I could really turn up my amp!
Time for all of you to head over to Beyond My DAW!
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cclarry
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 17:48:12
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I fried a tube once...
It got really greasy...
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The Maillard Reaction
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 18:57:09
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The point marked "E" -60vDC is the bias supply voltage. When that voltage rises or slowly wavers above a threshold the plates on the tubes can draw enough current that they red plate. fixed
post edited by mike_mccue - 2013/03/02 19:57:33
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batsbrew
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 18:59:26
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i've got a mark2b....
about 11 years earlier design.
they changed quite a bit by the time they designed the iv
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The Maillard Reaction
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 19:56:31
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My mistake. Sorry I thought you had a mkIV. I'll get rid of those picture links. The bias voltage connections will be in the same place. It's labeled "E" -52vDC.  edit spelling.
post edited by mike_mccue - 2013/03/02 21:09:52
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batsbrew
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 20:54:46
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it's all good mike...
it's a fascinating subject to me....
i don't understand much electricity.
i just look for mojo...
maybe mojo is somewhere between OHM and OOMMMMM
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batsbrew
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Re:fried a tube.
2013/03/02 20:56:23
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i've played this amp with fixed bias since i bought it..
but i'm seriously thinking of having several things modded on it, including adding a pair of bias ports......
another strange thing about this amp, the Vol 1 and Lead Master are rheostats, instead of potentiometers....
thinking about changing that too!
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