Early Mark IIB coliseum serials

  • Thread starter Thread starter dr teeth
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That's bad news on the TAD's. I've always meant to try them.
The 35w 7581A is the one ring to rule them all- the higher testing, higher QA standards 387 (415). I picked up a bass 400 (non-plus) a few years ago with them and then watched the market for years but finding good deals just aint gonna happen unless you find a local seller and very few non tube-ampers have a clue about makes/models of tubes or a way to test them.
If you make sure of "made in USA" the peavey super 6's are worth watching since you have to distinguish the crap ones with Sylvania's and people are inherently lazy. My first ever amp was a Heritage VTX which came stock with the 387's. I hate to throw this out there but old Peavey's might be a good place to look for 387's.
No one has confirmed it but the 430's I bet can take the coli plate volts. Jeremy- since you have an amp in MB's hands how about asking him what he thinks about that. There should be plenty of non-mesa labelled WXT+'s out there.
 
A shimmer of hope- Western Electric is going to start making amp tubes.
With any luck we'll get some double and triple mica 387/7581A's.
That would destroy current prices of questionable tubes with my blessing.
 
Thanks Markedman.
I reached out and there are a couple people he's holding out for that are interested.
I did ask if he knows if it has a sp-8c or sp-9a.
 
GJgo said:
I know a guy in Chicago that will buy any working 415, he has 100 + of them hoarded so he can always match sets. I've stayed away from them in general because at this age, if you can't afford to do that you generally aren't going to get good matched sets.

I'm stretching at the moment to find a good set of reliable tubes for the 105 C+ I just picked up. Short supply these days. I may have found an A/B pair but I'm coming up short on a Class A pair. My spare stash are all 440s which aren't the best choice for the hot iron.
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You planning to run all 6L6, or 6L6/EL34’s?
 
dr teeth said:
So for the record even though I have 6 B's currently is they suck and everyone should focus back on the IIC+ please to stop the B prices from becoming a relevant amp.

That said there are still some deals since the general population hasn't come around completely to much higher prices. I'd say grab one cheap and as said mod it if it doesn't sound great with the caveat of making sure you have V1 and v2 tubes that are known good and to your liking and put some quality time in with it.

My S IIC sounds so great with the 4FB redbacks I never wanted to mod it to plus though recent prices made me think about it.

I'm not tossing my III's anytime soon and the blue stripe is a venerable gigging amp. Well I'll prob sell my DRG blue stripe but that's only because I have a blue stripe KRG. Since the blue stripe was available (S, H, K) through the entire green stripe production there are plenty out there and is a good place to start if you want the highest gain amp mesa ever made. The red stripe is the chased (due to C+ references if you ask me). I only hope I land the purple stripe K before people start liking that amp. So far the purple is my favorite but that's not a popular opinion.
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My buddy just scored a purple stripe K, and it’s on the way. Why is it your favorite over the others?
 
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That must be the KD that Jeremy gave me a heads up on. Nice. I'd prefer 180W of headroom for the bedroom but never played a KD.
I've had 2 long head purples, 3 blues, 1 green (and have the IVA which is close), and have the red DRG that I haven't put enough time on to have an opinion. In a word the purples are the sweetest I've played.
It's the gold! The gold!
No, even tho the purple gold traced pres are hands down the sexiest thing I've seen with resistors I've always been a huge fan of the B, my first mark, a 60w loop mod I still have and 2nd mesa only to a DC2 I had/have forever.

I started locking myself in the bedroom with my sg and heritage a couple hours a day in the 80's and couldn't stand 80's radio, never been into hair bands and it took me a while to come around from guitar brilliance to composition brilliance like robert smith/gallup. And I only started giving that a chance after Nirvana and the Pumpkins put good rock and roll back on the airwaves.
That's an important background piece since I with some exceptions (scorps, priest but my love was with KK Downing guitars, VH etc) skipped the 80's and got buried in late 60's early 70's what I call heavy metal and dynamic stuff like Tull, bands with Hammond B's, southern rock and have seen my share of dead shows. Tony Iommi more than anyone was my guitar teacher while Blackmore, Gilmour/Barrett, Buck Dharma, and a few others made indelible dents in my skull.
So for the reasons the IIB hasn't been popular I love the purple. They are both phenomenal amps not trying to be anything other than great amps. Awesome pedal amps and pedals aren't needed for most things except that there is usually a delay in my signal chain even if it's subtle. It's not a high gain amp which is the rub for the masses while I'm not usually looking for a tone in my head when I'm plugging in. The feel, sound, mood, and hopefully a lot of air movement may pull me into a Keith Richard's ventilator blues riff and then I'm the king of tangents so who knows where that'll take me.
The purple is a great amp to get lost in for a while. But I'm hoping your friend hates it and dumps it!
 
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I should say the purple is not a high gain amp if the blue stripe is the standard.
There is plenty of juice in the jug.
 
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the purps
 

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dr teeth said:
That's bad news on the TAD's. I've always meant to try them.
The 35w 7581A is the one ring to rule them all- the higher testing, higher QA standards 387 (415). I picked up a bass 400 (non-plus) a few years ago with them and then watched the market for years but finding good deals just aint gonna happen unless you find a local seller and very few non tube-ampers have a clue about makes/models of tubes or a way to test them.
If you make sure of "made in USA" the peavey super 6's are worth watching since you have to distinguish the crap ones with Sylvania's and people are inherently lazy. My first ever amp was a Heritage VTX which came stock with the 387's. I hate to throw this out there but old Peavey's might be a good place to look for 387's.
No one has confirmed it but the 430's I bet can take the coli plate volts. Jeremy- since you have an amp in MB's hands how about asking him what he thinks about that. There should be plenty of non-mesa labelled WXT+'s out there.
Click to expand...
I’ll chime in on the Peavey Super Six Sylvania…I’ve had a few and every one was WAY too hot for any of the 4 C+ I had in here..like 60-75ma too hot. I’d stay away.
 
dr teeth said:
I should say the purple is not a high gain amp if the blue stripe is the standard.
There is plenty of juice in the jug.
Click to expand...
Gonna disagree here; I had 2 Mk 3s in at the same time to compare. The Purple slayed the internet favorite Red stripe and it wasn’t close. Both DRGs. Purple easily had the same gain as the red also. While they were here I picked up that first 2C…and in a week both 3s were gonzo. No contest.
Edit: I read your post too fast. I see you too like the Purple. Nevermind lol
 
Interesting you found the purple more gain than the red. My red came with 4 of the 416's which was the reason I recently brought out all the 440/7581A/387/WXT+/GE 6L6/425/454/non-labelled 420's wl too much idle current. I also tested some 442/447/416's since this is a DRG even though I typically use all 6L6.

All 416's didn't sound right to me and go figure one was so cold it wasn't usable and another not really good. I don't have a tube tester, just in amp with a bias rite for ease of use.

Except for the 2 pairs of 415's I bought from a tube seller, one of which are very usable, the readings were all over map.

For the 387's there were a handful of super6, RCA labelled, GT labelled and the bulk of them 415's. Though I've read they last forever I had several in single digits mA. There was about an even split between single halo and double halo getters. One set of single getters I believe were the stock set in a purple stripe. (26.2, 34.5, 21.2, 20.5) and even though the amp got crushed in shipping and rust on the chassis from being in a humid area I think it sat in a closet most of it's life.

The made in the usa super 6's tested 5.4 (which started to redplate it's 447 mate), 11.5, 18.2, 22.2, 26.4, 28.2, and the highest came in at 36.5. I'm happy with those results especially at the lower prices I paid but buying tubes is playing roulette at best which is 50% odds.
 
I realize mentioning single halo vs double halo leaves room to debate what is what. Given mesa's back tracking on the original 418 (6550) marketing only to label and sell the variant they originally said not to use (in the bass 400 non plus) putting a mesa label on a tube doesn't guarantee it to be 387 but I'm taking a leap of faith that they are both 387 and made in different factories with different tooling.

According to Watford the single getter was used up until '74 (and after) when the 387 was born ushering in the double getter. They state the 387 was built from the already proven Sylvania 6L6GC which stayed in production until the 80's.

It is pure speculation on my part but as many Mesa, Peavey, GT, and all the tube maker labelled stuff single getter "387's" as there are out there I believe they are all built (double and single) to 387 standard with the elite tested tubes thrown in the 7581A bin. This factory flashes with single getters, that factory flashes with double gettters. Same guts, except for flashing. It is reasonable to think at least one production line changed from 6L6GC to 387 later on for demand since they are close to each other and then just stayed with single getter.

Back in the day everyone labelled and sold each other's tubes so guts not labels matter.
 
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I’ve not noticed any difference in tone between single vs double getter Sylvania 6L6GC in my C+s. To my knowledge the single getter is the earlier design; but not exactly sure.
 
I couldn't help but wonder if the double getter 387's ran out and they started putting a 415 label on the 6L6GC Sylvania that pre-dated the 387, but stayed in production along side the 387.

Otherwise my guess is as said they are one in the same.
 
IIRC, the whole STR thing started with Fender for their combo amps. Mesa raised the bar with their testing / screening process and filtered out the “lesser” tubes and branded theirs as STR 415. They were STR 387 and/or Sylvania 6L6GC, but screened to really tight tolerances. Those that didn’t pass, went back out into the wild and were rebranded (ARS, Fender, Peavey, etc.). I have examples of both single and double getter STR 415’s, and yes, their construction is quite similar except for the getters. The double halo getter versions are near identical to the 7581A. Technically speaking the 6L6GC’s are rated at 30W, whereas the 7581A is 35W. Some would say that the double getter STR 415 are really 7581A, but the factory etching on the tube tells the story.
 
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