My Vintage 30 pile - Where is the line between enthusiasm and insanity?

SpiderWars said:
You'll hear it when you watch but there is a pretty big difference is between the 8 ohm and 16 ohm version. Most Mesa 4x12 that I've seen had 8ohm speakers and most Marshall were 16ohm. I know that ALL of my comparisons were Mesa @ 8 vs Marshall @ 16 and that explains why I thought Mesa versions were smoother. I also thought I liked the Mesas better but in the video I liked the early 2000 16ohm the best. Those sounded killer until he got to the 2004.

But I think I would prefer almost any speaker over those 5k spike versions.
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I miss-spoke. They are 8.
 
the other John Browne said:
Thank you! From my observations, it doesn't seem that Mesa speakers are any different to regular V30s. They may however be QC'd a little tighter or there might be a specific tolerance band for their frequency response curves. That would also possibly explain why one can still find the odd UK made "regular" T3903 or T3904 today. Maybe those are the ones that don't quite make the cut but are still good enough. However that is entirely speculation on my part.
Either way, the normal V30s can sound like the Mesa ones. I can't make out a distinctive characteristic that sets the Mesa or Marshall OEM speakers apart from the regular ones, I believe the production year/batch of the speaker cone really makes the biggest difference.
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Great job on the demo. I didn't sit through the whole thing but I was able to pick up on the reasoning, set up, process, etc and found the Mesa example at 16:20 and there was a slight difference but nothing discernable. Tighter I think is what you said and with 8's being a tad smoother I can see why people like them. But yeah, some V30s are grating and it should be stated that Splawn amps and V30 do not get along IMO. Mids thing.

Congrats - that was a metric ton of work :cheers:
 
311splawndude said:
Great job on the demo. I didn't sit through the whole thing but I was able to pick up on the reasoning, set up, process, etc and found the Mesa example at 16:20 and there was a slight difference but nothing discernable. Tighter I think is what you said and with 8's being a tad smoother I can see why people like them. But yeah, some V30s are grating and it should be stated that Splawn amps and V30 do not get along IMO. Mids thing.

Congrats - that was a metric ton of work :cheers:
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Ive heard the newer splawns are fine with v30's. I had a 2011 Nitro and quick rod and had an Orange cab with v30s in it and could not get rid of that cab fast enough. I got a splawn 2x12 with creamback 65's and loved that pair. Watching this v30 vid I actually thought about how distracting it would have been with an old splawn.
 
stephen sawall said:
Really interesting results.
Appreciate the time put into this.

Hope you do a video covering the variations you mentioned that are slightly different speakers.
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I'm definitely doing that. I was a little nervous about this video as it turned out so very long and the topic is pretty niche but the response in the first two days has blown all of my previous videos out of the water by a giant margin.
So yeah, I'l be making a short follow up with the exotic V30s (Black frames, Vintage 30MFs, 1777 cone Hughes & Kettner OEMs, Bad Cat OEM V30, TAD 25th Anniversary speaker and one really early V30 with Celestions cosmetics but with the Marshall product code) and some V30 trivia., as well as some follow up tests, like different dust caps and speaker break-in.
 
The speaker break in video sounds interesting. That's something I've really wanted to know cause I swear it's real. I remember hating one of my cabs when I first got it, but I kept using it anyways at loud volumes too and over the years it seems to have smoothened out over the last ten years, or I just have hearing loss, lol.
 
I'm sure I remember mic'ing my G12EVH's when they were first new and finding them brighter than V30's, and then a year or so after, and finding they were now darker.

But I don't have any proof. I should've recorded the clip. But IME, break-in is a thing. But maybe that's just our perception. Proof seems to suggest otherwise.
anomaly said:
The speaker break in video sounds interesting. That's something I've really wanted to know cause I swear it's real. I remember hating one of my cabs when I first got it, but I kept using it anyways at loud volumes too and over the years it seems to have smoothened out over the last ten years, or I just have hearing loss, lol.
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Yeah. The explanations for break in are plausible and the people I trust on the matter claim it is a thing. I just couldn't really point to anything in all the graphs I made and say "Aha! That's break in there!"
My guess is, it exists but the effect is probably more subtle or not as drastic as people think it is. I shall try to find out and document it!
 
This is huge, thanks so much for doing all this work! I have quads of 99, 01, 06 & 15 Mesa 8 ohm versions as well as some newer 16 ohm pairs and have formed many of the same opinions so it's awesome to see the tech you added to the conversation.

One big question I have is this- what fundamental differences are there between different segments that CANNOT be neutralized with EQ changes? I've been doing a lot of reamping lately and am slowly coming to the conclusion that Fricker is right within the context of close mic reamp recording high gain tones. Speakers & mics matter, the amp matters but to a lesser extent, and nothing else really matters once you take EQ shaping into account.

P.S. from a production & fulfillment standpoint, your sticker theory is not crazy at all.
 
The two I got last night appear to be unused made in 2017.
Currently have 13 Vintage 30. Each individual speaker can sound pretty different.
These are going in a Mesa oversized 4x12 with a pair of G12K85. I find myself more interested in speakers than I have been in a long time.
 
stephen sawall said:
The two I got last night appear to be unused made in 2017.
Currently have 13 Vintage 30. Each individual speaker can sound pretty different.
These are going in a Mesa oversized 4x12 with a pair of G12K85. I find myself more interested in speakers than I have been in a long time.
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Mother of God, that combo is brutal! V30 top 85’s bottom???
 
I do that combo as an 8ohm X-pattern in my old mesa straight-slant, and also with all 16ohm speakers by running my mesa 212 on top of my avatar 212(k100). I'd have to say the 412 is my favorite, but both are great setups. Even the k100s on top and the v30s on bottom sounds amazing, it just looks weird with the smaller 212 on bottom.
 
I was considering ordering 2 new Mesa V30s for my 2x12 cab because I really dig the York Audio Mesa 2x12 cab IRs. But then I realized the speakers used in the IR are 70 watt V30s from I don't know when. Has anyone tried any newer Mesa V30s and liked them? Or am I better off looking at the Jensen Jets series.
 
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