DC-5 Combo- bass, mid, treble, presence controls not working

Hello all, I wonder if any amp techs here can help me out. I have a DC-5 combo (first version) which I bought many years ago. It has been in its flight case for the last 5 years or so. I would dearly love to use the amp as my main amp now after owning a back breaker of a half stack for many years.

Anyhow, none of the rotary eq controls have any effect on the sound. The graphic eq still works well on the lead channel, but the bass, treble, mid & presence pots have little effect on the clean channel and on the lead channel only the mid & presence pots seems to work. There is no scratchy pots, crackle, or anything like that.

In its present state, the lead channel is useable but the clean channels sounds awful..like all mids and not much else..

I live in a fairly remote place, there's no decent amp techs here and I have to repair this myself.

I don't want to give up on this amp, so I hope someone can help me with this issue.

Hi,

lets change pre amp tubes , 12 ax7 and let us know if things evolved !

little effect is always better than no effetc, this mean than tubes are involved

Hi - thanks for that.

Can the tubes really affect the eq performance ? The graphic eq still works.

I ask only as I sent a mail previously to mesa support a month back, who said the tubes have nothing to do with this issue as that was my first question to them - should I change tubes ?.

I have owned lots of amps over the years mostly tube amps mainly marshalls but also peaveys & fenders and I have never seen an amps eq go bad on me.

They would not give me any more info other than saying "its not a tube issue" and just told me take it to an amp tech of which there are none that I would ever let loose on my amp...

Hi,

when pre tubes are down, it reduce the spetrum of tone!

especially if they are running for 20 years

let's try to change pre tubes first

I did buy a set of Mesa 12 ax7 tubes years ago, which I should still have somewhere but they are around 10 years old and I tried these in the amp years ago and they sounded bad...very bland/sterile...and that's why I think I just put them back in their boxes and forgot about them. I also have 2 spare sets of 6L6 Mesa power amp tubes which I also bought at the same time.

I will order up a total new set of JJ's from Hotrox here in UK.

hi

good one, JJ ecc803s long plate are very good v1 v2 v4

In the end the problem was a small tear in the C90 Black Shadow speaker, was very hard to detect. Just pulled the speaker out to inspect it and saw it on the front. Only reason I knew was because I wanted to try a new Eminence Cannabis Rex speaker in there. When I did the changeover, the sound difference was remarkable. I was very happy with the Eminence speaker in there but I did a repair to the C90 myself and put it back in to compare. I now understand what people love about this amp. All eq working good now after the speaker repair, AND I forgot to mention I replaced the mesa speaker cable with a new home made Van Damme speaker cable just to give the speaker every chance to sound good.

The reverb is still weak though and I am still get awful clipping noises when I use chorus on the effects loop when I dig in hard hard (be it chorus from my TC nova system or from my boss chorus pedals). I have come this far and if I can lick the effects loop problem, get the reverb working and replace the mains power transformer with a UK one (its a 110v at the moment and am using an external power converter) I think I will finally be there.

No matter what, this amp is NEVER going to be sold now !!

nice, really!

C90 is a mid attack ace, like it best!

about your reverb noise, its all about damping it more, you ad damping material !

monsta had a mod on reverb to get it a lil stronger output , google "dc5 mods", you ll find it

hope youll enjoy the DC5, its a amazing lil amp!

have a nice day

Pierre