Gave my Mark III purple stripe the executive treatment

I've had a Mark III purple stripe loaded long head for five or six years now, but for the past couple of years it was out of commission. One day I switched it on and noticed some channel bleed, which is a well-known indicator that it's time to change out the LDRs. Since it was as old as it was, I figured it was time for a cap job as well. Somewhat foolishly, I decided to attempt the work myself. Well, things didn't go so well. I sort of managed to get the parts in there, but my work was imprecise and I had to fix a few lifted traces along the way. When I got it back together and plugged in, I got bupkes...I knew the power amp was OK because I could plug into the effects return and get a signal, but something was up with the preamp. Eventually i got tired of trying to figure it out and moved on to other projects.

Finally, last month I decided enough was enough: I would ship the thing back to Mesa for the Mike B. treatment. Since I was going to that effort, I figured I might as well spring for the III+ upgrade as well. Within a few days of requesting the service, I was in email communication with Mike, who is as pleasant to deal with as can be. I shipped it off, and within a few weeks I heard from him...turned out I had installed all the LDRs upside down. Whoops. He fixed that and some of my other hack work, and swapped out a few caps and resistors that were on their way out to boot.

UPS delivered the amp yesterday. It had been some time since I had played it, so my recollections of what it sounded like before are a little fuzzy, but I definitely never remember it sounding this good. I mean, it sounds unbelievable. There's not a trace of any of that harshness that one associates with Mark IIIs (the blue stripe I used to have was definitely like that). It's like butter. I don't know if that's the + upgrade talking or what, but whatever it is, I'm down.

All in all, it cost a pretty penny to get all this done, but I'm not complaining. Knowing that the same guy whose signature is on the chassis from 30 years ago put it to rights and made it sound better than it ever did is worth the money. I can't say enough good things about the whole experience.

Whoopysnorp said:

All in all, it cost a pretty penny to get all this done.

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Can you give me a rough idea of what a pretty penny happens to equal out to in US $. I have thought about sending mine in one day to have it looked at and have some mods done.

Thanks !

The III+ mods cost $200. Getting it packed professionally and shipped out there from Chicago was about $150. Parts and labor for the remaining aspects of the service, which included the cost of two new 6L6s, was about $250 I think. So, it adds up, but no regrets here.