Express 5:25+ struggle with channel two

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KaiserSoze

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I Love channel one for cleans and it handles my pedals really well. BUT, I'm having a really hard time getting anything musical and good sounding out of channel two. It just seems so mid-heavy that it's annoying at all the different gain levels. I've worked the eq and tone stack a hundred ways and I can't get it to sound inspiring at all. Even the high gain settings sound very unbalanced to me. I play live and use humbuckers and single coils but have to stick with channel one exclusively, which seems like a waste. I had high hopes for using the blues side of channel two and boosting it but I can't get a good sound out of it. Kind of frustrating.
Am I missing something or does that channel just not have much use? Or does it need to be cranked to sound good?
 
Like most Boogies they seem to need to be cranked to get the most out of them. Have you played with the various wattage settings? Sometimes a lower output actually generates better tones. I like my Blues channel but I play at low basement volumes and the hiss is so bad I eventually bail and go back to Ch1. Mine's an older 525 1x10, I think the Plus models are a bit quieter.

I just picked up a TA-15 for laughs, what a cool little amp, great Ch2-type crunch without the noise (or the reverb or effects loop...but that's another story!)

Cheers
 
Have you tried channel two in the blues setting for your clean channel? If you don't mind just a bit of grit, this works well. Then I bet you can get a good crunch out of channel 1.

Works for me.
 
You can try another speaker. Some have tried a C90. I use both a Tone Tubby Winterland and Purple Haze. The tone controls and EQ respond differently with different speakers to my ears. The 2.2K EQ slider up and the 750Hz slider down is where i would mostly work it. It is still a thick sounding channel.

Agree with a previous post to try the Crunch mode on channel 1 and see.
 
+1 on the Tone Tubby, I put a 4040 in my 525 1x10, it's a totally different amp (in a good way). Can't wait for the 40 hours or so of breakin period to elapse!
 
Twally had exactly the same idea I would suggest. Try the Blues mode on ch2 for your clean, and dial in your dirt on the crunch mode of ch1. I owned one of these, and did not care for the Vintage 30 speaker. Mine was the 5:25 1x12 ( non Plus) version. I replaced the speaker with a Greenback, and it made a HUGE difference for me. I never had to crank this amp to get good tone out of it, once dialed in, it had great tone across the whole volume range. I sold it to get a 5:50 Plus, and quite honestly, wished I would have kept it.
 
I play a PRS DGT and Fender Tele into my Express 5:25 Plus. I have the burn channel set up as follows (all o'clock) settings

Gain: 9:30
Treble: noonish to 1
Mids: 10
Bass: 11
Master: 9

15 watt mode

Graphic EQ. I Push the 750 & 2200 sliders up a bar and a half, drop the 240 a bar (below base line) and push the 80 up a smidgen.
I like this as my "Dumble-ish" tone for the PRS. I find I can tweak the Burn channel far more than the Blues for some clarity. I think the blues channel sounds like a hot mess- nothing a simple TS9 won't do.
 
I know it's an old thread, but just wanted to add that running my Fender Strat through blues mode with treble maxed out, gain somewhere around two o'clock, and EQ sliders set similar to the one used in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xodnkjxsYc, I get a really great sound. This is my main clean sound. On channel one I usually use the crunch mode, with both gain and treble maxed out.
 
Resurrected I guess. I’ve since found the way to my happiness with channel two: catalinbread Naga Viper or probably any treble boost is a marvel with this amp. I’d tweaked and tried different things to really get a great rock tone and nothing did it the way this pedal did. Perfect compliment to channel two and I can now really get the most out of this amp, which is awesome. Beautiful clean channel and rocking gain channel....
My two cents....:)
 
What is the amp treble knob setting when using the treble boost? Push more of the frequencies you are looking for and clarity instead of the tone stack. Interesting.
 
KaiserSoze said:
Resurrected I guess. I’ve since found the way to my happiness with channel two: catalinbread Naga Viper or probably any treble boost is a marvel with this amp. I’d tweaked and tried different things to really get a great rock tone and nothing did it the way this pedal did. Perfect compliment to channel two and I can now really get the most out of this amp, which is awesome. Beautiful clean channel and rocking gain channel....
My two cents....:)

I'm using the sliders to slower the lows and highs, and boost the mids, and get a really fantastic sound with my Strat. Maybe I should check out a treble boost sometime too, and see how this would influence the sound.
 

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