F30 seems "hot"

NEw member -- old player---

I recently was fortunate enough to get an F30 Mesa in trade for a Marshall DSL and a Chibson husk--

and Ive noticed it seems much HOTTER -- the switches get warm to the touch as does the front face plate when playing for say 45 min to 2 hours--
is this "normal"

ALSO-- FYI I am usually playing AT home in small room and use the "attenuation hack" trick could this cause ti to run hotter?

this is my first mesa and FYI -- I TOTALLY LOVE THE THING!!!

Generally tube amps are space-heaters. Best not to push up against a wall, they need rear-venting to allow them to regulate temp. Mesa amps are also smaller than most, so many have fans installed to help with cooling.

The 30W amp shouldn't dissipate tons of power as heat, but it does have a number of filament heaters running, and class A/B amps are about 25% efficient at best. Essentially it should dissipate about the same heat as a 100W incandescent light bulb.

I'm assuming your volume hack is a volume knob in the loop. This would not have any effect on heat dissipation. If you run a power attenuator in line with the speaker, then the amp will dissipate more power and thus more heat.

Interesting you should say, those older jcm2000 DSL's were the hottest amps going round, mine got un use-ably hot.