Why does everyone hate the Nomad series ?

Seems the the Nomad series really gets a bad rap. I cranked mine up the other day and wow, it still screams.

I had a 100 212 for a couple years. I sold it this year to help fund my Stiletto Ace.

I liked the Nomad's orange channel sounds best. The cleans were crap, and the red channel only sounded good when run through a 412 cab. I liked it for the way I was using it, but now that I have the Ace, I sure don't miss the Nomad.

I don't think it's "Hated" around these parts, just not too many people fond of it or really have one.

I have a friend that has a Road King I head and a Nomad 2x12 and he perfers to play with the Nomad.... But he plays in a blues band and said he has no use for the "over the top" distortion the Road King has and his Nomad is perfect for blues and he even likes the cleans for his monthly country gig.

I think the sound of the Nomad depends alot on the speaker configuration. I have the 4x12 (Trad) cabinet with V30s and a Nomad 55 head. I like the GREEN / clean and RED channels, but have not quite figured out what to do with the ORANGE channel.

The LSS has has some better clean sounds, and the Rectifiers sound better for heavy stuff, but the Nomads do a reasoonably good job of covering both bases in a single amp.

I like Nomads.

I think the Nomads get it in the a** because their gain structuring is kind of weird, (more so than any other boogies I have owned or played).
It sure isn’t a "crank-n-play" kind of amp.
It's down right weird at times. Personally I found the red channel’s tones to be smoother (but certainly not less crunchy or tight) than the typical rectos, plus no fizz (you recto guys know what I mean LOL). Not to take away from them at all, just not my thing.
The Orange chan, I use for older rock/metal tunes (think “Wasted” by Def Leppard) or Ozzy kinda stuff (Jake E. Lee era, diff guitars for those songs though).

I think it even says it in the owners manual, the amp and tone controls react different depending on where the gain is set. Things to watch for, the bass control, it will “woolf” up on you faster than anything. Do be afraid to cut the mids to about 9 o’clock, there will still be plenty of mids in there.
My best suggestion, turn the knobs slowly,…very slowly even. Really listen to what they do. Don’t just dime the treb, bass and presence to 10 and zero the mid. That suggestion goes good with about any amp though….
The Clean chan, if someone says they can’t get a good full tone out of it, I think they need to stop diming the presence knob LOL, or try the neck pickup. For those that say “you can’t get a “Fendery” sound out of it ( or any other amp), uh buy a Fender amp, duh. :lol:
I’ve been looking a Roadster head myself, but to be honest, I can’t really see myself needing one, but that’s never stopped me before (insert evil laugh here).
Enough of my endless F-in’ ramblings.

i have a nomad
i use it for prog metal, thrash, rock, blues..everything

channel 2 is where its at for thrash, kill some mids, treble about 6, bass about 4..no presence and gain at 7..pure heaven..
channel 3 is my lead channel, petrucci tones from this. gain about 5, treble 4 and bass 7-8 ish, 3/4 on presence, thick, fluid and lovley
cleans, treble about 6, mids 7/8, bass about 4 and gain 3..fendery cleans

these are all X/10, no o clocks

i LOVE my nomad..its the 100w 1x12 model..just utterly love it.

I run my Nomad 55 4x10 with EL34s, and a 4 ohm THD Hotplate attenuator.

I get great tone from the amp. Would not want to part with it.

-Gary K

love my nomad 100.

dennq45 said:

Seems the the Nomad series really gets a bad rap. I cranked mine up the other day and wow, it still screams.

Click to expand...

One question, Do you like your Nomad ? If you do why do gives a rats *** what everyone else thinks ? Trust your own ears . If you dig it thats all that matters at the end of the day .

Amen!

-Gary K

+1 to all things said here. As you can tell by my name I love Nomads. One of my tubes blew a while ago and I've been trying to find the time to take it to the shop.....for about a month. :shock:


anyway. I love the channel 2 and channel 1. You just give the knobs some lovin' and carress them gently.... :roll:

take it to the shop ? what are you the grinch ? fire a bulb in it cindy lou hoo !

Nomads are sweet. the nomad 45 is the best amp i ever played that is el84. the thing is tits man! the problem is that it is all knoby. anytime you have to make moron musicians think it will always turn out bad. i love rectifiers, but lets face it they are popular cause they are easy to use. look at the Mark series. these all went away, minus I and IV cause they were to hard for most to use. lets face it mark II c+ is the best amp ever made. but its not "user friendly"

it's a shame. :roll:

My nomad 55 1X12" has been in the studio and on the road for 3 years. In that time it has been in for service twice, new tubes once and power transformer issues once. Personally I have had to open the amp up to fix pots 4 times.

My biggest gripe is the pots and the front panel. The nobs are flush with the cabinet and they get bumped easily, when they do, the pots come 'uncrimped' and that channel will fail. Buy a road case or do as I did and velcro a length of wood over the nobs while transporting the amp.

The tone is good, but not easy to get, and varies big time from guitar to guitar, set it up for humbuckers and a single coil will sound far too thin and visa-versa. Follow the owners manual for setting treble tone first.

Also, reverb on channels 2 and 3 is weak. Volume from one channel to the others can vary by several decibels.

Lastly, you cant lean back this amp while playing it, weird reverb feedback loop thing happens, so it's always on a bar chair at gigs. Oh, and when I transport it on its back it blows a fuse.

Good Luck
Other than that, its great.

lashawntay said:

My biggest gripe is the pots and the front panel. The nobs are flush with the cabinet and they get bumped easily, when they do, the pots come 'uncrimped' and that channel will fail. Buy a road case or do as I did and velcro a length of wood over the nobs while transporting the amp.

Click to expand...

I also think the Nomads are great. I've said this a million times, so here's a million and one. It's MUCH easier to get a killer sound with the Nomad 100 over the other models (45/55). Yes, the graphic EQ makes that much difference.

As for the problem you've mentioned. This is known by Mesa, but should of only affected the earlier models. What happened was that the knob that fits on the pots was manufactured too short (though it might of been a design issue?). When the knob is on all the way, there is still room between it and the threaded part of the pot. If the knob is banged/pushed in, it will losen the back casing on the pot, eventually making the pot useless. (The later Nomads had the correct knob. I've actually measured both and there is a difference).

I was able to buy a Nomad 100 VERY cheap because of this problem. Mesa sold me all of the pots needed for the front panel (yes, it was a lot of soldering). They also included some spacers for the existing knobs. Basically, it's just a thin plastic washer that press fits on the back of the knob, eliminating the existing gap. Works perfect now.

Give Mesa a call and ask them for some of those plastic spacer washers. It will solve the banged in pot syndrome. (Hey, that would be a cool name for a band. Banged In Pot Syndrome.)

Six modes in 3 channels!!!, if you can't find it here, maybe it's your fingers! Or not in your fingers!!! It's only valves, turn them up, turn them down! It's all the same!! Learn how to play and shut up!! It's not the size of the wand, but the skill of the conjurer that produces the rabbit!!

I had a nomad 100 long chassis as my first 100 watt head and i found it to be a very difficult beast to tame. Not really gainy enough to handle everything i needed, I was hopeing to find some mk IV tones there a la lamb of god style but it was a struggle. I used a compressor to goose it a bit and it still didnt really get me where i needed to be. The clean channel i thought sounded really nice, but the reverb was shitty and the head would break pretty constantly and i treated it like a queen, dual lipped flight case and the works. The term I'd use was just 'closed up' there wasnt much in the way of harmonics in its sound, nothing would just jump out at you as a great tone. That 'it takes awhile to dial in' bullshit doesnt really fly with me; i've been playing guitar for quite a while with quite a few different amps and if you cant get NEAR the tone you really dig in the first month its not the head of you.