TC50 Channel 2

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cpfeife44

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Hello everyone. I have had a Triple Crown for a few months now and I love it but I have been having and issue with channel 2. To me it sounds super thin and was wonder if there is a way to fix this. I have tried new tubes both pre and power. I like to keep this channel in the threshold of blues as is what I would like to use it for. Just can't seem to get what I want out of the channel. Thank you.
 
What's your settings? A quick and generic way to fatten something up would be raise your mids and bass and see where that gets you, but I'd need to see your settings to get a better idea to help you.
 
Presence-10 o'clock
Gain-12
Bass-12
Mid-130
Treble-10
El34 str447
Stock preamp
Channel in normal mode
 
Hmmm, In the normal mode, there tends to be more bass prevalent, so it shouldn't sound thin there for sure. Where's your channel and master volume set? What guitar/pick ups you using? Even with your settings it shouldn't sound thin at all. Mine set with them certainly does not.
 
My first questions would be: When you first noticed this, was there anything new in your signal chain? Something new in the loop? Something OLD in the loop? Does it remain thin sounding with any cord you use? Have you recently dropped your guitar? What speaker are you using? Just trying to isolate something else other than the amp. If this was a sudden change and there were no other outside factors like what I just asked, maybe there is something gone wrong with the amp. At first, I thought my effects loop was sucking the tone from the amp, but I just had to re-tweak my G-Major 2. I also had a toggle switch go bad on a guitar that totally killed my tone. As Daxman already said, those settings should sound plenty full.
 
I had a similar issue with the TC-50 recently. It sounded thin or weaker relative to the clean channel. I found the impedance switched to the 4 ohm position and changed it back to the 8 ohm position and bingo, back to normal. How does CH3 sound?

Note that the TC-50 does not follow the typical gain stage ladder topography like most Mesa amps. The clean channel has two tubes in its gain structure which are V1 and V2, CH2 or CH3 do not use these tube positions. V3 and V4 are responsible for the gain stages for CH2 and CH3. V5 uses a 12AT7 tube for the FX loop and the final tube would be V7 (PI), V6 role is the reverb send/return.

I would double check to see where you put the 12AT7 tube. You may have put it into the wrong place if you had taken them out. If both CH2 and CH3 seem to be weak or lacking you may have the 12AT7 in V3. (If you owned an RA100 V3 would be the position for the 12AT7 but the TC-50 it is different).
 
Hi,

I made a comparison of the TC-50 to the Rectoverb 25 and put it on Soundcloud (don't have the link handy, it is somewhere here in this forum). The TC-50 Channel 2 is way thinner than the Recto or Mark V. I noticed this out of the box when I got it and it hasn't changed. I have to roll off my guitars' tone knobs when on the neck position. For me this is unusual, I tend to like the tone knob dimed on the neck pickup. No pedals, ohms set correctly. Channel 2 is thin. I usually have treble around 9-10 o'clock, mid at 1 o'clock and bass at 3 o'clock, gain about noon.

Note: Mesa recommends that the treble may have to be rolled off on channel 2 and 3 when playing with low gain settings. So, I think this is a design thing and what gives the TC-50 some extra bite or grittiness and emphasises some higher frequencies when compared with other Mesas. Just my opinion.

At any rate, rolling down the tone knob on the guitar really has a massive effect on the TC-50 channel 2.

Another thing I noticed (and just remembered)....when using my Wah pedal with channel 2 at a band practice (i.e., drum volume) it felt like the sound volume would just disappear when the pedal was cocked "just right". In other words, when TC-50 wasn't reproducing some frequencies as much (as evidenced by the much lower volume at some wah pedal angles). My thinking is that the Channel 2 really emphasizes certain frequencies and this makes it quite sensitive to tone knob and wah.

Mace
 
The 6V6's are in it now. But the "thinness" is there with EL34s also. I suppose some solid recordings would help demonstrate.. but time isn't on my side.

Mace
 
I have not started rolling in preamp tubes with the TC-50 yet, however it is similar to the RA100 with some respects.

CH2 Lo gain only uses three gain stages, where as the CH3 Hi gain uses 4. V3A is the primary preamp tube circuit for both CH2 and CH3. V3B is the second gain stage for CH3. I believe the cascaded pair is V4. There may be a way to thicken up CH2 as well as CH3 with a long plate 12AX7 in V3. However it may be better served in V4 position and use a high gain medium/short plate in V3. The long plate 12AX7 will provide more depth with more roll off on the top end. At least this is what I have discovered with the RA100 as the Vintage low gain channel was thin as well.

Considering stock tubes, you could swap V1 +V2 with V3 + V4 and see if there is a difference. Unfortunately a 12AT7 will do no justice in this amp as the cascaded pair share the same tube position. Sooner or later I may try out some preamp tubes that have different characteristics than the Mesa 12AX7 (JJ tube). Change in power tubes will not correct for tuning of the two gain channels.

I have also noticed it may matter what guitar cable I am using with the TC-50. A standard guitar cable (cheaper one) vs high dollar cable (one that claims more tone like the Mogami platinum cable). I have two Mogami, one is the lower cost gold and the other is the high dollar platinum. I actually prefer the lower cost cable over the high dollar cable as the high dollar seems to make the guitar brighter but not necessarily better. Standard cable seems to transfer more of the lower frequencies and may have some loss on the top end but it just sounds better to me anyway. The platinum is the other way around since it has less capacitance per food and the lumped impedance of the cable reduces the high frequency loss. I am trying to get some recordings done of various Power tubes in the TC-50. I figured out why I could not tell the difference between two different power tubes was due to using the wrong cable. Try a different guitar cable... that may help a few things.

Note that the gain control will also act like a volume control or the volume control will act like a gain control. A good balance between the two can be useful. When you back off the gain you should push the volume and vise versa. The RA100 also is quite the same in this regard. Getting used to that amp has prepared me for the TC-50. Increase the bass and midrange a bit and dial back the treble (midrange acts as a treble boost in some respects). Also dial out the presence when adjusting your tone controls and when you have the gain structure and volume and tone dialed in adjust the presence to add more edge as needed. I am able to dial in CH2 to get an awesome tone and I think it actually sounds better than the high gain channel. However I am a bit aggressive on the gain control on CH2. Once you figure out how the tone controls relate to each other and the gain setting, CH2 is really nice and not thin. This can be done with stock tubes, EL34 STR447 too. What is the settings on the master volume? That may also change depth of tone as well.
 
I found something really nice.
Gain-12oclock
Master-"Dimed"
Presence-10:30
Bass-2:00
Middle-2:00
Treble-11:00
 
You would be surprised that is close to some settings I use on the RA100 but I do not have a global master volume so it can get loud quick. Drop in gain boost the volume to compensate as both act like a volume control in some respects. That is where the TC-50 and RA100 are very similar. I may find a good rock tone with a higher treble and lower midrange or vice versa and use the presence to add in more bite when needed.

I will have to try your settings to hear for myself what that sounds like.
 
I'll fiddle more with the channel volume. I play with bands a lot and so I need to have the volume between channels balanced and I usually use my Mark V rule of thumb and set channel volumes between 9-12 o'clock on the TC-50. So, I'll boost that up more and see if it fills out the Ch2 sound a bit.
I've been very happy with the TC-50. I've found the "thinner" bitier sound a compliment to the Mark V crunchy midrangey sound.

Mace
 

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