my Mesa Roadster is DEAD?! Can't even power it on!

[Calippo Tecks]

Damn, just wanted to start playing, put my roadster on spongy to let it warm up. After some minutes turned on the amp and heared some cracks and tweeds through my cabinets... immediately put it back in standby, did a quick check of my speaker cables + input circuit (pedals & stuff). Pressed on channel 2 on my footswitch to make sure I'm in a channel, switched it back to ON and back some cracks and tweeds and then the power went down... Immediately turned back into stand by and powered the amp down (although it lost his power already). Right now I did a full check on everything again , plugged speaker cables in and out, seems the amp is totally dead, can't even put it on anymore, nothing happens! This amp is 2-3 months old... What the hell now?
I know there's a broken preamp tube inside since the beginning, it was the reverb tube, but I switched it with the fx tube since I don't use that one at all. Could this have something to do with it? I also turned my amp on a few times without speaker cables connected (switched my amps but forgot that shit) although never had any problems with the amp, it still worked nice yesterday, today is another thing... And I'm just SO IN THE MOOD OF PLAYING!!! Luckily I still have my marshall tsl 100.

 

[Genius Gone Insane]

uhhh did you try putting in new power tubes?? errrrmmm

 

[Calippo Tecks]

Nope, still have the original power tubes, only other thing could be, bad ohm output to my cabs?
I use a behringer 412 h cab and a Framus FR 412 DRAGON ST
Both on mono ofcourse, and I used the two 4 ohm outputs on the roadster. I play like this for a few days already and didn't have a problem. Also use my TSL like this, no problems too.
Could it be of the bad tube inside? It's not a power tube, but I know shit about amps to be honest, first time something fucked up happens.

 

[kass]

check the fuse homie.

 

[TomiR]

check the fuse homie.

Yep, that's propably it!

Mesa's are not very sensitive to mismathcing ohm ratings, so I highly doubt that even if you had a mismatch going on, that was what made the amp go dead.

So check the fuses, and if it is a broken fuse and you get it running again, check the power tubes when you turn it on, since tubes are very unpredictable and even new tubes can go bad very quickly.

 

[ahjteam]

also check that you can power anything else from the outlet it is connected to

 

[Calippo Tecks]

took out the fuse, it's black, which is... not good ;-)

 

[Calippo Tecks]

took out the fuse, it's black, which is... not good ;-)
readin some stuff on the mesa site right now, probably something with a tube, .. What I did notice is when I switched from channel 4 to 3 it always had a little punch when I switched it. I use the recto tracking on channel 3 so... And that started quite recently that little punchy pop when switching from 4 to 3, it didn't make that noise when I switched to channel 4 which uses diode tracking. For those who don't know recto tracking = 5u4 tubes, I see that one of the 5U4 tubes has some grey cloudy stuff on the inside, the others all look really clean, perhaps this one is doing something fucked up.

 

[Calippo Tecks]

Oooh my first blown fuse... it feels so... ahh I feel so adult right now. *takes a sniff on his sweaty body*

 

[kass]

took out the fuse, it's black, which is... not good ;-)

blown fuse is good news

 

[Metaltastic]

Read the manual or around the fuse plug to see what kind of fuse you should replace it with (definitely slow-blow), go to Radio Shack, buy replacements, put a new one in there, and if it works, problem solved! (sometimes the fuse just goes for no reason). However, if you blow another fuse, then something else is wrong, probably power tubes.

 

[Calippo Tecks]

Thanks Metaltastic & co, I'll take a picture of the 5U4 that looks a little bit weird and post it here probably tomorrow. I'm getting out of here, there's thunder atm, don't want anything else messed up today

 

[greyskull]

Read the manual or around the fuse plug to see what kind of fuse you should replace it with (definitely slow-blow), go to Radio Shack, buy replacements, put a new one in there, and if it works, problem solved! (sometimes the fuse just goes for no reason). However, if you blow another fuse, then something else is wrong, probably power tubes.

yep...
if fuses keep going, and your power tubes have white speckly stuff inside them, Theyre fooked.

 

[Calippo Tecks]

Yup, I have some white stuff on one of my preamp tubes, I know that one is broken but I have some white/grey stuff on the bottom of a power tube and I thought having white/grey stuff on the bottom doesn't mean it's blown, I know that the preamp tube has it on top, so that's a difference. Anyway I'll post a pic of it and when I get some right fuses, I'll let you know how things ended. My guess is it's just the fuse.

 

[greyskull]

if its the bottom where it joins the plastic; then thats fine, you'll notice if its gone, the silver bit at the top of the power tubes go white.

 

[Calippo Tecks]

Alright I've got a new fuse,
this is the result:
http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/970622/roadstertubefail.jpg
I also switched it from place to be sure it's really damaged and it is.
Indeed greyskull, the silver stuff is grey/white.
Tubes are only a month or four old, but I guess it's just bad luck?
I've a broken preamp tube as well, but that one was broken from the first second I switched on the amp when I got it.
Time to buy myself two new tubes....
and kinda off-topic but: my first seven string as well, lol. (probably ibanez xiphos)

Thanks again everyone for your reply's.

 

[Metaltastic]

I hope new tubes solves it for ya dude, I would hate to think it's something worse! Did you buy it new? Cuz if so, warranty should cover it!

 

[Calippo Tecks]

Well I get a new preamp tube for free, but I guess the power tube isn't warranty?
I know I get one but since I bought it from England I told them they don't have to send the preamp tube yet until I order something so they don't have to send it seperate from an order. The shop helps me alot so.. and since I don't use my fx preamp tube I switched the bad reverb tube with that one when I bought it.
Oh there's something else I'm still not sure of. I live in Belgium and we have arround 230 v in here. UK is mainly 240, on the amp 240 v is marked, but I'm still not sure if this is bad or not? I also bought my marshall from their shop but that one is just 230 v, I guess if it matters they would've made a 240 v for the UK as well... Although I know really nothing about electricity
Funny thing was also when I bought the mesa I didn't see I could get the power lead out of the amp and I was getting crazy at first lol, since UK are different power leads.