Are Orange Amps good quality?
 

Hey,

I've been looking around for a new bass amp and I've been looking at Mesa Boogie, Ashdown, and Orange. The one which has stood out the most for practicality and price has been the Mesa Boogie Walkabout but I've recently just started looking at Orange and I'm loving the retro look and I'm loving the sound of the hybrid tube amps, such as the Terror 500 and 1000 Bass Heads. Are Orange Amps good quality compared to Mesa? And where are they made because I am all about quality when it comes to my bass gear. Are they Made in Britain or just assembled in Britain or are they neither made or assembled in Britain?

Thanks,

Nathan.

See the little tab up top that says search....type in terror and it will answer every question you ever had about orange terror.....I didnt mean to sound like an ass but thats what I did when I found a zillion threads about the terror

Quality wise, Orange are comparable to Mesa. Mesa stuff tends to be more complicated so the cheap construction is more of an issue, but the Mesa bass stuff tends to be pretty simple.

Where they are mad doesn't relate to quality, but some are fully made in the PRC (Terrors), and some are assembled in the UK, probably from made in the PRC parts.

If actual quality rather than branding is what you are after, they aren't really ones to go for.

Ashdown have made stuff all over the place, quality varies across the range, I've had some top end Ashdowns that are hand wired in the style of Matamps (original run were made by Matamp, but mine were later). Others are standard made in PRC PCB type amps, laid out a bit more sensibly than Mesa, so easier to fix when they go wrong, but fully made to a price.

i got the vintage mesa d180, because my gf works in hollywood and they can repair a 30 year old tube head there with no problem, the orange tube head sounds great too, but i thought they were too expensive in the us and they didn't seem to be able to do loud and clean

I;ve had my AD200b for 4 years. I still love it.

They are probably as expensive in the UK as Ampeg is in the USA. So, we pay more for Ampeg, and then get the advantage of paying less for Orange. Vice versa for the USA.

I don't understand are you saying my handmade USA Mesa is cheaply constructed? thank God I have a full five year transferable warranty and great resale value when it goes belly up.

For the prices we pay in the US, I think Orange is way over priced for what you get, at least their tube heads anyway. I would give the nod to Mesa in terms of build quality.

Throw up some inside shots and I'll see. Not poked about in early ones, but they are probably a bit out of scope of the OP question. The jobs with the two rows of knobs are where it goes really wrong when it comes to maintenance, stacked PCBs and stuff you need to get past. The comparison point with cheap Ashdowns, those, you slip the head out of the sleeve and you can get right to the pcb and solder up problematic stuff, and the pots are accessible to clean. I don't generally work on SS amps, but I take in Ashdowns because they have never been a pain in the nuts, and the company are easy to deal with for parts. Mesa stuff I've taken to sending to another guy.