Mesa Boogie WD800, How Do They Do It

[Matt Power]

Thank you all for your feedbacks. At the moment the WD800 caught my interest...not available in any shops here in Italy at the moment (classic...). I was looking also into Genzler and Orange Bass Terror after @Wicked G gave me this advice some years ago, before I decided to go "all in" with the SVT but the Mesa seems more appropriate for my tastes.
I'm not trying to copy the SVT obviously, it would be impossibile and I know it would only be frustrating...
I'm looking something on his own way, I hope to find a WD800 soon, thanks!

Talk to Todobasso in Spain...I bet he could get you a WD800! A GREAT guy and will do whatever he can to help!

 

[DrThumpenstein]

I do like mines…

View attachment 7428020

One of life's simple pleasures is the way you sound playing through a Subway rig.

 

[DJ Bebop]

One of life's simple pleasures is the way you sound playing through a Subway rig.

 

[smike]

WD-800 with two 12" cabinets (stacked tall), custom built 35" scale 5-strinrg. just made a parametric eq shorting plug and got a noticeable bump in volume and tone... not big, but i'm definitely leaving that thing plugged in from now on. as someone previously said, it sounds more tube than solid state. i pretty much use the high pass filter to dial in my tone, notching it out a noogie by pulling down the passive mid just until the sound kind of hits in the throat. here's the amazon link for the plugs i used (along with a short piece of fender pickup wire): Amazon.com since i had extras, i made a second one, and put an un-touched one in the 'tuner out' jack just so the parametric eq bypass one wouldn't be bearing all the weight when the thing was sitting in the bag. life is good.

 

[DJ Bebop]

WD-800 with two 12" cabinets (stacked tall), custom built 35" scale 5-strinrg. just made a parametric eq shorting plug and got a noticeable bump in volume and tone... not big, but i'm definitely leaving that thing plugged in from now on. as someone previously said, it sounds more tube than solid state. i pretty much use the high pass filter to dial in my tone, notching it out a noogie by pulling down the passive mid just until the sound kind of hits in the throat. here's the amazon link for the plugs i used (along with a short piece of fender pickup wire): Amazon.com since i had extras, i made a second one, and put an un-touched one in the 'tuner out' jack just so the parametric eq bypass one wouldn't be bearing all the weight when the thing was sitting in the bag. life is good.

I used a single-button switch plugged in halfway for a while before I got a two-button switch that works both the mids and mute

 

[Jim Kernan]

 

[Nebadon2000]

I got a inexpensive 2 way foot switch from Amazon that works fine at home

But I bought a Genz Benz footswutch from Andy that he re-labeled for Gigs or Rehearsal Heavy duty type: Mesa didn't have any in stock at the time

 

[mrwood4]

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That is technically the footswitch for a TT-800, but those who have a WD-800, this footswitch will also work. the button marked channel will disengage the parametric EQ on the WD-800. I use it this way also.

 

[agedhorse]

TT and WD footswitches are identical except for the labeling.

 

[Jim Kernan]

That is technically the footswitch for a TT-800, but those who have a WD-800, this footswitch will also work. the button marked channel will disengage the parametric EQ on the WD-800. I use it this way also.

Yes I didn't noticed that it said channel.

 

[smike]

ok, did a little more A/B-ing. with the parametric EQ bypassed, i get maybe 2db more gain... and a clarity/transparency bump. if i weren't having so much fun playing through my 'new' (ahem) amp, i could have made and posted some recordings... here's how i'd describe it. going from a D800+ to the WD800 gave an obvious boost in transparency... the WD800 was instantly more open. inserting my little home-made 'bypass the parametric eq' plug gives me that transparency boost again (!), with the addition of a couple of DB of gain. to mix multiple metaphors, it's like getting new tires, and cleaning your windshield... driving/playing is more fun. i understand this might be completely unique to my bass and rig. "more tube than solid state" is a great description. i would absolutely recommend trying it.

 

[agedhorse]

ok, did a little more A/B-ing. with the parametric EQ bypassed, i get maybe 2db more gain... and a clarity/transparency bump. if i weren't having so much fun playing through my 'new' (ahem) amp, i could have made and posted some recordings... here's how i'd describe it. going from a D800+ to the WD800 gave an obvious boost in transparency... the WD800 was instantly more open. inserting my little home-made 'bypass the parametric eq' plug gives me that transparency boost again (!), with the addition of a couple of DB of gain. to mix multiple metaphors, it's like getting new tires, and cleaning your windshield... driving/playing is more fun. i understand this might be completely unique to my bass and rig. "more tube than solid state" is a great description. i would absolutely recommend trying it.

It's likely that it's only pot tolerance that's causing this. There is nothing inherent in the PEQ circuit that would change tone or level other than this.

Try turning each of the 3 mid level pots up just a tiny bit and see if the difference goes away.

 

[smike]

It's likely that it's only pot tolerance that's causing this. There is nothing inherent in the PEQ circuit that would change tone or level other than this. Try turning each of the 3 mid level pots up just a tiny bit and see if the difference goes away.

sorry, don't understand… When I plug in my little plug the parametric EQ is bypassed. What three mid-level pots are you talking about? I am saying that I have been running the amp as purchased, with the parametric EQ engaged but all of the pots at 12 o'clock. When I plug in my little foot switch simulator I am removing the parametric EQ from the equation.. resulting in a better and more responsive sound. If you are saying that I could turn up the three parametric EQ knobs so that plugging and unplugging my device would make it so there was no discernible difference, my response would be a bit of disappointment that I've been playing it for so long without the full tonal range, and that Mesa didn't catch that when the amp went back for a slightly noisy mute switch repair. If taking the parametric eq out of the equation yields a different sound than the parametric with supposedly flat settings, that seems not great to me... and a bit impractical… Putting knobs at 12 o'clock is a reasonably repeatable. Putting them at some bit off 12 o'clock might not be. Also, not that I'm OCD or anything, but why do I want to look at my parametric EQ knobs tilted slightly if I'm not even wanting to use the parametric EQ?

 

[agedhorse]

sorry, don't understand… When I plug in my little plug the parametric EQ is bypassed. What three mid-level pots are you talking about? I am saying that I have been running the amp as purchased, with the parametric EQ engaged but all of the pots at 12 o'clock. When I plug in my little foot switch simulator I am removing the parametric EQ from the equation.. resulting in a better and more responsive sound. If you are saying that I could turn up the three parametric EQ knobs so that plugging and unplugging my device would make it so there was no discernible difference, my response would be a bit of disappointment that I've been playing it for so long without the full tonal range, and that Mesa didn't catch that when the amp went back for a slightly noisy mute switch repair. If taking the parametric eq out of the equation yields a different sound than the parametric with supposedly flat settings, that seems not great to me... and a bit impractical… Putting knobs at 12 o'clock is a reasonably repeatable. Putting them at some bit off 12 o'clock might not be. Also, not that I'm OCD or anything, but why do I want to look at my parametric EQ knobs tilted slightly if I'm not even wanting to use the parametric EQ?

That's exactly what I am talking about, the 3 PEQ level pots. It may only be one of the pots. This is a +/- tolerance, so it's possible that it could be louder or quieter, and generally the tolerance is +/-1dB.

This is just a practical aspect of mechanical controls, they have a tolerance and there's nothing that we can do about it. EVERY manufacturer deals with this, just that generally you can't bypass these controls so you wouldn't know. It has nothing to do with not catching something, or being defective or not caring. It has to do with commercially available parts (and we use premium Noble pots on the WD, most other vendor's average commercial grade pots have a greater tolerance than ours).

Now we COULD either pay more for higher precision controls, or screen out all but those within say 5%, but that would add a LOT of cost that would have to be passed onto every customer even if they didn't care about it. This is actually one reason why I don't like to use center detent controls, because often the center is not exactly center.

If you don't want to use the PEQ, than bypassing it takes this entire quandary out of the equation.

I used to run into this all the time when I was designing mixing consoles for the pro audio industry, the more expensive mixers would use tighter screening or tolerances on their controls, but that was only in consoles costing $10k and more (up to $50k), below that threshold it just wasn't possible.

 

[smike]

thanks for the perspective… Just to confirm, you are saying that running the signal through the additional circuitry and pots of the barometric EQ section would do nothing to the signal? And that it's probably just one of the PEQ pots' center position not being dead center as expected? Is it unreasonable of me to think that Mesa should have checked this as part of their default calibration process? Gain and tone levels identical with and without parametric EQ engaged?

 

[agedhorse]

thanks for the perspective… Just to confirm, you are saying that running the signal through the additional circuitry and pots of the barometric EQ section would do nothing to the signal? And that it's probably just one of the PEQ pots' center position not being dead center as expected? Is it unreasonable of me to think that Mesa should have checked this as part of their default calibration process? Gain and tone levels identical with and without parametric EQ engaged?

The amps are tested to comply with the design tolerances… which are dictated by the tolerances of all of the parts themselves.

When building amps, all components have real world tolerances which are deviations from ideal components. Ideal components are not commercially available.

There are roughly 600 components inside the WD’s preamp and power supply/amp. Managing all of these component’s tolerances, the overall spread from the target is better than +/-2dB and often better than +/-1dB and this is held over thousands of amps too.

This is actually one benefit of digital processing based amps, it’s possible to hold the tolerances to almost 0% due to the circuit functions being described by equations rather than manufactured components.