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Mesa Walkabout Megathread!

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#121
What a great little rig...

I just finished playing my fretless Bongo and Jerry Jones Bass6 through my Scout. :hyper: It's amazing just how much bottom this thing can dish out. I had so much fun, I decided to document with photos. :D

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The guilty parties. The basses sound amazing through the Cafe Walter headphone amp sitting on top of the Scout, too...

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This is my original burgundy faced Walkabout. It's from the first batch, so it's had to have some work done on it over the years. Still sounds amazing, though.

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This blackface Walkabout that came with the Scout sounds pretty great, too. I was playing the Jerry Jones with the gain on 10, and it sounded fabulous. Thick, gritty, glassy--perfect.

Since I've got two, I plan to try some different tubes while leaving the stock set in one of the Walkabouts. Should make for an easy A/B test, don't ya think? I also plan to run DIs out of both to record a comparison, too.

Oh, and if anyone wants to donate tubes for the test, shoot me a PM. :ninja:
 
#123
tombowlus said:
Yo, bassmonkey, can you play chords and other "guitar like stuff" on that JJ? Or do you mostly play it like a bass?

Tom.
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Well, I've only had the JJ for about a week, or so, but I have been working on my chording (and getting used to the pesky B and E strings :D). So far, though, I seem to be able to play it with a pick, my fingers, and even slap a little on it.

Playing the strings separately on my 8 string has gotten me used to working with tight string spacing, so that has probably helped some.

It sounds great through the Scout. And, when I use my VBass for a tremolo effect and reverb, it reaches a whole new level.
 
#125
bassmonkeee said:
This is my original burgundy faced Walkabout. It's from the first batch, so it's had to have some work done on it over the years. Still sounds amazing, though.

This blackface Walkabout that came with the Scout sounds pretty great, too.
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Question, even tho there shouldn't be any, have you noticed any diffs between the older and newer amps?

FYI, mine's also the older one and is still due the updates, tho it works great for me right now, so no rush... just need to do it within the warranty period, which will be no problem.
 
#126
Vic said:
Question, even tho there shouldn't be any, have you noticed any diffs between the older and newer amps?

FYI, mine's also the older one and is still due the updates, tho it works great for me right now, so no rush... just need to do it within the warranty period, which will be no problem.
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I haven't done a head-to-head yet. But, rest assured, I will. :D

When I got it, the Scout came with three additional Mesa STR 12AX7s, so I don't even know if the tubes currently living in the head are stock, or not...
 
#127
Got yet anuthr'n
lawndart said:
Ive only played out of a scout cab at my Local Guitar Center. By itself it sounded very sweet. Very smooth and nice an loud for its size (12") Never played it in a band situation. I use two Aggie 1x12 cabs and the whole setup holds its own in the bands I'm in.

Recently Ive been thinking of switching the pres with Teles like you are doing. But then again i just played out of a new Aggie AG500 and I 've been jonesing for one of those. Perhaps a trade in the future. although it can hold its own it seems to get winded very quickly.

sean
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#128
and 'nuthr...
slombovia said:
I just have the head. Ran it thru two Avatar 1x12 cabs. Best little head ever. Fretted and fretless New York Bass Works 6-strings basses in all styles. Never tried it w/different tubes. It sounds a little honky compared to my rich smooth Read Purity preamp into Stewart World 1.2. Same bass and cabs. I just remembered I did audition the Scout once - it was even honkier - not for me. I like rich and smooth. Good luck with yours!
Tom
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#130
I plugged in to my Walkabout today for a morning practice session only to find that I had almost no volume. I switched cords, basses, and even cabs, but I still had the problem. There was almost no volume at all coming from the amp.

I had a wedding gig last night, and if any of you are from the north east you'll know that we had heavey rain all night last night. The amp worked well for the gig so I figured that maybe moisture or something during transport after the gig did something to the amp.

I opened up the case to look at the tubes to see if maybe they were blown or something. I took them out, and put them back in again. PROBLEM SOLVED!

I'm not sure what caused this or if it is normal, but I'm glad that my amp is not broken.

Has anyone else experienced this issue? Is it normal for tubes to do this?
 
#131
SMASH said:
Common problem with Walkabouts, and you'll find many instances of it discussed here.

The effects send/return jacks are cheaply soldered to the circuit board and - even if you never use them - can become detached from playing vibrations resulting in occasional loss of volume. By removing and re-inserting the tubes you basically wiggled the works enough to remake the connection - next time just give it a good "whack".

Resolution is to get the jacks soldered via wires (I believe it's called "floating connection") to the circuit board - smart idea to do that with the input jacks on the front perhaps too.
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Awesome. I'll keep this in mind. I may even make this mod myself.
 
#136
tombowlus said:
How did that rig sound?
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It was an odd room. I let the Schroeder fling out the big sound, the Wizzy was more for me as a monitor. I was forced to be way too close to my rig and we were playing LOUD. The Schroeder doesn't have the high mid articulation that I like, so the Wizzy was filling that in nicely. I've played the same room with a GK 1001RB-II and one Avatar B210 Delta and it sounded a LOT better to me. I don't get it.

Alan
 
#137
tallboybass said:
It was an odd room. I let the Schroeder fling out the big sound, the Wizzy was more for me as a monitor. I was forced to be way too close to my rig and we were playing LOUD. The Schroeder doesn't have the high mid articulation that I like, so the Wizzy was filling that in nicely. I've played the same room with a GK 1001RB-II and one Avatar B210 Delta and it sounded a LOT better to me. I don't get it.

Alan
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How long did you have to adjust your EQ and such for that room? Ive had problems with rooms, that now that I think about it, I probly could have fixed it with some twiddling of the EQ.
 
#138
DMB said:
How long did you have to adjust your EQ and such for that room? Ive had problems with rooms, that now that I think about it, I probly could have fixed it with some twiddling of the EQ.
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Definitely could have done more EQing. I seem to have more problems when using cabs with lots of low end. The best sound so far is the WalkAbout with an Avatar 210 or two.
 
#139
tallboybass said:
The best sound so far is the WalkAbout with an Avatar 210 or two.
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Very interesting! I have one of their NEO 210's in a 4ohm. I'll definitely have to try that! So far, tho, the pair of Aggie 112's just sound totally awesome with my Walkabout, and while I haven't yet done an outdoor gig with it, I've played small indoors and even the guitar player came over and commented on it (in a good way... ummm, yeah, I know, hard to believe :) ).
 
#140
At gigs I ALWAYS ran it into two 4-ohm Avvies. Even to the point of clipping the power amp. never failed. (Except the aforementioned FX loop problem - keeping that always patched fixed that.)

PS - am finally sending it in for high frequency oscillation fix - will post how it turns out - hope they fix the FX loop issue too.
 
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