Purposefully Running Mesa With Safe Mismatch 4/8 Ohm & 8/16 Ohm

[244300]

For those of you out there who are purposefully running their Mesa with a safe mismatch, namely 4 Ohms out into a 8 Ohm cabinet or 8 Ohms out to a 16 Ohm cabinet, I'd like to get your take on why you prefer it.

Less volume?

Better tone?

Other reasons?

 

[Tommy_G]

That answer depends on what power amp tubes I am using, or half power or full power.

For 6L6's, 100 W its matched. for half power, it's mismatched.

For EL34's or 6v6s, its mismatched once. For half power, mismatched once more... 4 into 16.

 

[bigtone23]

Mesa suggests it in their Mark Manuals as a tone modifier--they say using a 16 ohm cab out of the 8 ohm speaker out (and presumably an 8 ohm cab out of the 4 ohm jack) will result in the amp running cool, getting a different feel and a darker tone.

 

[CanserDYI]

That answer depends on what power amp tubes I am using, or half power or full power.

For 6L6's, 100 W its matched. for half power, it's mismatched.

For EL34's or 6v6s, its mismatched once. For half power, mismatched once more... 4 into 16.

What about EL84s?

 

[Coli]

feel of the amp is a little different ( 4 into 8 for me)..a little darker-Mike B talked me out of making my Coliseum C+ a simul...he suggested the mismatch would get me close. " I can take your money, but spend it on something else"....I went with his advice.