Mesa/Boogie TriAxis Owner's Manual download pdf (Page 13)

PAGE 9

LEAD 1 DRIVE

8 9

LEAD 2 DRIVE

THE CONTROLS: (Continued)

BASS: This control blends in the lower frequencies and its’ effectiveness, again, depends on the setting of the

TREBLE control. It should be set with moderation as extreme settings in either low or high directions can produce an

unbalanced tone. Be especially careful in higher gain settings of all modes except LEAD1 Red. Too much Bass will

cause a ﬂabby, unfocused sound that can’t be dialed out elsewhere because excessive Bass has been introduced

early on in the circuit. Try setting the BASS control to 4.0 or 5.0 for clean sounds in the Rhythm modes and 3.0 or

below when dialing up high gain overdrive sounds in these nodes. In the Lead modes, try setting the BASS some-

where between 3.0 and 6.0 depending on the amount of Gain and Treble that’s dialed up. Keep in mind that LEAD

1 Red has its’ own dedicated range of the BASS control, 5.5 to 10, as it can support higher BASS control settings

than the other 7 modes. See explanation in the Modes section of this manual under “LEAD 1 Red.”

LEAD 1 DRIVE: This is the principal gain control for the LEAD 1 group of circuits. It determines the amount of

overdrive present at the most crucial pre-amp tube stage in these three lead modes. As we mentioned in the Mode

section of this manual (see LEAD 1 Red), this controls’ location moves along with many other parts to better ac-

commodate this pre - tone control type of architecture. In the Green and Yellow modes, LEAD 1 DRIVE affects the

ﬁrst tube stage of signiﬁcance and high settings of the LEAD 1 DRIVE here, will produce rich warm gain that “ﬁlls

in the holes” and blends the harmonics subtly. We feel the best sounds are achieved by matching the LEAD 1

DRIVE to the setting of the GAIN control (far left-front panel) or setting the LEAD 1 DRIVE slightly below that

of the GAIN...for example, GAIN at 8.0, Drive at 8.0 or GAIN at 8.0 DRIVE set at 6.0 etc. This scheme lends itself

to the most focused, well balanced sound.

Once again, the LEAD 2 group of modes are post tone control. Therefore, the ﬁne tuning of overdrive must occur

later in the circuit where it can focus on ﬁner increments of gain. This Drive control meters the Gain in the third stage

of the LEAD 2 group of circuits. Its’ taper was chosen to deliver very ﬁne increments of gain in the lower regions, 0.0

through 3.5...small increments in the middle range of 4.0 through 7.5 and fairly substantial increments in the upper

range 8.0 through 10. As with many of the controls aboard TriAxis, moderation often produces the best results. Try

using this control subtly in conjunction with the GAIN control. It is usually unnecessary to set the LEAD 2 DRIVE

above 8.0, even for the most crazy rock sounds. If you are ﬁnding moderation to tame when using this control...

perhaps it is time to take a look at other parts of your system, i.e.. your guitars’ pick-ups, speakers, power amps etc.

In other words...there should be more than enough gain here to accommodate even the most extreme styles.

Once again the two controls, GAIN and LEAD 2 DRIVE, work in tandem with each other and their mix is crucial to ﬁnding a speciﬁc

sound. In general, the higher the Gain...the darker, fatter and more saturated the sound will be. The higher the LEAD 2 DRIVE...the

brighter, more harmonic and aggressive the character becomes. We like to see a GAIN control setting of 7.0 or 7.5 for bluesy or me-

dium gain solo sounds and for the more high wire rock sounds. Then simply adjust the LEAD 2 DRIVE to taste. Many of the coolest

sounds ﬁnd the LEAD 2 DRIVE either equal to, or substantially lower than these aforementioned Gain settings. Speciﬁcally check the

lower range of the LEAD 2 DRIVE where the threshold of distortion is incredibly smooth and single notes purr. Consult the factory

presets for comparison purposes and as always...experiment.

MASTER : The programmable MASTER control serves three purposes in the layout of the TriAxis. FIRST: It

serves as a level balancing control for each of the eight modes. This enables a wide range of front end GAIN

control settings to be matched to a given listening level and the relative level compared to the other modes. SECOND:

It acts as an effects send control for each mode in the Effects Loop. As with many of the controls in TriAxis, the

best results for balance and tone are usually found in the middle range of this control. THIRD: The MASTER is the

Recording jacks’ send level control. When using the direct Recording jacks found on the Rear Panel to interface

directly to a mixing board or a recorder, this control will determine the amount of signal you will be sending via these

jacks. In this application it is usually best to start with the MASTER control set to 0.0 and gradually increase it to the

BASS

MASTER

1 2 ... 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 ... 45 46

Comments to this Manuals

No comments

Mesa/Boogie TriAxis Owner's Manual Page 13

Comments to this Manuals

Related products and manuals for Supplementary music equipment Mesa/Boogie TriAxis