Bill Fitzmaurice

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1423231211' post='2682540'] oh dont start that one again! Well not before weve been around "fodera:worth it?" "Barefaced handles I have known" "this months flavour of the month love in" "rosewood or maple" "are fender any good" "valve or solidstate" "tweeters yay or nay" "and "bass reflex vs horns" [/quote]Get back to us with your opinion after you've built a few dozen guitars and/or basses using different body, neck and fretboard woods. [quote]the tone you hear from the bass is what the pickup 'hears' at its specific location - with a wide-range pickup like an Alembic or Q-Tuner it's very similar to what you'd get from close micing at that point. The tone at that point depends hugely on how the body/neck of the instrument is taking energy from and returning energy to the strings.[/quote]One issue I had with rosewood guitar bodies was an increased tendency for high frequency feedback. Rather than the usual spring/screw mount I ended up isolating the pickups from the body with foam rubber to break the feedback loop. It's not necessary with bass, since you don't run super high gain. This taught me why so many players who use super high gain and lots of distortion effects, like Steve Vai, prefer a lower density body, like basswood. I tried a basswood bass body once and the tone and sustain were so bad that it ended up as firewood after one gig. That's when I also found out that basswood doesn't even burn well.

[quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1423228365' post='2682479'] I know it's been a commonly debated subject. I know that in an acoustic instrument there is a noticeable difference, but for electric, the debates have mostly said it's minimal.[/quote]Said debates don't take place between luthiers. They shouldn't take place between players either, as Les Paul among others sorted this out in the 1940s. Density is the main factor, not weight. Thirty years ago I found that solid rosewood gave tone and sustain that you couldn't get with anything off the shelf, including ash, but at the cost of literally unbearable weight. I then went to a semi-hollowbody construction similar to what Rickenbacker uses in their semi-hollows, with the thickness of the top and back about 1/4 inch. The weight came down to about the same as a solid poplar body, but the tone and sustain of solid rosewood wasn't lost in the process.

[quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1423170754' post='2681853'] I believe that I'm right, that the bodymaterial of an electric bass doesn't have much baring on tone, but I can't guarantee it. [/quote]It can make a major difference, with guitar as well. The more dense the wood the brighter the tone, and the longer the sustain.

[quote name='Dad3353' timestamp='1423147694' post='2681419'] If one's sole goal is efficiency, you're right. For some folks, there are other criteria, though. Horses (and buggies..?) for courses..? [/quote]Horses are fine if you're an avid gardener and need the fertilizer. There's at least two more analogies that could be drawn between horses and eighteens, I'll let your imagination fill in the blanks.

[quote name='taunton-hobbit' timestamp='1423078291' post='2680488'] There was a reason why Jamaican Sound Systems 'back in the day' used 18" drivers - [/quote]Yes, there is. [i]They had to[/i], because of the short excursion drivers that were available 'back in the day'. The horse and buggy used to be the most efficient form of personal transportation as well. I don't yearn for one myself.

Electrically the result is identical. The only advantage to connecting the cabs indepently to the amp is that the current going to the second cab doesn't have to also go through the cord to the first. If your cords are of sufficient gauge that won't matter, but if they're undersized it might.

[quote name='monsterthompson' timestamp='1422990800' post='2679268'] i'd suspect a bigger driver often comes in a bigger enclosure, which alters the output you hear. the G3 Barefaced SC and SM use the same driver, yet the SC is in a bigger box and it goes lower and louder (based on Alex's claims and my observations as an owner of each cab). perhaps that is part of what people hear and attribute to the driver size. [/quote]The enclosure is just as, if not more, responsible for the low frequency extension and output than the driver. But where the driver itself is concerned there are over a dozen specs that determine both how low and how loud it will go. Cone size is not one of them.

[quote name='Conan' timestamp='1422972614' post='2678999'] True. But despite the "science", many bassists still insist that they can hear a difference when changing cone sizes! [/quote]To a great extent that's placebo effect. If you think that you'll hear a difference you will. No one is immune to it. The main difference that is really audible is the result of the one difference that will always be determined by driver size, and that's off-axis response. Even that will be different when you use two or more identical drivers compared to just one, or for that matter two compared to four, not to mention two placed vertically versus two placed horizontally. The value of knowing the science is that you can predict the outcome with any of the myriad of possible permutations with a very high degree of accuracy.

[quote name='JPJ' timestamp='1422042166' post='2668209']a respectable brand like TC Electronics hadn't taken the time to fit 50p's worth of acoustic damping in the cabinet. [/quote]50p here, 50p there, eventually you get enough for the CEO to take a week in Cannes. Can't blame him, Denmark in January is colder than Scotland. G-K pulled the same stunt a few years back with their Neo cabs, got outed on talkbass, and no less than Bob Gallien had the gall to say that they'd tested their new line with and without damping and bracing and that they sounded better without it. After a few people added damping and bracing, with the same result as yours, he wasn't heard from again. [i]But guess what happened a year or so later when they introduced the next version of those cabs. [/i]

Anytime you consider replacement drivers you must look at the T/S specs in terms of cab compatability and frequency response in terms of tone. The problem is that you can't get that information for most OEM drivers.

[quote name='grenadilla' timestamp='1421808205' post='2665309'] Don't forget the Hiwatt 415 used by John Entwistle at Leeds. When I first saw The Who (1970) he had 4 412s and 2 415s. Fantastic! [/quote]Also ancient history. That's the same time frame when I was using eight twelves in 200 seat rooms, only driven by a 50w Bassman head, because the drivers were such sh*te that it took that many to run a clean low E. Today I only need a 1x12 to do that. Listen to Jack Bruce on '[i]Wheels of Fire'[/i]. I doubt it sounded as dirty as it did because he preferred that sound, it was because it was the best he could do with the gear available then. He didn't have that same crap sound on the TV broadcast I saw of his last reunion gig with Eric and Ginger.

[quote name='Dad3353' timestamp='1421788799' post='2665120'] [size=4]Few folks really need [/size]427 [size=4]cubic inch [/size]V8 en[size=4]gines, either, or 4wd pick-ups. [/size] [/quote]True, but you don't have to haul a 427 out of your crib and put in in your car before taking a drive and then haul it back in again when you return. OTOH if you're going to drive a pickup in snow country it's best to have AWD, as RWD is next to useless when the weight balance is 65 front/35 rear.

[quote name='Muziekschuur' timestamp='1368133864' post='2073769'] I have a kustom (chanute) 415b cabinet. From the '80's. So it's a tolexed cab, not with naugahyde. I was only able to locate one other Kustom 415b and this is in the Usa. I was wondering if anyone here has ever seen/played one. [/quote]I didn't use a 4x15, but I did for a couple of years play through a pair of tuck and roll 4x12 columns. With the drivers available then that's what you had to do, just as it took two 8x10s to handle the original SVT head in 1969. Thanks to modern driver technology no one really needs more than four tens, or two fifteens, though that doesn't stop people from doing so.

[quote name='SingleMalt' timestamp='1421272034' post='2659333'] Both have [b]stupid [/b]amounts of hum when the volume or gain are turned up. This is true with no bass plugged in at all [/quote]That's a defect. With no bass plugged in the input is shorted and any noise is self-generated.

[quote name='taunton-hobbit' timestamp='1421423388' post='2661058'] you will never hear the full break-in change with one of our cabs. [/quote]You'll never hear it with anyone's cabs, the change is too subtle and your ears are too insensitive to hear it. For that reason you'll see legions of those who deny that it happens at all, though none of them have ever measured the changes, which really do occur.

[quote name='Twincam' timestamp='1421237551' post='2658711'] A Jack Russell pissed through the grill onto the speaker. [/quote]You're lucky it wasn't a Great Dane.

There are two ways to choose a correct replacement driver. One is to find the T/S specs and frequency response of the original and match it. Since speaker companies won't divulge that information you'd have to measure those items yourself, which requires specialized gear and knowledge. The other is to reverse engineer the cab, using speaker modeling software to find that driver specs that will work best in it. That also calls for a high degree of knowledge. Option three, which is what you should probably do, is to sell your amp and buy one that meets your needs.

[quote name='1970' timestamp='1421153035' post='2657666'] One thing I've found useful lately is recording directly out of my GT200 DI output - would I be able to do the same thing out of the preamp/slave output in an OR120? [/quote]Yes, but only into a line level input. It would overload mic level.

[quote name='Dad3353' timestamp='1420642229' post='2651649'] there are many that use this mix with (apparent...) satisfaction. [/quote]That goes to a basic acoustical engineering tenet, which is that almost [i]any[/i] two cabs together will sound better than either one alone. Knowing what combination of cabs actually works best requires being able to test every permutation side by side, for instance, a stacked pair of 1x15, a stacked pair of 4x10, and a stacked 1x15/4x10. I've yet to see anyone report ever having actually done so. [quote]It's generally accepted these days that there is no direct correlation between the speaker diameter and its bass capacity. [/quote]There has not been since circa 1980.

[quote name='chrisasp' timestamp='1420639233' post='2651611'] Im wanting to buy the hartke 410bxl (400 watt at 8ohm) and the 115 bxl (200 watt at 8ohm). [/quote]Reconsider. First, a 1x15 doesn't go appreciably lower, if at all, than a 4x10, and it won't go as loud as a 4x10, so you don't gain anything, while half the power goes to the 115, even though it has only half the capacity of the 4x10. IMO the only worse configuration than the 4x10 is the pairing of a 4x10 with a 1x15. You should consider either a pair of 1x15 stacked vertically or a pair of 2x10 or 2x12 aligned vertically.

[quote name='6v6' timestamp='1420584883' post='2651086'] Ok, thanks all, trial and error I can do just wasn't sure if there was a more scientific method I could be applying. [/quote]There is, but it's way beyond an amateurs skill set.

Close your eyes, turn the knobs, wherever they sound best is where they should be. The numbers don't mean a thing.

Mixing cabs can work well, and it can be horrid. The problem is that it's difficult for even an expert to predict it in advance. With identical cabs you know what you're going to get.

[quote name='RJB280' timestamp='1420362623' post='2648332'] Thanks Bill, I understand where you are coming from ref drivers but surely the design of the enclosure would have a large part to play ? Ported versus sealed etc ? [/quote]Yes, but that has nothing to do with transient response, which is primarily seen above 500Hz, whereas the effects of the cabinet are primarily seen below 200Hz. [quote]making the cab a bit too small gives a bump in the low mids, which may or may not be a good thing depending on your preference[/quote] The effect of a too small cab is usually seen between 80-160Hz, which is technically midbass. A hump there is usually heard as 'boom'. It's pretty much the typical sound of inexpensive combos.

[quote name='Dan Dare' timestamp='1420322324' post='2648147'] Looking at the original question, I wonder if amp clipping may be to blame. Most combos will struggle once the master volume goes over the half way mark. [/quote]Perhaps, but it's a crapshoot with combos which will run out first, the amp headroom or the driver xmax. It's not unusual for combo drivers to run out of excursion capability with even 40 watts input.