Phil Starr

Thanks David. Martin @Mottlefeeder managed to find them too. The "small vented cab" is 45l and to 55Hz for a single driver. My first guess was to use a 90l cab tuned to 50 hz which is the approximate volume of the Ampeg cab we are copying so in this case it's reassuring to know I've come up pretty much with the same design as Eminence. It may even be that Ampeg knew of this design when it developed the VB212 but to be fair there are only so many sensible solutions for any given driver.

This is interesting, it's the measured response curves of the SVT212. Obviously ignore the top end because we won't be using a tweeter but the bottom end shows a similar roll off to your speakers in a 90l cab, It rolls off really quite high from 150Hz but also quite gradually so it is around -10db @ 50Hz. There's a big drop in everything at around 1300 Hz, which I'm guessing is the crossover. The red line is the response straight ahead and the colours are off axis. You cvan see how much the mids are lost off axis and this is increased because of the sideways displacement of the speakers. You get quite a lot of off axis fall off anyway due to the size of the 12" drivers but the cab is over 600mm wide so it's like having a 24" driver rather than a 12. Above 2,000Hz you are looking at the response of the horn which isn't relevant if you are building a tweeterless cab. I'm not a purist in these things, if you've tried the SVT and love the sound then you can build something like a horn free SVT. Without a horn the off axis problems will be worse but if you tried it with the horn turned off and still liked it then that's clearly somethign that doesn't worry you. If you want a cab the same width as your amp but with the speakers in line then you can do that too and it will be slightly easier to hear yourself on stage.

You could go for this shape

OK a bit of a recap. on our discusion so far. This is the cab Martin wants to copy but he won't use the horn driver so we are leaving that out. I suggested that he would be better with a taller cab and putting the two 12" drivers in line to improve dispersion and the audibility on stage. Anyway this is the cab we are 'copying'

That's my fault, I'm a details person and I just assume everyone is as fascinated as I am about loudspeakers. I'm a riot at parties 😂

Hi, I've put in the speaker parameters and run a quick check. Get ready for a blizzard of graphs. The first thing is that these speakers are underdamped, basically the magnets/motor systems are small giving a very 'American' approach to bass. The sort of warm/bloated sounded you might expect from Ampeg To get lotsof deep bass extension and a flat response they would need a huge cabinet. This is a pair of them in a 100,200 and 300litre enclosure The one in bold is the 100l cab which is roughly the size you are planning. The 300l cab gives you output down to roughly 33Hz -10db and the flattest response but you wouldn't want to fit a 300l cab into a car never mind carry it. However you probably wouldn't want that much bass anyway in a gig situation. I just want to show you the choices you are making

Hi Martin, I've had a quick look on the Eminence website and these speakers look like they would work in a 50l cab or 100l for the pair. They are very high efficiency and have Eminence's typical midrange peak so good for creating an old school sound. Eminence used to offer cab designs for all their speakers but I can't find them as they have re-built their website. The designs may still be there of course. In performance the basslites will be very similar to the ceramic magnet Beta12-2A as used in dozens of commercial cabs so you'll end up with something sounding like TC/Markbass etc etc. Not exactly, but in that sort of ball park If you are a valve man you'll probably be looking for that sort of sound rather than FRFR anyway so they could be a great match.

Hi all, I had a recent request from @police squad for help with a 2x12 design. I've started to do this via PM but thought other people have asked for similar designs and people might like to follow the design process. Basically it involves me asking a series of stupid questions to home in on exactly what he is going to try to achieve. Then I run computer models and ask more questions to home in on what I hope will be his best speaker. Anyway this was his initial question

Not by one of the mods I hope? I'm kind of surprised that when people ask for help and others offer to go over to help out in person that there isn't a response, but I've also posted questions myself and fogotten the thread for a few days because I've solved the issue. I always feel as if I've been unintentionally bad mannered but it's never intentional. I do like a happy ending though, so it would be nice if @proy900 did come back and tell us it's all up and running

It's the amp @stevie uses

The system you’ve got is easily enough for your needs. As Dad has said you will have feedback problems way before damaging the speakers. The amp is excellent, the mixer is fine and the speakers will probably be reliable though the vocal sound will need some tweaking. They’ll do a job for you but might be the first things to replace if you are unhappy with the sound. You might need to address the room acoustics too but you’ve nothing to lose by just setting up and giving the system a try. Again once you let us know where you are based I’m sure someone will help you do the basic set up

Maybe we need to run a wiki of some sort on routers, they are probably the most difficult power tool to use. It's much safer all round to only use them with a jig or mounted on a table. I have a 1/2" router that I use for cutting kitchen work tops and any big jobs I do like shaping architraving or skirting boards. I pretty much won't/can't use it freehand for anything I have router tables so the machine is static and I move the workpiece, I also have an ELU 1/4" router which has a bit of a soft start but even so you can't start it enywhere near the workpiece as it still needs a lot of strength and skill to manuvre. It's roughly 1HP so it's literally got a kick like a horse and routers operate at really high speeds so it's like guiding a gyroscope, it wants to go it's own way. I round all my edges with it in mounted in the router table and move the cabs. I'm wondering about getting one of the little trimmers for the odd small job.

Don't tell anyone but my BC110T is my favourite speaker, it never sounds wrong and I've had a couple of sound engineers, when mixing the band at festivals, describe it as the best sounding bass cab they've ever heard. It's a little gem that just gets the balance right.

Really enjoying this and it's stimulated me to spend a few hours finding out how to use mine properly. I've an ancient DeWalt getting little use. You Tube as ever came up trumps and many thanks to @alittlebitrobot for this really informative and such a clever way to demonstrate what I for one have been doing wrong, I'm afraid I've been using it like my table saw and not getting the best out of it.

First of all well done, they look great and I'm waiting for the results you find when you finally get them to a gig. Concentrating on the financial side alone that adds up to £805 including the grilles and that is for two speakers. For that you have two speakers which are 'almost Silverstones' and which have the same care over the crossover design that @stevie always uses. I've had the pleasure of following the development of this with numerous listening and measuring sessions in Stevie's workshop and then listening to the subsequent deveopment of the Silverstone Mk1. I know there were changes to the crossovers which improved the sound in the commercial Silverstones but the most significant to my ears was the use of the Celestion horn which you do have. I too test stuff out at home listening to classical recordings and I'm sure you'd hear a difference but in reality that's a tribute to the sensitivity of the human ear. Your speaker would sound the same as a Silverstone with just bass going through it in a band situation. I know in listening tests the BC112 mk3 would leave the Barefaced offerings way behind in everything other than weight. In terms of cost I think the Silverstones were originally £599 so by building you saved nearly £400. I reckon that's a pretty good return for your labours. However it's a remarkable observation on just what a bargain the LFSys cabs are. You'd expect the materials cost of a commercial speaker to be around 30-35% of the cost at most. Add on labour, production and distribution costs and that initial Silverstone should have been somwhere in the £1,000-1200 price bracket. It's only by selling direct and limiting production that LFSys can keep the prices so far below their competitors. The reality is that your speakers are worth £1,000 in terms of the quality of sound they will deliver and what it would cost to buy the equivalent commercially buying from anyone other than LFSys.

I was really impressed with this the first time I saw it and more so now I've had a follow up listen. I think this puts to bed the arguments about putting bass through PA with no back line or the use of (great) quality 12" tops without having to use subs. It clearly can be done and outdoors too. It also shows you don't have to sacrifice bass tone because that was spot on too. That's not saying that subs are inappropriate in other situations with different music, bigger arenas or for whatever reason but that this is a PA with wide applicability which would do most of the gigs the majority of us do. I wouldn't claim to sound this good but I gigged for four years with QSC K12-2's and never a problem or hiccup with bass and Kick going through the PA. We used subs twice I think in four years and only for outdoor gigs. And Al I love the band

Look up Tuff Cab paint from Blue Aran applied by roller it gives a fantastic professional finish and is genuinely tough as you'll find out if you ever have to sand it off. It'll also be ideal for renvating your 2x10 and a can will probably do all three cabs.

That sounds like a plan Good Luck

Thanks John I've no knowledge of which drivers they've used over the years though I do know one enquiry a few years back for TS parameters yielded the answer that they didn't know what they were which was a little bit of a surprise

Hi David welcome to the party. I see you live in Exeter, not too far from me and I've played in Exeter a lot over the years, including many of the open mic venues. You'll find the 1x10 to be remakably able and it's all I'd ever take to open mic's or jam sessions. In fact I take a much smaller 1x6 to most open mics. I've done dozens of gigs with just a single 1x10. I ended up with the prototype and didn't expect to use it but though I have more expensive cabs it is still my go to cab. Two of them would be seriously good gigging set up. That's with the Celestion drivers though, the Ashdown drivers might not work quite so well. The crossovers are designed for that particular combination of drivers too so you could end up with a mis-matched cab and a miss-matched crosssover. I don't want to be too pessimistic though, most drivers cluster around a fairly similar performance level and for all I know Ashdown may have used re-badged Celestion drivers. That cab would suit a range of drivers and you might be lucky. the crossover was optimised for the 110T but it's a very simple thing so it would kind of work and I've seen much worse in commercial cabs. I'm not trying to put you off but if you are aware of the limits of your plan then at £35 you don't have an awful lot to lose and a reasonable chance of success.

I too can see no problems. We had a guitarist who used a Helix which tbh sounds consistently better through the PA than a mic'd up cab or a DI. He used in-ears or an Alto TS10 for monitoring which he upgraded to an RCF310 after borrowing mine. I've also worked with other guitarist using multi fx/modellers and it's been a positive experience all round. Reducing stage volume and using the PA for heavy lifting is the future

Have you developed British understatement She pretty much nailed that and so did the band. I wonder if Led Zeppelin recorded through that mic would have sonded an awful lot better? She's a lovely person too, she thanked the bassist first If you are playing with people like that no-one is going to notice you smiling, and it would be a shame if anyone upstaged her. Just wind her up and let her go.

I think you've nailed it there. I've done some successful gigs with a great front person and the crowd have lapped it up even though the band were embarassingly bad and played with and seen great musicians who never really made any attempt to reach out leaving a sterile atmosphere with a disinterested audience. I'd way rather play with a great front person with an okay voice than a great singer with no personality on stage. Band interaction is good though. I try to be a foil/straight man for the singer. My duo partner and I kind of heckle each other between songs, the first time we do it in a set the audience wonder what is going on but then get that it is an act and often join in. It has to look natural though most of the 'moves' have started up on stage as a spur of the moment thing but when they have had a reaction become part of the set. One female singer used to try and put me off playing bass when she wasn't singing, just as a tease. The audience soon picked this up and seemed to love her for it.

Ha ha, I think you do protest too much, you do many more than a 'couple' of crowd peasers in your set They are also placed where they should be; mainly at the end of the second set. I'd happily gig that lot. That's actually a set of well known songs from a band of people who know their audience and want to entertain. They also hang together as whole so consciously or not you've decided to give the audience a good time. You guys are very clear who 'your' audience is.

I feel your pain. I've been though a bit of it myself recently, much the same position in that there are two of us committed to the project and we've had a series of false starts with people turning up to rehearsals unprepared. It's horrible to turn up to rehearsals only to find you are wasting your time and everyone else's because one person hasn't done their homework. Doubly horrible becaue you know you are going to have to tell them they aren't needed and then go through the process of finding yet another new person and making another fresh start. Firstly I think it is quite possible that a band can thrive if you are all in other bands but it's really simple: once you've accepted a gig you do that gig lettig the other bands know you aren't available and you turn up to rehearsals prepared, exactly as other people have said. I actually don't think it is a bad thing to have a band where a couple of you are highly committed and others come in for the ride so long as everyone has a degree of professionalism in their attitude at least. I've played bass for a band where I took no part in decisions and just turned up and played. It was one of the most fun experiences I've had at gigs, all I had to do was learn the songs and turn up and play. The motivation was that audiences enjoyed themselves and I got to play a load of new songs without worrying about anything but playing bass. I've found I've needed to develop a thicker skin in all this. Most musicians I've met are pretty focussed on what they want to do, and partly that is a sensible and practical attitude. I play strictly covers, the thought of playing someone else's poorly written songs or trying to find an audience for an unknown band fills me with dread. If I'm looking to join an existing band then the first thing I want to see is their set list. How many songs do I already know? Do I like the songs and want to play them? Do I think they are out to please an audience of just themselves? How many gigs are they doing and will they be a decent venues? How far away are the gigs and the rehearsal rooms? Do they look organised or disorganised? Can I deliver what they want? I can't ask all these questions myself and then complain when they look at my band in the same way, balancing the pain and effort against the rewards works both ways For many of us the rewards are lots of good gigs. I'll rehearse because I need to and I'll turn up prepared because I hate letting people down. I've got a bit of pride and lets face it sometimes you need to rehearse. I don't want to be in a band that spends time in the rehearsal room every week for six gigs a year. I'm a grown up (some of the time) if a band are getting good gigs, fun to be with and moving forwards I don't need any other motivation.