tvickey Posted June 19, 2020 Share Posted June 19, 2020 Like some of you, I have a few amps (and GAS). I also have one nice set of speakers that I'm really happy to stick with, even while using any of my various amps. I know there are a lot of amp switchers for guitars, but these all have 1/4" ports on the back of them. I'm wondering if there are any out there which utilize SpeakOns? Okay, yes, I could do 1/4" to SpeakOn and then back again... but this seems like a silly and wasteful thing to do. Anyway, let me know if you have suggestions for a piece of kit that might be out there. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassmanPaul Posted June 19, 2020 Share Posted June 19, 2020 This is something that you have to be extremely careful with. Most Class D bass amps are not ground referenced. They are permanently in bridge. This means that while one power amp channel drives the speaker positive rail the other drives the negative rail. If you then plug in a unit that IS ground referenced it will short the negative channel to ground destroying the amplifier. 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dan Dare Posted June 20, 2020 Share Posted June 20, 2020 10 hours ago, BassmanPaul said: This is something that you have to be extremely careful with. Most Class D bass amps are not ground referenced. They are permanently in bridge. This means that while one power amp channel drives the speaker positive rail the other drives the negative rail. If you then plug in a unit that IS ground referenced it will short the negative channel to ground destroying the amplifier. This is excellent advice. Most switchers for guitar amps are also not intended for high current use, hence the 1/4" rather than Speakon sockets. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Starr Posted June 20, 2020 Share Posted June 20, 2020 It would be simple enough to knock up something that would do the job. I don't know if he does anything other than leads but I wonder if @obbm would make something up for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fretmeister Posted June 20, 2020 Share Posted June 20, 2020 Alex seems to have something like this in his latest vid. Ask him! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stewblack Posted June 26, 2020 Share Posted June 26, 2020 On 20/06/2020 at 14:26, fretmeister said: Alex seems to have something like this in his latest vid. Doesn't this do the opposite? Switching between speakers but with the same amp, rather than one speaker set up and switch between amps. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stewblack Posted June 26, 2020 Share Posted June 26, 2020 https://youtu.be/vXLuKNAcWRo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tvickey Posted June 26, 2020 Author Share Posted June 26, 2020 4 minutes ago, stewblack said: https://youtu.be/vXLuKNAcWRo Thanks a lot for the suggestion, but as far as I can tell, that has 1/4" speaker jacks on it. Now we just need a version with SpeakOn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stewblack Posted June 26, 2020 Share Posted June 26, 2020 5 hours ago, tvickey said: Thanks a lot for the suggestion, but as far as I can tell, that has 1/4" speaker jacks on it. Now we just need a version with SpeakOn. Ooh, sorry I didn't read the opening post closely enough, I was only looking for speaker switcher. They all seem to be jack socketed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tvickey Posted June 26, 2020 Author Share Posted June 26, 2020 4 minutes ago, stewblack said: Ooh, sorry I didn't read the opening post closely enough, I was only looking for speaker switcher. They all seem to be jack socketed. I'm guessing it's just not a common enough application... guitarists frequently switch amps, some even in the middle of songs. Bassists I guess not so much. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassmanPaul Posted June 26, 2020 Share Posted June 26, 2020 It would be fairly simple to make. The switches would need to be DPDT that break before make. Both the +1 rail and the -1 rail would need to be switched. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fretmeister Posted June 26, 2020 Share Posted June 26, 2020 43 minutes ago, tvickey said: I'm guessing it's just not a common enough application... guitarists frequently switch amps, some even in the middle of songs. Bassists I guess not so much. Usually different cabs as well though. Switching amp heads on 1 cab is very dodgy if they are valve amps. There are a few expensive and complex bits of lit that can do it, but not many. Needs to keep the amp seeing a load all the time but not have any audio gap either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassmanPaul Posted June 27, 2020 Share Posted June 27, 2020 Tube heads are easy - you just have to provide a suitable load resistor when the amp is inactive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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