Weight of "Lightweight" Cabs

[stewblack]

A little while ago Thomann released a range of cabs under their house brand. I recall thinking, they'll not sell many of these in the current market. Great lumpen 4 and 8x 10s when we're all shifting them for peanuts and buying lightweight stuff. 

Now I'm not starting a debate on the merits of their cabs compared with others. We know from guitarists who've opened up their HB cabs that the speakers inside were excellent and would have cost more than the loaded cab if bought elsewhere. In this instance I'm only interested in the weight. 

There are prices in my example but that was for another comparison I'm doing for another, different reason.

I simply picked a bunch of cabs either labelled as lightweight or known to be so. Look at the results. 

Two things struck me immediately, the 8x 10 is heavier than two 4x 10s which seems illogical, and if the specs are to be believed these are (purely in terms of weight) competitive cabs to say the least. Not talking quality. Just weight.

I'm not comparing prices or quality just weight.

THIS IS ONLY ABOUT THE WEIGHT. 

Not quality. 

 

... 

I am not saying Harley Benton is as good or better than Gallien and Krueger. 

Or Mesa Boogie. 

[Pea Turgh]

Not that I’m in the market for a cab, but would certainly be interested to see what drivers they use.

[andy67]

I think HB use celestions or maybe like their sister company Bugera, probs turbo sound. 

[Lozz196]

In their guitar cabs HB use Celestions. Our guitarist has one of the 1x12s and it’s a Vintage 30 in there. Great sounding little cab and surprisingly pokey.

[LukeFRC]

Problem is - Other than bro drivers there’s two ways you can go lightweight ...

Use thinner Lighter panels 

or 

properly brace lighter thinner panels. 

so there’s part of me thinks that construction quality can’t be completely taken out of the equation in a conversation about weight 

[Pea Turgh]

The only review the cab has stated it’s internally braced.  Doesn’t look like a bot/employee review as they say they returned it 😂 (just because of the sound though).

[Marvin]

The Harley Benton 810 is only 8kg heavier than my old Ampeg B410hlf.

[stewblack]

I'm just surprised given the numbers, they haven't made a huge deal out of the weight. 

Maybe these days people just expect a bass cab to weigh less that a bag of chips so the marketing folk deemed it unimportant. 

 

[Pea Turgh]

Less than 1kg heavier than the cloth BF Four10. Or, lighter than the steel grill Four10.

Less than 1/5th of the price too!!!

[Phil Starr]

Out of curiosity I checked, the cab is made out of poplar ply which is probably the lightest practical material to build a cab with. It's actually quite expensive compared to generic hardwood ply. 15mm thickness is quite acceptable for a cab this size but 18 is normal. The reviews mention some stiffening inside but this may be a single batten across the back which is common in 4x10's. Even so this is remarkable and if you were home building buying this cab and replacing the drivers might be almost as cheap as building your own once the cost of covering and hardware are included. Here's the link https://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_solidbass_410t.htm

A cab like this is going to be filled with drivers with very modest magnets to save money. Retail it's hard to buy any 10 for under £30 but that's OK the original idea of an 8x10 was to get high volume and plenty of bass warmth by packing lots of cheap speakers into a cab. These speakers will only weigh 2-2.5kg with 1.5" voice coils and magnets that weigh around a kg.

http://www.bluearan.co.uk/index.php?category=Speaker_Components&startprod=0&instockonly=&man_old=all&masthead=Loudspeaker_Drivers&subheadnew=10_Inch_Drivers&sort=pr&manufacturer=all&stock_option=All+Availability&submit=Go

This cab really is serious value for money. I think Harley Benton is just a label and they can be made for Thomann by anyone. If it was Bugera then that is the same group (Music Group) as Behringer and many others and whatever way you cut it this is probably just a generic 'made in China' cab. 

Final observation, it might be around the weight of the BF but the BF cabinet is going to be a lot stiffer and have complex cabinetry as well as more powerful neo speakers inside.

[stewblack]

Thanks Phil. I was hoping you might chip in. 

I have two pretty good light speakers in poor quality chipboard cabs and have been put off building my own cabs due to having no workspace. 

I may consider this a decent option. Bracing through the baffle in a 15" cab is doable. I have in fact doabled it once already on the chipboard cabs. 

I'll try one, if it works, rehouse my 10" speakers as well. 

Edited October 6, 2020 by stewblack

[Beer of the Bass]

That's true, Phil, and I bet the 1x15" with a little revision to the porting and a nice neo 15" like a Faital or Eminence could be equally good value.

[Japhet]

I've got a HB 2x12 guitar cab and it's a fantastic piece of kit. Got it off ebay for £120 and it's made out of proper plywood and loaded with Celestion Vintage 30s. Sounds great and goes silly loud. Presumably the bass gear is of similar quality and value.

[stewblack]

31 minutes ago, Japhet said:

I've got a HB 2x12 guitar cab and it's a fantastic piece of kit. Got it off ebay for £120 and it's made out of proper plywood and loaded with Celestion Vintage 30s. Sounds great and goes silly loud. Presumably the bass gear is of similar quality and value.

Yep I saw a guitarist review a 412 and the speakers were worth more than the whole thing cost him

[Beer of the Bass]

The guitar cabs with the Celestions make a big selling point of it and have "Vintage" in the name as they use Vintage 30s, but there are also cheaper models which use more generic speakers. I feel that if the descriptions and model names of the bass cabs don't make a big deal of using branded drivers, they almost certainly aren't using them.

[stevie]

The cheaper cabs in this list, @stewblack (the first four) all have ceramic magnet drivers. Barefaced also use ceramic magnets. The more expensive ones are fitted with neo drivers, which is what you'd expect. 

Those Harley Bentons are ridiculously cheap. As a DIY'er, it would be difficult to build a poplar ply cab for those prices - never mind buying the drivers.

[andy67]

The Tribal Music Group who own Harley Benton also own TC Electronic, Behringer, Bugera and Turbosound so, I’m guessing the cabs although some fitted with Celestions, most will either be a Turbosound or derivative there of. 
 

From what I gather, the Bugera bass cabs are Turbosound loaded.

Edited October 7, 2020 by andy67

[itu]

My alusonic 2 x 12" weighs 18 kg / 40 lbs, so I think a lightweight bass cab should be under 20 kg / 44 lbs. Then it can be carried with one hand.

Trace Elliot 1818X was 51 kg / 112 lbs...

[andy67]

2 hours ago, itu said:

My alusonic 2 x 12" weighs 18 kg / 40 lbs, so I think a lightweight bass cab should be under 20 kg / 44 lbs. Then it can be carried with one hand.

Trace Elliot 1818X was 51 kg / 112 lbs...

I had 2 x Ampeg SVT-410e cabs, each weighed 41.5kg 😮 

[Pea Turgh]

2 hours ago, itu said:

My alusonic 2 x 12" weighs 18 kg / 40 lbs, so I think a lightweight bass cab should be under 20 kg / 44 lbs. Then it can be carried with one hand.

Trace Elliot 1818X was 51 kg / 112 lbs...

Show off

[chris_b]

It seems some judge lightness against the heavy end of the scale. So a 40lb cab will be light compared to an SVT 810. 

I judge lightness against the lightest cabs, so my 21lb Super Compact is a lightweight. In this context a 30lb cab is pretty light but a 40lb cab is not.

[barkin]

I don't really care if a cab is 25kg or 60kg. Either is too heavy. For me.

[stewblack]

I would do the decent thing and buy a couple from Thomann purely for research purposes. However I already share my room with several large bass cabs and a couple of hi fi cabs bigger and heavier than some bass cabs. 

 

[andy67]

6 minutes ago, stewblack said:

I would do the decent thing and buy a couple from Thomann purely for research purposes. However I already share my room with several large bass cabs and a couple of hi fi cabs bigger and heavier than some bass cabs. 

 

Pix or doesn’t exist! 😂

[stewblack]

Not easy to see jammed in the corner but bigger than my Barefaced 12"