I did something stupid - no speaker cable

[stewblack]

That's a really good point @Bigguy2017 my Cobra 90, my HH100 watt heads were tiny. When I went up to Trace it was combos

[Lfalex v1.1]

17 hours ago, nilebodgers said:

I used orange 2 core mains cable back in the day. No chance of mistaking that for a signal cable.

I used white,  but same principle applies- all my instrument cables were/ are black. 

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

21 hours ago, nilebodgers said:

I used orange 2 core mains cable back in the day. No chance of mistaking that for a signal cable.

Black and Decker? There's a famous incident about Peter Walker showing up at an introduction of his latest Quad speaker without any cables. He went to the nearest hardware store and bought a couple of Black and Decker mains cords, cut the ends off, and put them in play. The audio press were impressed by the speakers, but some attributed the excellence of the sound to those orange cables of unknown origin. 🙄

[nilebodgers]

21 minutes ago, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

Black and Decker? There's a famous incident about Peter Walker showing up at an introduction of his latest Quad speaker without any cables. He went to the nearest hardware store and bought a couple of Black and Decker mains cords, cut the ends off, and put them in play. The audio press were impressed by the speakers, but some attributed the excellence of the sound to those orange cables of unknown origin. 🙄

Lol, no, but it was the 1mm2 2-core that is used on electric lawnmowers etc.

[Stub Mandrel]

On 01/09/2021 at 18:35, stewblack said:

Hey guys, as soon as I read about it I switched to OBBM speaker cables. I'm not decrying the science.

My only point was that we all used the same cables from amp to cab, from instrument to amp. Everyone I knew, every band -all of them. For years and years and years and no one I ever played with or was friends with ever suffered any problems.

Which is why I wondered about it. That's all. 

 

Over 30 years ago I bought along length of orange two-core 13A cable and made up a set of jack-to-jack speaker leads. Never any issues, although I have upgraded to heavy-duty metal bodies jacks (which I then realised could cause a short more easily, so I shrouded them with heat-shrink tubing). Not easy to confuse with guitar leads (as long as I don't buy orange ones).

 

Bass Terror has speakon-only, new cab has Neutrik combined sockets. Speakon-speakon is fine (actually really good).

 

Elf has jack socket, bought a Stagg speakon-jack cable at PMT and the jack is about 1.5mm short. It works but the first time I used it in anger it vibrated out of the socket, scaring the crap out of me - I relocated the amp to the floor. So new jack-speakon required, or maybe use one of my old, orange mains leads!

[Downunderwonder]

My very first, and only bass rig for a very long time, came with a thing of wonder, a heavy 1/4" speaker cable. It is still the only one of those I own!

 

One time the guy I played a lot of open mics with calls me in a panic. ''Can you do the PA for tonight?" Half of his gear got left in another guy's car and he was out of town.

 

So not having had my gear out in a long time I get a mental checklist going for what to bring to get out of his mixer to my stuff and have bass and guitar and vox out from what is accessible in the garage. 'No worries''.

 

Get there and plugging it all in and almost done but I am one 1/4" speaker cable short, AARRRRRG!

 

''What's the problem''

''Missing the speaker cable''

''Oh'', helpfully wanders to the dwindled pile of spare leads which are not speaker leads in any way shape or form.

 

The star of the show has my speaker lead sticking out of his guitar.

[Newfoundfreedom]

On 01/09/2021 at 20:52, nilebodgers said:

I used orange 2 core mains cable back in the day. No chance of mistaking that for a signal cable.

 

I still use 2 core mains cable. But it's black. Still no chance of confusing it with an instrument cable, apart from the fact that it's much heavier cable, all my instrument leads are braided, and the speaker cable has speakon connectors. 

Edited September 3, 2021 by Newfoundfreedom

[Newfoundfreedom]

5 minutes ago, Newfoundfreedom said:

 

Sorry. Double post and it wont let me delete.

Edited September 3, 2021 by Newfoundfreedom

[BassmanPaul]

On 31/08/2021 at 07:55, stewblack said:

I often read about the dangers of not using proper speaker cables, but tbh I only learned if the existence of such cables when I joined Basstalk.

 

You must have been in a Midsomer Night's Dream all those years.

Edited September 5, 2021 by BassmanPaul

[BassmanPaul]

What used to give me pause were the Guitar players who used 'curly' cables between their amps and speaker cabinets!

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

35 minutes ago, BassmanPaul said:

What used to give me pause were the Guitar players who used 'curly' cables between their amps and speaker cabinets!

It seems that one's IQ is inversely proportional to the number of strings on the instrument. I remember using those on my bass back in the day, and they were horrid in how they killed the mids and highs because of their capacitance and inductance, two terms not in the vocabulary of most six-stringers. 😊

[BassmanPaul]

Hey you! I play mostly six string basses! LOL

 

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

What I can't do with four strings I don't need. 😊

[BassmanPaul]

I couldn't live without my Low B.

 

I find that the choice of fingerings that a Six provides gives it great versatility.

Edited September 6, 2021 by BassmanPaul

[funkydoug]

IQ is surely a function of scale length anyway…😅

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

18 minutes ago, BassmanPaul said:

I couldn't live without my Low B.

 

I play Classic Rock and R&B. They didn't go below E, neither do I. For that matter I doubt that James Jamerson ever hit a low E. That's not a key for horns.

[moley6knipe]

On 02/09/2021 at 16:08, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

Black and Decker? There's a famous incident about Peter Walker showing up at an introduction of his latest Quad speaker without any cables. He went to the nearest hardware store and bought a couple of Black and Decker mains cords, cut the ends off, and put them in play. The audio press were impressed by the speakers, but some attributed the excellence of the sound to those orange cables of unknown origin. 🙄

This made me smile. When I joined my current band many many years ago they were using all sorts of crappy guitar leads as speaker cables for the Peavey amps and HiSys speakers. I bought a drum of orange mains two core, a bunch of neutrik jacks and made new speaker leads that, like, actually reached where they needed to go and didn’t cut out all the time. Lasted for years until we moved to active speakers!

Edited September 6, 2021 by moley6knipe

[Stub Mandrel]

On 06/09/2021 at 22:12, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

I play Classic Rock and R&B. They didn't go below E, neither do I. For that matter I doubt that James Jamerson ever hit a low E. That's not a key for horns.

 

Bass goes down to E so you can play in F without having uneven sounding open strings 😉

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

1 hour ago, Stub Mandrel said:

 

Bass goes down to E so you can play in F without having uneven sounding open strings 😉

I doubt that had anything to do with how standard orchestral tuning of the double bass was arrived at. How they decided on E I can't imagine, it's not an octave below the cello, which has a C as it's lowest note.

[Stub Mandrel]

28 minutes ago, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

I doubt that had anything to do with how standard orchestral tuning of the double bass was arrived at. How they decided on E I can't imagine, it's not an octave below the cello, which has a C as it's lowest note.

 

I was jesting.

 

Wkipedia hints at some background although it certainly isn't a full explanation:

 

Quote

Regular tuning

The double bass is generally tuned in fourths, in contrast to other members of the orchestral string family, which are tuned in fifths (for example, the violin's four strings are, from lowest-pitched to highest-pitched: G–D–A–E). The standard tuning (lowest-pitched to highest-pitched) for bass is E–A–D–G, starting from E below second low C (concert pitch). This is the same as the standard tuning of a bass guitar and is one octave lower than the four lowest-pitched strings of standard guitar tuning. Prior to the 19th-century, many double basses had only three strings; "Giovanni Bottesini (1821–1889) favored the three-stringed instrument popular in Italy at the time",^[11] because "the three-stringed instrument [was viewed as] being more sonorous".^[21] Many cobla bands in Catalonia still have players using traditional three-string double basses tuned A–D–G.^[22]

Throughout classical repertoire, there are notes that fall below the range of a standard double bass. Notes below low E appear regularly in the double bass parts found in later arrangements and interpretations of Baroque music. In the Classical era, the double bass typically doubled the cello part an octave below, occasionally requiring descent to C below the E of the four-string double bass. In the Romantic era and the 20th century, composers such as Wagner, Mahler, Busoni and Prokofiev also requested notes below the low E.

There are several methods for making these notes available to the player. Players with standard double basses (E–A–D–G) may play the notes below "E" an octave higher or if this sounds awkward, the entire passage may be transposed up an octave. The player may tune the low E string down to the lowest note required in the piece: D or C. Four-string basses may be fitted with a "low-C extension" (see below). Or the player may employ a five-string instrument, with the additional lower string tuned to C, or (more commonly in modern times) B, three octaves and a semitone below middle C. Several major European orchestras use basses with a fifth string.^[23]

 

[Beer of the Bass]

On 08/09/2021 at 22:41, Stub Mandrel said:

 

I was jesting.

 

Wkipedia hints at some background although it certainly isn't a full explanation:

 

 

 

Some suggest that the double bass may have some heritage from the viol family, which are usually tuned in fourths. The differently shaped shoulders compared to the violin family, and the frequent use of canted flat backs would also support this idea. And with the string making techniques of the time, a low E or low C would be likely to be fairly unsatisfactory, hence the higher tuning of the old 3 string double bass.  When the fourth string was added, continuing the existing pattern of fourths tuning would seem logical.

[Chienmortbb]

On 08/09/2021 at 20:45, Stub Mandrel said:

 

Bass goes down to E so you can play in F without having uneven sounding open strings 😉

Although it is said that JJ played open notes whenever he could. Did he just dislike the E?

[EssentialTension]

On 08/09/2021 at 20:45, Stub Mandrel said:

 

Bass goes down to E so you can play in F without having uneven sounding open strings 😉

 

Playing open strings is good. It's four notes that are available in any position.

 

Especially on a fretless where it's four notes that are always available and also in tune.

 

(Obviously more notes on a fiver, etc.)

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

The advantage to playing open notes is it frees the fingers to fret other notes. JJ would have avoided open E for the same reason we all did back then, the speakers couldn't handle it.

[beans-on-toast]

There are those that buy long speaker cables then coil them up and tie them to keep them off the floor. Not the same inductance as a curly instrument cord. Buy just the length that you need, not way longer.

 

If you have a long instrument cord, snake it back and forth on the stage, don’t coil it. It is important not to walk on your cords. It can damage them with time.

 

Also, when winding your cables for storage, use the over-under technique. This prevents twisting.