New Cab Day-LFSys Silverstone

[stevie]

I'm a big fan of 15-inch drivers. There are some amazing products out there that haven't found their way into bass guitar cabs. 15s do seem to have dropped in popularity over recent years, however, at least if the word on Basschat is to believed. So the question is, when buying a larger-than-compact cab, do people want a 15, a 2x10 or a 2x12?

[RichardH]

I guess a certain cohort of people will (incorrectly) consider 15" drivers incapable of covering the whole frequency range, thus discarding them as a one cab solution.

[Chienmortbb]

2 hours ago, RichardH said:

I guess a certain cohort of people will (incorrectly) consider 15" drivers incapable of covering the whole frequency range, thus discarding them as a one cab solution.

I am sure @steviewill respond, but the main point is that you would normally need to cross over at a lower frequency than for a 12". That may mean a better horn and/or compression driver.

[nekomatic]

15 hours ago, stevie said:

I'm a big fan of 15-inch drivers. There are some amazing products out there that haven't found their way into bass guitar cabs. 15s do seem to have dropped in popularity over recent years, however, at least if the word on Basschat is to believed. So the question is, when buying a larger-than-compact cab, do people want a 15, a 2x10 or a 2x12?

The impression I’d picked up, mostly from discussions on here, was that larger drivers have worse dispersion than smaller ones and so a vertical 2x10 or 2x12 would be preferable to a 1x15. 
 

Until success, fame, fortune and more storage space favour me I’m not likely to be in the market for a larger-than-compact cab though, so don’t let me speak for those who are…

[chyc]

I know why people like 12" drivers, but the market seems to be saturated with them.  Like @nekomatic says I think people are scared away from 15" by the marketing around dispersion, which is silly because a cabinet with a 15" can have as good a dispersion as any other sized woofer. RCF have the 15" ART-945A as having 100° coverage, which could mean anything, but crucially it's the same as their 12" ART-932A. Not cheap though.

 

[basstone]

My first commercial amp was a Polytone Minibrute III  15" combo , bought secondhand in the 1990s. It does not look particularly scientifically designed as it's nominally a sealed box as small as the 15" driver would allow with a very modest 50W solid state amp., which would do 100w with the similarly sized 15" extension cab. It was used extensively for jazz gigs with fretted and fretless bass and for pit work. I found it very versatile and ideal for small venues and tight band pits! I preferred the 15" version of the Polytone for the smooth low end, even if lacking the top end and maybe a bit of punch of the 12" versions. I do still have it and used it recently for theatre work.

 

I also have an Ashdown active 15" sub and a GK 1 x 15" both of which get used with  2 X 10S  if extra bottom end and volume is needed for bigger gigs. I also have a BC112 Mk3 which I'm tending to use more and more as it is great all round on its own for most situations, and the LFSys Silverstone is an improved version of this!  At the end of the day it comes down to what you like to hear that works in your band and gig situation.

[Chienmortbb]

18 minutes ago, basstone said:

My first commercial amp was a Polytone Minibrute III  15" combo , bought secondhand in the 1990s. It does not look particularly scientifically designed as it's nominally a sealed box as small as the 15" driver would allow with a very modest 50W solid state amp., which would do 100w with the similarly sized 15" extension cab. It was used extensively for jazz gigs with fretted and fretless bass and for pit work. I found it very versatile and ideal for small venues and tight band pits! I preferred the 15" version of the Polytone for the smooth low end, even if lacking the top end and maybe a bit of punch of the 12" versions. I do still have it and used it recently for theatre work.

 

I also have an Ashdown active 15" sub and a GK 1 x 15" both of which get used with  2 X 10S  if extra bottom end and volume is needed for bigger gigs. I also have a BC112 Mk3 which I'm tending to use more and more as it is great all round on its own for most situations, and the LFSys Silverstone is an improved version of this!  At the end of the day it comes down to what you like to hear that works in your band and gig situation.

I quite agree, any of my recommendations are my own views and while I will defend them to the hilt. I saw a band once where the bassist used a PJB cab, I spoke to him afterwards, and he was raving about it, It would not work for me, but it worked for him.

[stevie]

I'm not sure how aware the average bassist is of speaker dispersion. Not everyone reads reads Basschat and not every member reads this section of the forum. Dispersion is an issue no matter what the size of the driver. I remember using an 8" midrange a while back (in a 15" cab)  and finding the dispersion inadequate until I added a compression driver.

 

If you're using an HF horn to complement the main bass driver(s) and cross the horn low enough to obtain a smooth off-axis response without any mid suckout, the size of the bass driver doesn't matter much. As @chyc points out, PA speaker makers like RCF do this as a matter of course. But you need a decent compression driver and horn to cross over at around 1.5kHz (or lower), which is what's needed with a 15.

 

 

[tubbybloke68]

Any news/pics of the 10” cabs please? Thank you x 

[stevie]

Everything is ready to go, @tubbybloke68. I'm just waiting for the woodwork. I'll post pics as soon as I have a production model finished, but it's basically a scaled-down version of the Monaco. So the appearance and cosmetics are the same - it's just smaller.

[Chienmortbb]

On 21/12/2022 at 10:21, chyc said:

I know why people like 12" drivers, but the market seems to be saturated with them.  Like @nekomatic says I think people are scared away from 15" by the marketing around dispersion, which is silly because a cabinet with a 15" can have as good a dispersion as any other sized woofer. RCF have the 15" ART-945A as having 100° coverage, which could mean anything, but crucially it's the same as their 12" ART-932A. Not cheap though.

 

As far as I remember, those ART-945A have a monster of a compression driver and coupled with a good horn it can go way below 1KHz (650Hz from memory). That is well below the "beaming point" of a 15".

[tubbybloke68]

4 hours ago, stevie said:

Everything is ready to go, @tubbybloke68. I'm just waiting for the woodwork. I'll post pics as soon as I have a production model finished, but it's basically a scaled-down version of the Monaco. So the appearance and cosmetics are the same - it's just smaller.

Thanks for your reply! Looking forward to seeing them. Cheers x