Problem with a Peavey 410TX cab

[Jon Chewning]

This is the second time I've had to crack open this cabinet and I still think there's a problem. Anyway from the beginning:

I hauled this cab to a gig and plugged it in. Nothing. So I opened it up (this was an hour before I started, but no pressure, heh) and found a wire had popped loose from one of the speakers. No problem, I just clipped it back on the speaker missing a lead.

Jump forward a couple of months. Same scenario, the day of a gig and the cabinet's dead. This time I crack it open and there's TWO wires popped loose. Great. Well I checked the Peavey paperwork I got with the cab and they had no wiring diagram. Same thing with the website. I called some friends but they were only a little help.

I figgered I had a 50-50 going here so I tried it the first way and sounded dead and really weird. (out of phase?) The second sounded loud and normal so that's the way I left it.

The problem? I was doing a sound check at a gig yesterday and I was watching the speakers in this cab. The top two were really moving and the bottom two looked as if there were nothing running through them. I touched them to see if there was any vibration and there was, but the sound out of the top two speakers was much more apparent than the bottom two.

So my question after this long ramble is, did I still hook them up wrong? Am I missing something? Does anyone know how an 8 ohm 410 cabinet would be wired up?

It has a tweeter wired into the crossover separately and the 4 10"'s (8 ohms apiece) wired into the other crossover connection. I know they can't be in series because I would not get a total load of 8 ohms.

Anyone care to venture?

[White_Knight]

I'll let someone more familiar with Peavey gear do the bulk of this, but here's my thoughts.

1) Ok, try reversing the connection on the two speakers (back to the dead sound way) and see if the speakers all act normally again.

2) Check the wires inside, make sure there aren't any cuts or gouges (especially in those bottom two speakers) that could cause a loss of signal.

3) To get 8 ohms out of four tens you'd either have to go with a) two sets of tens of 8 ohms wired to each other in parallel and then wire the two sets together in series to get 8 ohms or b) each driver would have to be 32 ohms (someone check my math there). Tweeters have such a high resistance that they don't figure into the overall impedance of a cabinent.

4) I don't know how they were originally hooked up, but perhaps there's something wrong with the crossover itself: maybe if there are four outputs and a tweeter output then two of the outputs are damaged (perhaps the same situation if there are 2 woofer outputs and a tweeter output), but in my limited experience there seems to usually be only a crossover that sends the signal two ways: tweeter and woofer, so I don't think that's the problem.

At any rate, once you do find out the problem I'd solder or crimp the wires in place so that they don't fall out again. Maybe mark + and - on them as well. You could try contacting Peavey or looking at their website for more info. Hopefully someone here will be able to help you better than I can. Good luck.

[Munjibunga]

Ever think to solder the danged wires on while you had 'em out? It's amazing to me that Peavey (or any other manufacturer) would not solder the leads to their speakers. I'm just an old solder freak. I like the fumes off the rosin core.

[Munjibunga]

On a more serious note, maybe the speakers are wired so they are out of phase. Make sure all the same color leads go to all the same color connectors. Also make sure you don't have them wired in series/parallel.

[Jon Chewning]

Ok thanks guys.. I'm gonna open it up again tonite and see what I can find.

If I remember correctly the wiring alternates between blue and yellow from point to point without regard to the positive or negative posts on the speakers. (at least from what I can tell).

Yeah after I'm sure that everything is hooked up right I may go in and solder the connections but I'll have to pull the speakers to do that. I did crimp the spade clips down a bit for a tighter fit but of course that's no guarantee they won't pop loose again.

But it sure would be nice if Peavey could put schematics or wiring diagrams on their website. It would almost be like actual customer service.

[rcrimm]

The Peavey 410 TX is wired series/parallel. This is a pretty common wiring scheme used on most four speaker instrument enclosures (some bass cabs might be wired all parallel).
Basically, you have two pairs of series connected speakers (+ to -), with the two Pairs connected together in parallel (the remaining + to + and - to -). This results in a total impedance equalling the impedance a single driver in the enclosure (provided they are all the same impedance). If one of the speakers in any pair becomes disconnected or fails, both speakers in that pair will shut off.

Peavey does not offer schematics online for liability reasons. As I said, this wiring scheme is pretty common. Any tech person should be able to handle it, or just look in most any four speaker enclosure. Or send me an email at rcrimm@peavey.com and I will be glad to send one.

[John M. Cote]

Jon wrote -

>But it sure would be nice if Peavey could put schematics or wiring diagrams on their website. It would almost be like actual customer service.

Jon - I think Peavey's customer service is second to none. Their online and telephone support are just great, IMO. I've dealt with them several times, for basically trivial issues (amp control buttons and the like), and was treated like a king.

Kudos to Peavey.

John

[Jon Chewning]

Yeah I probably assumed a little too much because I haven't actually had dealings with Peavey, so that was me speaking out of my ass about them.

However I DID have problems dealing with Gibson for info on my Tobias and I parlayed that frustration with them into my comment about Peavey.

[k_BASS]

check out series/parallel wiring at:
http://www.bcae1.com/spkrmlti.htm

[KramerBassFan]

I would recommend everybody does NOT click on that link...

[quacksibaugh]

Greetings:

Read your posts about problems I'm having similar to the intermittent sound issues described there. I am not technically proficient at all. But I opened up the cab and found a third wire loose on one of the top speakers, but when I connected it the sound went to nothing or distorted so I left it unconnected and used it that way until lately a similar problem, now I'm wondering if I have the wrong wires in the wrong places, Can you give me an idea if there should be three connections to the top two speakers or just two. Also I'm thinking I have positive and negative wires crossed somewhere. I've taken this cab in for professional service twice already and the problem keeps recurring.

[BassmanPaul]

I don't like push on terminals. They always lead to trouble somewhere down the line. That said, Jon you knew you had a problem with the connectors in your cabinet. If one has fallen off the others can do the same. You SHOULD have taken the time to check and repair before the second event occurred. Maintaining your equipment is the professional thing to do.

Having said all that, I'm sure you'll make damned sure that it never happens again.