Thinking of making a series cable for two cabs

[Munjibunga]

Last night was one of those nights when my brain was grooving along too much to go to sleep. So it's 1 or 2 in the morning and I was thinking about what I was going to put in my next batch of jambalaya, and I wrapped that up, but still couldn't go to sleep.

Well, I have this new Berg AE212 down in my practice room, and it's sitting on top of my D-210XST. Both these cabs are 4-ohm, so I can run only one at a time off my WTX-500. So I started thinking about how I would go about making a cable I could use to put the cabs in series for an 8-ohm load. It really isn't that difficult, but I want it to be bullum while still looking bitchen.

The wiring is straight-forward, but I fleshed out where all the shrink tubing would go so it wouldn't look ragged. I also thought about which connectors to use, and decided Neutrik Speakons were the way to go, in case I need to change the polarity on one of the ends that go to a cab. I guess I'll use 12 gauge wire and make each tail about 5 or 6 feet long.

When I get it done, I'll plug it in to the two cabs and measure the resistance across the pair. It should come up somewhere about 6 ohms. Before I put the Speakon on the amp end, I'll put a 9-volt battery across the wires to see if all the cones go in the same direction. If not, I'll just switch the polarity on one of the cab-end Speakons.

So I got done with that, and started thinking about what earthquake photos I wanted to put on a thumb drive to show my students today. I decided to show them pics from the Sierra El Mayor earthquake of Sunday April 4th 2010, some of which were taken during the earthquake.

Then I thought about how I was going to counsel my daughter, who is going to Magic Mountain tomorrow.

I don't remember what I thought about next.

[oldrocker]

So, what is going in your next batch of jambalaya?

[Munjibunga]

OK, so nobody gives a flop, however, you might be interested to know that I did a dry run and made a prototype. Now, it isn't the ultimate product because I made it out of some crud I had lying around. It's 16-gauge cable and ¼-inch Switchcraft plugs, so it's not bullum.

But the splicing of the cable went well and all bare wires are in shrink tubing. It's a one-foot pigtail with a plug on one end and two 5-foot speaker cables at the other end. There's red shrink tubing over the plug at the amp end, and yellow on the speaker ends.

I got the polarity right on the first try. So I was brave enough to plug it in to my WTX-500 and the AE212 and D-210XST cabs, both 4-ohms. This presented an 8-ohm load to the amp. It sounded as you might expect - breathtakingly bitchen. It has the nice, creamy, even frequency response of the 212, plus the low end punch and crisp highs characteristic of the XST.

Volume? A ton. I played it for about 10 minutes, and the exhaust from the amp was still completely cool.

So now I guess I'll gather up the pieces/parts to make the real thing. Oh yeah, my prediction of 6 ohms measured across both speakers was spot-on. The impedance is going to be closer to 8 ohms in real life, depending to some extent on the frequency.

[Munjibunga]

Originally Posted by oldrocker

So, what is going in your next batch of jambalaya?

I was just thinking about that. Some shrimp, this time (my daughter nixed that) and something to make it taste a little dirtier. The spices were sage, cumin, thyme, cayenne and oregano. The recipe called for soy sauce, which I put in, but I added Worcestershire sauce, which it needed. I'll probably add a little more. I'm thinking some file might dirty it up a little bit. I put crushed tomatoes in there and a little tomato paste, but I think I'll leave the paste out this time ... I don't want it too tomatoey.

I always start out with the trinity. Of course it's got andouille sausage and chicken.I used breast meat last time, but some thighs will go in there this time. If I could find some tasso ham, I'd dice that up, but I used a smoked ham steak diced and it was pretty good. I'd put crawdads in there if I could get some fresh ones. That's pretty much it.

[Munjibunga]

One more thing. Using this cable, I can hook up two 4-ohm cabs, then daisy-chain another 4-ohm cab off each of those and have four 4-ohm cabs presenting a 4-ohm load to the amp. Of course, with my 500-watt amp, each cab would be getting only 125 watts, but I have a Fender MB-1200 mono block amp that could provide plenty of power. In fact, since it goes down to 2 ohms. I could daisy-chain another two 4-ohm cabs ... or is it four more?

[Munjibunga]

WTFudge? All of TB has me on ignore except oldrocker.

[ulrich]

POIDH

[Thunderscreech]

That's a cool idea, for real.

[geeza]

Sorry, I just got home. Pics?

[Munjibunga]

Originally Posted by geeza

Sorry, I just got home. Pics?

I knew this would happen. OK, here it is. The magic happens in the joint. It works bitchen.

[Passinwind]

Originally Posted by Munjibunga

WTFudge? All of TB has me on ignore except oldrocker.

Ping 4Mal and check out how he did his in an electrical junction box.

[Munjibunga]

Originally Posted by Passinwind

Ping 4Mal and check out how he did his in an electrical junction box.

Seems like it would be a little bulky. It might be cool to put the connections in a little tube right on the cord to keep it tidy. Tomorrow I'm going to go out and buy the supplies to make a bullum one.

[Chowowbus]

OK this is cool.
I thought there was no way to run 4 ohm cabs like that.
I would love to add another cab to my gk mb500 but my existing avatar 410 is 4ohm. Is this for real munji?

[Munjibunga]

Originally Posted by Chowowbus

OK this is cool.
I thought there was no way to run 4 ohm cabs like that.
I would love to add another cab to my gk mb500 but my existing avatar 410 is 4ohm. Is this for real munji?

It is for real, indeed. We get a lot of folks here asking about daisy-chaining cabs to put them in "series." The sad fact is that daisy chaining puts them in parallel, electronically identical to running one cab off each of two outputs on the back of an amp.

The pictures above are of the actual cable, and it works perfectly. I have it hooked up to my amp and two 4-ohm cabs right now. It took me about a half-hour to make it. I'm going to buy some 12 gauge cable and Neutrik Speakons today to build the bullum version of it.

If I get rambunctious, I may take step-by-step pictures of the process.

[6jase5]

For more traffic, change the thread title to "Munji's Special Jambalaya...oh...and some cable I made." My eyes are guided by my stomach, probably not alone.

[Chowowbus]

Thanks Munji, I almost sold my 4ohm 410 to get 2 8ohms 410s. You just saved me about 500 bucks! Thank you sir!

[Passinwind]

Originally Posted by Munjibunga

Seems like it would be a little bulky.

The plastic gang box that Mal used is smaller than many DIs. Very clean looking, and completely bomber.

Lookin' forward to seeing yours.

[Munjibunga]

Well, I just made the bullum one ... I discovered I had the parts in one of my multitude of bins. I'll do pics later. I'm going to Ace Hardware today, and I'll look around for something small enough to put on a cable. A retrofit will be easy. Pics later. I still have to put the idiot-proof color bands on the connectors.

Also, I made the jambalaya. Last time I made it with linguine, ala CPK. This time I made it with rice. Even my daughter likes it ... without crustaceans.

[Chowowbus]

Yay pics!
For some reason I am hungry...

[Thunderscreech]

I sold my amp, but I will remember this exists as apparently I am the guitar and bass tech of a local metal band.