2000w+ power amp suggestions?

[Jim C]

I think Bob is talking theory regarding how many amps of current are required if in fact you could dissipate the energy through either speakers or a very big load resistor.
Would imagine that the old fashioned caps used in power supplies allow the current to float for brief periods of time during high transient demands.

I would think running a low frequency tone with the amp flat out on the bench would be worst case.

Got to give the guy a break, not only an engineer for QSC, but secretary for AES; another over achiever making us all look bad!

 

[Thangfish]

Just as side bar example here...

Bass Gear mag, when testing the Carvin B1500 head, found that although it is rated at 1900w @ 2Ω, they were only able to get about 1700w out of it with a 1khz sine wave.
They used a dedicated 20 amp circuit and measured about a 5v voltage drop. They said said they were able to get more output power by using some various (unspecified) power regulation devices.

 

[Bob Lee (QSC)]

First time I've ever been called an overachiever!

 

[ashtray]

I might have missed this - but it seems that your concern is not wattage, but volume - correct? If so - what kind of cabinets are you using? You can get a lot of volume out of a "small" amount of wattage if you have enough speakers. Also, depends on which frequencies you are trying to boost will depend on your volume (cabinet design, wattage requirement, etc).

On the topic of modding a 5150 head... those things are stock at 100 watts (tube). That's super loud. You can easily power two 4x12 cabs with that. Not likely going to run out of "clean" headroom. To get 300 watts, he'd have to have 12 6L6 output tubes (in addition to the 8 preamp tubes it already has). I doubt the head even has space for all those tubes!! (now power CONSUMPTION is another story - but we're talking about output here)