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A few questions about dual speaker cabs.....

LightGroove

LightGroove

Oct 24, 2006
1,997
187
Happy Bottom, VA
#1
Hello, tb bretheren

I have a few questions for you. I'm interested in modifying a pair of speaker cabinets. They are peavey pv215's..I would like to change the internal crossover setup..as of right now the lower spectrum goes to the lower speaker , mids upper speaker, and highs to the horn...I would like to change the lower speaker to get closer to the mids range and purchase a sub for the low end I'm hoping to a gain a cleaner separation by doing this..

Or I have an outboard crossover can I bypass or remove the internal crossover and pick which frequencies from there...basically treating each speaker as it's own

Secondly the cabs are 1/4 inch only and I would like to go speak on...is this straight forward or more difficult being there are several speaker and a crossover

Thanks for your time and added input if these ideas are pointless /stupid
 
#2
You can simply add the subs with an active crossover. There is no need to alter the internal crossover network. Send the high pass to your 2x15s and send the low pass to the subs. Done!!! :hyper:

You can easily change your jacks without doing any damage to your speaker system. Simply disconnect the leads to the old jacks and wire them into the new ones. There is no trickery there.

I do not recommend that you alter the crossover network for the reasons you mentioned. Crossover design can be very tricky, especially with a passive network that is controlling a 2 x 15 PA speaker.
 
#4
That's been my delima ...to me these sound very muddy...I continually get the..well your the sound guy..you should be able to make em sound good...

So in theory a simple 12 n sub concept will handle vocals,keys,acoustic,electric,bass ,n drums...or what alternatives should I be looking at..the band is Christian rock ranging from mild ballads to all out rock
 
#7
I ran sound for a band a few years ago where the guitarist decided to rip out the passive crossovers on some PV SP4s and run them tri-amped--against my advice!!
Totally ruined them, and after trying everything possible to salvage some decent tone I quit that band as soon as I got an offer that was for less money just so I wouldn't have to hear those awful speakers anymore. And I LOVE PV SP4s!!

Passive crossovers are designed to make their cabs sound as good as possible while still being efficient. Not perfect, but a lot of people worked really hard at getting them as close as they could. Using science and witchcraft.
Unless you are a better soundman than most, it might be a good idea the leave them alone and concentrate on other ways to get better sound, like a quality 1/3rd octave EQ.
 
#9
Even though the PV215 has 3 speakers in it, it's only a 2-way system so the X-over sends the same lows/low-mid to both 15's and the mid/highs to the horn. I don't know for sure because I've never looked inside one but based on the price point I bet the 15's aren't chambered separately which explains the muddy sound. You'd be better off with a pair of the PV115's or the PV15M's (they have pole mounts as well) and a pair of the the PV118D powered subs.
 
#10
2x15 + horn cabs are "garage band bait" as far as i can see.

they're too short to get the horns over the crowd's head, too heavy to put on poles, and if you get real subs to stack them on, then the bottom 15" (which is almost always crossed over to have only lows since mids would phase-cancel with the top 15") has no reason to be there.
 

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