Well, I've had my Ampeg BA210V2 for a few months now and it's been a great little amp up until last night. As we started into the second set I started to smell that telltale roasting speaker smell. I immediately backed off the low end a bit and the smell went away and the Lil guy finished the night without any issues. I pulled the speakers this morning and yep, a bit of lingering heated voice coil smell. Now I'm looking to upgrade the speakers. It's used, it's not under warranty. So, after calculating the internal volume (~1.2 cu ft per speaker) so I could decide what speakers would be a good upgrade. The search was on. At this point I had a few options. To keep it usable with an extention cab: 2 - 4 ohm speakers in series Or 2 - 16 ohm in parallel. To make it a stand alone cab at 450 watts: 2 - 8 ohm speakers in parallel. The search for a compatible speaker took a bit and I ended up finding that 2 Eminence Kappa Pro 10LFs would fit the bill for the internal volume I have to work with. A bit pricy, a bit heavy (18lbs each) but since they only come in 8 ohms and they handle 600 watts RMS each this would negate my combo to a stand alone 450 watt, 4 ohm unit (speakers in parallel). Which I don't have a problem with. I have an SVT-6 PRO with a 6x10 larger rig for big shows. So this is where I'm at. Sure I could get the stock replacement speakers but I don't want to deal with this again and the upgrades will handle everything this amp can dish out power wise (and then some). Anyone else had this issue? Done speaker swaps in a BA210V2? Side Note: I have owned Eminence Kappa Pro 10LFs before and they are some killer speakers.
You are paying a huge sensitivity and significant high end extension penalty with those drivers compared with other options like the DeltaLite 2510, Delta 15A, even the Basslite S2010. Since you can’t use the extra power handling, this represents performance thrown away. This is why those drivers aren’t seen in most bass cabinets, they really require a mid driver to sound good (unless you are looking for a dark tone)
Thanks Agedhorse, I've posted this in other areas (Facebook) and after checking out some of the suggestions it seems a Eminence BA102 may be a more suitable replacement.
Also, I'll look into the speakers you suggested. Would be nice to drop the weight of the combo a bit.
Well, I decided to finally change the speakers out and also decided that loosing a few pounds for the prices available wasn't cost effective. After some research and checking recommend cabinet size/port size it seems that a set of eminence ca1059 will fit the bill perfectly. I decided to go with the 8 ohm versions (in series) as the rated power for the BA210V2 is 450 watts into 4 ohms (with an external cab hooked up). I unhooked the external speaker jack so there will be no accidents. The speakers are ordered and should be in Tuesday. I played last Saturday and once again started to smell the tell tale sign of voice coils overheating and decided then it was time to go with a more robust speaker.
Following this. I’m considering picking up this amp and saw lots of good reviews, this one being the first red flag but other than the speaker issue you seem happy with it overall?
Did you mean to say that you are using the two 8Ω speakers in PARALLEL for a 4Ω load? I think I was following you, but the stuff about the external speaker jack confused me.