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Best 15” speaker

#145
Cheers mates! Enter the Greenboy fEearless F115. It can be bought or built. Is it the "best 15 inch speaker"? Maybe so, maybe not. But it's likely better than most of us blokes on TB will ever need. Good luck and don't forget to tip your bartenders and servers.

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#146
A top quality 12" will get as low as a 15" and sound much tighter. ... For every action there is a reaction so the bigger the speaker the slower the response. ... Plus 15's can get very woofy and sometimes you have to raise them up off the floor to get control of those frequencies. ... And this is why there are fewer 15" cabs around.

That said.
EV used to make a tight 15" as did JBL. ... Gauss made a 400-watt 15" that would shake the windows. ... 15" speaker cabs need to be ported just so to get the best out of them. ... The older TL designs, front port, were very good. ... If you can find one remember to lift with your knees and not your back.
 
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#147
agedhorse said:
I know the backgrounds of some of the guys (and gal) on the design team. There's a LOT of engineering and code writing behind what they did. As simple as it appears on the outside, there's ton of computational horsepower under the hood making the amp appear simple. That (IMO) is where their brilliance shines.

Of course DSP based amps are polarizing, but I think this series is more or less the "benchmark" of getting the user interface (for the target market) right. The fact that it sounds good, and is quiet, reliable and delivers convincing models makes it hard to ignore for players looking for the traditional Fender tone/feel/vibe/ etc.

This doesn't mean that I'm against analog, or anti-tube, or a traitor to tradition, but I recognize well executed designs where they stand out.
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I was intrigued, so now I'm terrified: A 200 watt digital modeling Twin Reverb, that works ? Holy Smoke ! Yet to look at the control panel, you'd never know, especially if it sounds legit, which I'll bet it does. Very smart people at work, there.
 
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#148
I was in exactly the same situation as you, and had a similar wish to build a cabinet, however I didn’t have a cab so without thinking much I bought a cab from parts express and asked here what speaker would work, I was surprised at the answers I got and a bit shocked how different bass speakers work. I was given lots of advice and educated about speakers by the talk bass community and discovered that it would have been cheaper to buy, nothing lost thou I know a lot more about speakers now.
The basic information you will require is the internal volume of the cabinet in sq” then you can use the calculators on parts express and us speakers to come up with a speaker suggestion.
However as with all internet based things it’s not perfect and I would take the advice of the people on here, some of who are experts in there fields, personally I have benefited from there advice and suggest you listen and tread lightly, there are some very intelligent and interesting people on talk bass who are willing to share there knowledge freely
 
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#150
Jim C said:
Many here have designed a cabinet around an Eminence Kappalit #3015 speaker with great results.
https://www.parts-express.com/Eminence-KAPPALITE-3015-Neo-15-Driver-290-597
Eminence can supply you with a drawing for the cabinet so that it will be tuned to that particular speaker.
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I agree that the Eminence 3015 (the regular one, not the LF version) is among the best readily-available 15s for a single-driver cab. (*) I don't know that they will provide a drawing, but they do supply a couple of suggested designs by supplying the necessary internal volume and porting information. That info is here: https://www.parts-express.com/pedocs/more-info/290-597--eminence-kappalite-3015-cabinet-design.pdf There's an almost over-whelming amount of data there, but all you really need to design a functional speaker system (the cab and driver together comprise a "system") is the total internal volume and the porting data.

Edit: Do note that the cab designs for the 3015 on the Eminence design page require the use of an external High-Pass Filter to achieve their rated specs.

Much of the advice offered has been accurate and valuable -- it's far easier to buy a used cab, it's never cheaper to build, you need to buy a new $1K speaker, etc. -- but if you want to buy a driver and experiment, there's no reason not to... no one is likely to die if you botch it. :D

(*) I see that Parts Express is showing the 3015 is currently out of stock and is advising a 2/28 delivery date. There may be other sources that have them in stock...definitely check with USSpeaker.
 
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#151
The worst thing you can do to a speaker is run a clipped, square waved signal into it. As long as the speaker is moving back and forth cleanly, and not spending extra time at the limits of its excursion...( and not banging against the magnet)..it will survive for a long,long time.
Square wave distortion means the speaker is spending extra at its limits absorbing wattage and creating heat instead of moving back and forth, pumping air, cooling itself. Of course, you have to put a speaker in a proper box, but that was not the question.
 
#154
I'm happy with an Eminence Deltalite II 2515 NEO. I built the cabinet myself, design based on information from here, and then quite a bit of time playing with port lengths and internal damping to tune it. I started out planning to save money reusing a lot of secondhand fittings from the 30 yr old predecessor cab I scrapped, but in the event some of them broke on removal, and some of them just looked like hell, so I didn't save nearly as much as I hoped.

I used some complex boat building techniques making the cab so its lighter than commercial, and its also finished varnished wood not tolex or carpet.

The brutal truth is that secondhand is always cheaper then build new, so unless you have special requirements like super lightweight construction or finish I advise used. Also do not underestimate the amount of work needed to refine the thing post building - the crap like damping and port tuning is tedious as hell unless you are a major gear nerd (and damn difficult unless you have special test kit available), whilst the company that built your second hand one did all that bollocks for you.
 
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#155
Tim Rinkerman said:
The worst thing you can do to a speaker is run a clipped, square waved signal into it. As long as the speaker is moving back and forth cleanly, and not spending extra time at the limits of its excursion...( and not banging against the magnet)..it will survive for a long,long time.
Square wave distortion means the speaker is spending extra at its limits absorbing wattage and creating heat instead of moving back and forth, pumping air, cooling itself. Of course, you have to put a speaker in a proper box, but that was not the question.
Click to expand...

Barefaced Bass - Mythbusters #1 - amplifiers
 
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