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Big E Speakers Part 4 - Quadraphenia

#4,043
@Mike Arnopol , glad to hear things are coming together for you. The struggles of a small business owner are real. Add on the health issues, and it’s not an enviable situation. I look forward to reading some reviews of your finished line. I am one of the guys willing to give up a bit of Uber clarity for extra bass cab warmth and texture. IME your original 8x5, 4x6, and 112 (with custom driver) all exhibited this. The flex 210 had amazing mids, and it appears you are using the the same mid driver for you 4x6 Bodai tower. Your cabs all have that something special in response. Just my opinion, but I believe your line would benefit from an traditionally voiced offering alongside the Uber clarity offering. I look forward to owning some of your cabs agian!
 
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#4,045
Hi guys; can you clear some info up for me.....I’m looking possibly buying one of two used MAS cabs. One is a 112 Bodai. The other is a new version of the MAS 112, here are specs: 29"H x 16 1/2 W x 14 1/2 deep, 44 lbs, 4 ohm, Baltic wood
12" Kappalite, two 3" Faital mids, one Typhany 1" dome tweeter

Curious as to the comparison of attributes. I dabble in everything musically but my meat and potatoes is Stingray, P or J passive. Hard rock, Blues, Sabbath, Zeppelin, AC/DC, Skynyrd, etc and so on. Some fusion occasionally. (Love Gary Willis!). I used to own a MAS 112 18sound and loved it. These two, especially the new 112 I know nothing about. Thanks guys!!!
 
#4,047
The only Bodai cabs I've heard at length and turned up are the old version of the Bodai 110 (the one that looks like a little Bodai 112) and the Bodai 28 (played back and forth with the MAS 28). I did get to play through @thumbs&fingers' Bodai 112, but at "don't disturb the neighbors" volume, so I don't feel that I've got as good a handle on that one.

I also haven't played the most recent, more compact MAS 112. The 18Sound 112 has been my main medium-to-loud venue cab for several years, though, and I did get to play it back-and-forth at some length with the version immediately preceding the most recent one, which used the same, 4 Ohm, custom Eminence driver as in the compact MAS 112 and the Bodai 112. I posted my impressions of the two relative to each other, earlier in the thread.

MarkA said:
I've not played the Faital version. I own the 18 Sound version and I've played the custom Eminence version. (Mike used to make a version with the 3012 HO as well, but I think that's been more-or-less shelved in favor of the custom Eminence driver.)

The 18 Sound version is the "driest" cab I've ever played in the sense that there is almost no overhang to the notes. (That's what I mean by "dry", here.) Even moreso than the other MAS cabs, which seem to have less overhang than most ported cabs. Some of this depends on the amp, of course.

The 18 Sound is also pretty "lean" in that it doesn't really have a bump in the bass/low mids. Mids-to-upper mids the response rises slightly. The cab takes to EQ really well -- you can boost the bass quite a bit and it handles it well -- and plays well with a wide variety of amps. Low end extension is good, but it's not as deep as some of the other MAS cabs. Low end response is more square-edged -- it's a hard kick. Some people like this (I do), where, for some, it's a bit much. I posted earlier that for twisty, organ-like, modern R&B lines (I'd say for gospel, too) I feel the 46+sub, with its rounder bottom end and slightly more relaxed response and hi-fi tone, is a more natural fit than the 18 Sound 112. Takes some of the edge off. Funk, Afro-beat, chordal stuff, the 18 Sound is great. Great for Rock, too, though that's less in my wheelhouse.

The Faital -- again, haven't played it, just talked to Mike about it -- is supposed to go a bit deeper and be bigger/rounder down low. I get the impression that Blues guys would prefer it to the 18 Sound, though it certainly wouldn't be restricted to that.

The custom Eminence version goes, I think, deeper than either the Faital or 18 Sound. It's a bit less dry than the 18 Sound but still very articulate. A bit "rougher", too, in the mid-mids (which I think I'd like well in a live mix). I get the impression that the Eminence would growl a bit lower than the 18 Sound (which has more of a grind in the upper mids), but not quite as low as the 6" mid drivers in the Flex. Voicing of the Eminence strikes me, in some ways, as being in-between that of the 18 Sound and the Flex (it does have a bit of upper-bass bump like the Flex, but spread out more). I like my 18 Sound 112 but think now and then about trying an Eminence version.

Finally, the Eminence version is a couple dB or so more efficient than the 18 Sound version. A non-issue with my GBE 1200, but if I were looking at a cab to use with a low-to-moderate power tube head or to get the most out of a "500 Watt" micro amp, I'd lean toward the Eminence version for that reason.
Click to expand...

Relative to the Custom Eminence 112 that I tried, Mike has said that the most recent one, being in a smaller box, would have slightly less pronounced lows (but that half-a-click on the bass knob would bring them back in line with the bigger cab) and that, courtesy of the funky cutouts on the side, it would be more open-sounding. There might have been other refinements between the two versions (there usually are, with Mike), but I don't know any specifics.

I can't say as much about the Bodai 112 as I can about the Bodai 28, but I did get to play the Bodai 28 and the MAS 28 back-to-back -- the separate mid section really does add detail (to an already detailed cab) and a more open, more "3D" feel to things. (Similar experience with the 210 Flex cab, which also uses a separate mid chamber.) The B28 was brighter, overall, than the MAS 28, too. I don't know if the B112 would be brighter than the MAS 112 or not, but I imagine that the "more open/detailed/3D" thing would apply.

That said, when it's opened up at a gig, my 18Sound MAS 112 is plenty open and detailed sounding. I have to imagine that the compact MAS 112 would be at least as good in those regards -- it's a tempting, little (relatively), one-cab solution. The B112 is still fairly compact (both are shallower than the old 112), but several inches taller (with the separate mids) and a little heavier than the compact MAS 112.
 
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#4,052
pretty efficient. The 4ohm 4x5 is around 99.5 and the 8 ohm around 97.5. Another advantage--multiple ceramic magnet drivers dissipate heat much better. The worst would be a single neo driver. They tend to go into thermal compression MUCH sooner. Cab designers don't like to talk about thermal compression. It is a HUGELY important subject. Before I knew what it was I'd get so frustrated on gigs wondering why halfway through a set my volume would go down and the low end would get thinner. Now I know it's thermal compression. I'll use neo on mids and tweets---no disadvantage there. But on woofers I only want to use ceramic. Yes they're heavier. My new 45 weighs around 39# and the 46 around 49#. I could save around 7# by using neo. But why save on weight when you would need more cabs to produce the same results? Because by mid-set your volume would start dropping. I love my 12" cabs. But I could clearly see thermal compression with these cabs. The new 45 and a reflex super 12" neo cab would start the set with the same volume limitations. But by mid-set---the 45 would go louder. The mass of the ceramic magnets dissipate much more heat than the little neo magnets on a "super" 12. This was initially pointed out to me by the designer of the Kappalite line!
 
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#4,055
Mike Arnopol said:
The mass of the ceramic magnets dissipate much more heat than the little neo magnets on a "super" 12. This was initially pointed out to me by the designer of the Kappalite line!
Click to expand...
I'm fascinated and puzzled. At what sort of percentage of rated power would you expect thermal compression to kick in? I'm sure I don't run my driver hard enough to run into the thermal compression issue - certainly I've never noticed anything - but obviously the more power going in the more waste heat. Is air temperature within the cabinet an issue? Seems to be that 300W or 500W is going to generate a bit of warmth, even if the average load is way smaller than that.

My puzzle is why wouldn't much bigger finning and heatsink area be a recipe for improved heat dissipation on the neo? Looking at my deltalite it seems to me that it could have an awful lot more heat sink area for not much more weight. I can see, I suppose, that a higher mass magnet has much greater heat capacity which will affect how quickly it will heat up or cool down, but it seems odd to me to design and ship a driver that will run into heat problems if its avoidable with a few tens of grams of alloy fins.
 
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#4,056
I'm guilty as are a lot of others--in running speakers just below the "fartout" threshold. Let's take a 500 watt rated neo speaker. A continuous 500 watts will melt the voice coil. But--the threshold of fartout might only be 300 watts. But--for some reason moreso with my cabs--they can take peaks way above that. I've hit 500 watt rated drivers with peaks of around 800 watts with no big problems. Maybe because my design exerts more control over the driver.
One thing that really heats up drivers---subsonics. Typically there is a lot of information under 30hz that your amp and driver are seeing. If you're running your speaker close to its limit---there will be a lot of subsonics that are drawing tons of power from your amp. This will REALLY heat up a driver. I've definitely noticed that with a good HPF that I've seen much less thermal overload.
And--cabinet design does make a difference. My cabs have much more air moving inside--so better cooling.
And yes---more heatsinking is a HUGE advantage. This is an 18Sound neo driver that I've used. I noticed a distinct advantage in less thermal compression. Huge, thick aluminum frame with smaller opening and a big heat sink . But---it weighs 6# more than a Kappalite. Maybe only 4# less than a ceramic.
12NLW9300.png
 
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#4,057
Mike Arnopol said:
pretty efficient. The 4ohm 4x5 is around 99.5 and the 8 ohm around 97.5. Another advantage--multiple ceramic magnet drivers dissipate heat much better. The worst would be a single neo driver. They tend to go into thermal compression MUCH sooner. Cab designers don't like to talk about thermal compression. It is a HUGELY important subject. Before I knew what it was I'd get so frustrated on gigs wondering why halfway through a set my volume would go down and the low end would get thinner. Now I know it's thermal compression. I'll use neo on mids and tweets---no disadvantage there. But on woofers I only want to use ceramic. Yes they're heavier. My new 45 weighs around 39# and the 46 around 49#. I could save around 7# by using neo. But why save on weight when you would need more cabs to produce the same results? Because by mid-set your volume would start dropping. I love my 12" cabs. But I could clearly see thermal compression with these cabs. The new 45 and a reflex super 12" neo cab would start the set with the same volume limitations. But by mid-set---the 45 would go louder. The mass of the ceramic magnets dissipate much more heat than the little neo magnets on a "super" 12. This was initially pointed out to me by the designer of the Kappalite line!
Click to expand...
Thanks for posting Mike, very useful info. Speakers are not efficient transducers so most of the input power ends up as heat that has to be dissipated. So the combination of thermal mass and ventilation determines how well the design holds off thermal compression under heavy demand.
 
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