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Eminence kappa pro lf2 15 replacement for ampeg pf115 he ???
- Thread starter BASSIST73533
- Start date
Stock 15 farts. Hoping to improve low end and better power handling capability. Goal is bigger better sound from compact rig. Btw, I'm using th pf800 amp.
No matter what you stick in it, it is going to fart out after you turn it up to 200-250w worth of power. The 400w power handling rating is how much it takes to make the speaker blow, not how much it takes before it farts out. That's a heavy duty cab with a heavy duty 15" in it, and the power handling is about as good as it gets in a 115. It's just a small cab and that's all there is to it. Any commercially available 15" you stick in it won't improve power handling by much at all. A neo will help you eke out a tiny bit more at best, but not enough to make much of a difference. My advice would be to live within its limitations or get another if it's not enough. No matter what 115 you get, that'll be the story.
And BasturdBlaster is correct about the Eminence LF designated speakers. They are designed for subs, not as standalone bass cab speakers.
What amp are you driving it with?
How much are you cranking the amp and what EQ settings are you typically using when it farts?
How much are you cranking the amp and what EQ settings are you typically using when it farts?
Not that simple, promise. You have been given some good responses and solid advice. I think you need a different cab design. This one wasn't designed for what you want to do. Its just not your flavor. It happens. If you're wanting to stick with Ampeg, I agree whatever cab you shop for should have an HLF somewhere in the model number.
And on the subject of three letter combinations of interest, you might want to read about HPF's too. There is a wiki and a mega thread about them here on the forum.
And on the subject of three letter combinations of interest, you might want to read about HPF's too. There is a wiki and a mega thread about them here on the forum.
Basically this. You can eke out a BIT more low end by porting the cab with the stock speaker, that IS documented in a thread somewhere. TBH, getting more performance with another speaker is doable, but there's an art to it and it takes a bit of reading. Like, I'm going through a text on acoustic engineering by a guy named Olson (or maybe it was Olsen), it's 700 pages, and that's considered introductory. Granted, you don't need to take an academic approach to learn some basics.
In a nutshell, the thing that's hard about it is that the box is actually tuned to the speakers that are inside of it to give an overall performance that the designers of this stuff would want. This involves weighing out a lot of compromises. If you're just adding in a new speaker that isn't designed to go into that box, it can be hard to know without a bit of homework how the thing would perform in terms of power handling and low-end, and may even perform worse - which would kinda suck to find out AFTER spending a hundred bucks on something.
I really don't want to discourage a guy from going DIY at all, but DIY in many instances can involve a learning curve. If you want to do this homework, if you think you can make do with "just a little bit more" you could absolutely port the cab and use the stock speaker just like in that one thread. If you want to go ahead and tune the cab for a new speaker, that's fine too if you can work it out - though to be honest it'd be simpler on the design side to actually start designing a new cab from scratch, and from there there are designs like the fEARful or the BFM simplexx designs that you could go with as well that could save you some time and homerwork. If you REALLY want to stick with this cab, though, just do a bit of homework and ask yourself whether it's worth it to potentially harm the resale value by modifying it.
I know the guy who did it and he liked it. He just bought two typical Ampeg ports and started cutting in the back and left in the stock speaker. Will probably get some extra low end out of it. But there's a tradeoff for it, and that's lower sensitivity, and that'll be the case no matter what speaker you put in it.
Jim Carr
Dr. Jim
- Jan 21, 2006
- 16,223
- 7,613
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- Disclosures
- fEARful Kool-Aid dispensing liberal academic card-carrying union member Musicians Local 72-147
There are plenty of cabinets that easily out perform your cabinet, using the Eminence Kappalite 3015LF, which I think is the driver you are contemplating. However, such cabinets are larger than yours, have a mid-driver/crossover, and are so loud they might just kick your Ampeg cabinet down the stairs for fun—OK that last part is a joke, mostly.
