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fEARful part 13: the bad luck's done, son

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Had about 15 minutes in the bedroom to play through the EAi Amp800 > AoN 15/6/1 combo and was immediately struck by the midrange and high end detail at low volume. It was like hearing my basses for the first time: each has a very definite and totally unique personality that I've never heard before. I'll need some time working out eq settings with each bass at rehearsal before I come to any conclusions. I also plan to use the stereo mini-jack input on the iAmp to play some mp3s through the rig which should be fun and will help me get a handle on the cab and amp's capabilities. I'll try and post pics and register on the fEARful forum soon.
 
Thanks for the detailed review of the TC rh 750. I'd be really happy to hear more about and especially the eq section with the adjustable centers. Any issues with reliability, warranty or customer service? Do you use the foot controller for presets and mute?

My second 15/6/1 is Baltic birch, 11 ply, comes in 5'x5 sheets for $35 a sheet at my local yard. I rarely find even tiny voids when I slice this stuff. With a sharp blade I get nice square edges with almost no tear out, and it routes nicely too. It has a good, full size, void free veneer ply on both sides.

I'm really tempted by the idea of losing my rack, the 22lb GK, and the rack tuner for the 10 lb TC. With the 12/6 cube, the whole rig would be under 50lb. The GK is rock solid but kind of a one trick pony, and it doesn't really get happy at low volumes. The eq and preset memories, plus the tuner, aux in, headphone, and all the other features look pretty sweet.
 
Here's a writeup on my Anchak fEARful 15/6/1 stack.

Last weekend I went and picked up the second 15/6/1 cab that I had Ron Anchak build for me. I had previously brought the other 15/6/1 cab back to his shop so he could test some things out with the pair before I showed up, so we had both cabs to play with at Ron's shop when I stopped by. I brought over both my TC Electronics RH750 and Ampeg SVT-7 Pro to test the rig.

Both the RH750 and the Ampeg sound great through a 15/6/1. They sound different but they are both great. SPL wise, with one cab the RH750 and the Ampeg put out the same SPL.

With both cabs, both amps sounded great. When I had both cabs stacked, playing in front of that was like getting a full body bass massage. Heaven. Best cabs I've ever owned. With the cabs stacked, this is where the difference between the RH750 and the SVT-7 Pro can be seen, headroom wise. At levels of db 123+ the SVT-7 exhibited more headroom than the RH750. The SVT-7 Pro can stay cleaner, louder than the RH750. Even with TubeTone all the way down, with both 15/6/1 cabs and pushing past 120-123db, the RH750 starts to break up. A pleasant breakup, but a breakup nonetheless where the SVT-7 Pro can stay clean at 123 db plus. So if you need loud and clean, use the SVT-7.

In the case of both amps, the fEARful cabs could take more than the amps could give. That being said, with either amp, 1 cab is probably all I will ever need in situations I play. If I did have the need for both fEARfuls, I would default to the SVT-7 because it has more headroom with both cabs.

With all that I concentrated on the SVT-7 Pro and 2 cabs and played around at high SPL levels. It was Saturday morning and the businesses around Ron's shop were empty so we can crank as much as we liked. The whole time I kept quoting famous thesbian Samuel Jackson over and over. The quote rhymed with "Brother Tucker." I kept playing and kept quoting over and over. The SVT-7 Pro with 2 15/6/1 cabs has a set of brass-basket-balls. Fantastic tone and volume for miles. You can take this rig to a Rock / Doom / Metal / X-Core gig and have plenty and then some. The bass is full without boom and the mids are articulate. I roll the highs back normally, but to test I put more treble than I normally use and tested that out. If you like treble, its there. I walk around and the rig sounds as good off axis as it does on.

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For giggles we took it up to some serious volume and then hit the ultra-low button on the SVT-7. The fEARfuls took it without problem. I have to say, Greenboy designs and Ron Anchak builds a mighty fine cab. Great Lows, Mids, and Highs with off axis definition that sounds fantastic. This will be the last set up big rig cabs I will ever need. I will probably put this on the rig of doom and the big cab threads on Talkbass. This rig definitely qualifies. You can definitely feed the 2 15/6/1 fEARfuls more than the 1000w at 4 ohms that SVT-7 Pro puts out, but I think most people would be happy with what they get with this combination.

I spoke with Ron Anchak a couple of days ago and he mentioned this trial that you did with the Ampeg SVT7 and 15/6/1. He seemed most impressed by this particular setup than any other.

Has anybody had experience putting a "little" MarkBass Little Mark Tube 800 or Genz Benz Streamliner 900 through (1 or 2) of the 15/6/1 or (2)? Do they have what it takes to push this beast of a cab at 8 or 4 ohms?
 
Has anybody had experience putting a "little" MarkBass Little Mark Tube 800 or Genz Benz Streamliner 900 through (1 or 2) of the 15/6/1 or (2)? Do they have what it takes to push this beast of a cab at 8 or 4 ohms?

I've posted before (in this thread, in fact).
GB SL 900 through a 15/6/1, and it kicks wooly arse.
 
I spoke with Ron Anchak a couple of days ago and he mentioned this trial that you did with the Ampeg SVT7 and 15/6/1. He seemed most impressed by this particular setup than any other.

Has anybody had experience putting a "little" MarkBass Little Mark Tube 800 or Genz Benz Streamliner 900 through (1 or 2) of the 15/6/1 or (2)? Do they have what it takes to push this beast of a cab at 8 or 4 ohms?

I just looked at the Little mark website and it says it puts out 500 watts at 8 ohms and 800 watts at 4 ohms.

The GB site says that the streamliner 900 puts out 500 watts at 8 ohms and 900 watts at 4 ohms.

The Ampeg SVT-7 Pro puts out 600 watts at 8 ohms and 1000 watts at 4 ohms. With both 1 and 2 15/6/1 cabs the Ampeg could get loud and the cabs still had more to take if the amp would give it.

The amps are in the same ballpark so I would say that on paper the two amps you are asking above could probably get loud enough for most people, but the fEARful cabs would be able to take keep taking more than those amps give.

I don't have any experience with those amps so I am speculating.

I think to push the 15/6/1 fEARfuls to their limits right now it requires a separate pre-amp with a power amp, or one of the high-power integrated amps like the Carvin BX1500 or something like that.
 
Would you miss the tweeter if you had a 15/6?

My RH750 rolls off more highs than my Ampeg SVT-7 so I would miss it more with the Ampeg than the RH750. I like to roll back the highs a bit so in normal cases I wouldn't miss the tweet that much. However I went ahead and got the tweet as I was already in for a pound and adding later would be more difficult than having it put in the first place. If you later wanted to use a cab later for synth/keyboards, a drum machine, or as a PA you would definitely need the tweet.

I would suggest if money is not an issue, get the tweet.
 
My RH750 rolls off more highs than my Ampeg SVT-7 so I would miss it more with the Ampeg than the RH750. I like to roll back the highs a bit so in normal cases I wouldn't miss the tweet that much. However I went ahead and got the tweet as I was already in for a pound and adding later would be more difficult than having it put in the first place. If you later wanted to use a cab later for synth/keyboards, a drum machine, or as a PA you would definitely need the tweet.

I would suggest if money is not an issue, get the tweet.

Just curious - is that with the TweeterTone set flat/noon? Because I a/b'ed my RH750 with my Ashdown MK-500 yesterday (thru a Barefaced Big Twin T) and found the RH750 brighter up top than the MK-500. That was with the TT opened up almost all the way, but also with a healthy amount of treble EQed in on the Ashdown, as well as Harmonic Emphasis about half way up.
 
Just curious - is that with the TweeterTone set flat/noon? Because I a/b'ed my RH750 with my Ashdown MK-500 yesterday (thru a Barefaced Big Twin T) and found the RH750 brighter up top than the MK-500. That was with the TT opened up almost all the way, but also with a healthy amount of treble EQed in on the Ashdown, as well as Harmonic Emphasis about half way up.

I should have said RH750 rolls off more highs than the Ampeg SVT-7 with both amps dials set at noon. I think that the tweeter tone was at the default, which I think is noon. I'm not a big 'high' fan so I tend to roll off anyway.

On the RH750 I will keep treble at the default. On the Ampeg, I roll back the treble to about 10:00-10:30 or so and still have plenty of highs for my taste.
 
Would you miss the tweeter if you had a 15/6?

I have some hearing loss below 40hz and I've always relied on the upper harmonics and sizzly tweeters to identify notes. So, I'm one of those guys who can't stand cabs w/out a tweet, but the fEarful is a totally different beast. There is just so much detail happening above where the woofer rolls off that I'm guessing that even I would be satisfied with a 15/6. Caveat - I've only had a few moments with my new 15/6/1 so I'm no expert.
 
Would you miss the tweeter if you had a 15/6?

I could live without it, but I like having it, especially in my funk band when I slap. I like that bit of crispy.
If I were playing only fingerstyle, I wouldn't miss it at all.

However I went ahead and got the tweet as I was already in for a pound and adding later would be more difficult than having it put in the first place.
This was it for me as well.
 
You really don't need a HF section for a lot of slap tones. Having a HF section opens it up for acoustic basses and guitars, and keys, and drums etc.

One way is to go with the exceptionally afforbale waveguide and plug it, and then add the compression driver and extra crossover bits later if you find you need more stuff beyond 6.5K Hz.
 
I run the horns off the GK's high side, with a second speakon cable, on it's own input. They don't interact with the crossover at all. 5K and up, 50 watts to one, 75 to two.

It's a good set up for doing controlled comparisons of horn and no horn, with the control on the amp head. If I switch amps I'll need to install the extra high pass. At that point I would really want a tweeter control. Either on the cabs or hopefully the TC's tweeter control would play nice with horns.

The results: the horns are nice to have, but you could easily live without them. For that meat and potatoes bass sound, I don't use much horn. If you are dialing in the modern hi fi, or upright, or drums, keys, vocals in a PA use you'll like it.

They don't add much cost or labor to the project. I cut it with a hole saw and seal the edges with gasket material, four t nuts and pan head machine screws. It took me maybe half an hour, and that's because the shop is a mess.

It would be really messy to add it after the cab is full of batting, especially with the top glued on, but with a shop vac you could keep the saw dust out of everything.

I didn't do a horn on the 12/6 to reduce the weight and keep the costs down to bare bones. I don't miss it. Even with the inexpensive Alpha 6 mid, the 12/6 cube has plenty of highs.

Thanks for the detailed discussion of the TC!
 
Re: those pics of the prototype 8" cabs:

Very intriguing. Want.

I'll check back in a few months to see what's going on with these.

Very nice work as usual, greenboy. I absolutely love my Berg AE212 but would some day like to get a fEARful or one of your new designs just because I think what you and Duke and some others here are doing for the bass community is so freakin' cool. Kudos!!
 
I'm confused about the 6ND410 vs the 6NM410. They are supposed to be a bit different. If I use the appropriate crossover, will the result sound the same either way?

If I can get a hold of a 6ND410 for a good price, is that a better (or worse) option than the newer driver, or are they really equivalent?
 
Hi guys-

I noticed some distortion at higher volumes and so I opened the first of the two cabinets back up to go over everything and tighten up some loose wire. I think the mid wire coming down from the top of the cabinet to the crossover was vibrating against the 15" cone.

The best advice I can give anyone building one of these is to make sure everything, and I mean EVERYTHING inside the box is securely fastened!

The vibration issues are now essentially gone, but have any of you guys run into woofer distortion on a specific note? I'm getting buzz when I play the low "D" (NOTE - low "B"s are perfectly clear). Could it be a wire or lead that I missed?

Lonnybass
 
Hmmm, air leak is a distinct possibility, also resonance from the handle or grille. Put your hand on the grille if you've got one and make sure it's not buzzing, do the handles, etc.

Air leak is easy to find--get your hand wet, run a sine wave of the low D through your amp with a laptop, and feel around for air flow.
 
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