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GK MB500 problems

#23
MuthaFunk said:
That Eden would Kill and unless there's something wrong with it, it wouldn't ever shut down on you. The Class AB amps with standard power supplies are a little more robust when it comes to supply power from the clubs. IME.
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But would it overkill? Being that it would give off 100 watts more than the cab is designed to handle? (Would I just not be able to crank it?
 
#24
That 1000w power rating is kinda bogus anyway. The excursion limits of the drivers would likely be hit at a much lower power output from the amp.

Still having extra clean headroom on tap from an amp is a better situation for the drivers than an amp that is not powerfull enough and driven into clipping to get the appropriate volume.

Overkill? Not at all. I use a Markbass LMTube 800 with a Bergantino AE410 and the extra power it provides just sounds so much more controlled and authorative at loud volumes compared to sayyyy my Markbass F500.
 
#27
I have had a similar experience with my head. But in my case i could not switch it on again for the rest of the gig. No fun. When i came home it worked just fine. Im never going to trust that amp again.
 
#34
GroovinOnFunk said:
Last night at my gig, my MB(2)500 kept restarting on me. I had my Roscoe with Aguilar pre going into it. I had the -15db pad pressed and everything. The amp was going into a 4 ohm avatar 410 cab.
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the aguilar pre-amp - is it the tone hammer pre/di? i believe the "ags" side adds +15db, this plus your active pre on your bass - you may have been pushing it harder than you think, even with the pad on the amp engaged. with the setup you were using, you were EQ'ing your signal 3 times before anything even made it to the cab. depending on your settings you could probably easily overload the amp to fault.

this, plus possible faulty/crappy power and all this talk about the avatar cab...

2 cents
 
#36
Sorry for this mega-bump, but this was the first thread I found regarding my problem. I thought it would be a good idea to have this previous discussion handy when discussing my problems.

Long story short, my original MB2-500 did shut down and come back on, just like originally described in this thread. Contacted GK and got a fair deal on a new MB500 (without the 2), and everything seemed fine.

However, this thing has been doing the same thing as well. Not as often, and I'm yet to reproduce it myself, but my friend borrowed it in a band I play guitar in, and then it happened. He had a Jazz bass straight in, no clipping, no extreme volume. Settings were "nomal", as in no excessive bass eq and no excessive contour, as were described in this thread as potential causes. The amp was not running hot at all, and the limiter was off.

The cabs were two 1x12 EBS Neo's, rated at 300 W each, 4 ohm total load on the head. How exactly can I know if these cabs "drop below 4 ohms", as suggested above? Also, can a bass in itself cause the unit to do a safety shutdown, e.g. a broken signal? What else?

As a curiosity, my own setup would seem to be a lot more prone to problems, but I never had any with this updated head. It includes a Music Man SUB, a VT Bass and sometimes a Bass Muff PI and a cheap Hughes & Kettner distortion pedal, all of these on a very DIY pedalboard.
 
#37
I've re-read the thread and it may be that there is a connection problem in your cabinet(s). The head will shut down, as a safeguard, if something is wrong with the cab (in my case, the 15" became disconnected). Can you try your head with someone else's cab or just try one cab at a time and see if it happens again?
 
#38
eriky4003 said:
I've re-read the thread and it may be that there is a connection problem in your cabinet(s). The head will shut down, as a safeguard, if something is wrong with the cab (in my case, the 15" became disconnected). Can you try your head with someone else's cab or just try one cab at a time and see if it happens again?
Click to expand...

I suppose I could try playing with only one cab at practices to find out which one is causing problems. The problem would be, as said, that I haven't been able to get the amp to shut down myself. :/

Don't have many gigs right now, luckily. Wouldn't want to use this stack live.
 
#39
If you can't get the amp to go down by itself (ie. without any speakers connected), I'd say the amps probably fine and it was something else. Play each cabinet individually. Then, try them collectively, if nothing happens you are good to go. At higher volumes, you may want to put on your limiter (as advised in the manual). Good luck!
 

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