Low Down Sound Cab Club started!

[lomo]

I am also eager to believe, but having trouble wrapping my head around the idea that a particular 15-6 box, if goosed with enough flowing electrons, can get as loud as my ShuttleMax 12 and Epi 310-210 stack with around 900 watts into it. I grock the concept of longer Xmax and all that, but it's still difficult to accept. Is this really the case? If so I am ready to rethink my setup.......yet again.......

 

[rpsands]

I am also eager to believe, but having trouble wrapping my head around the idea that a particular 15-6 box, if goosed with enough flowing electrons, can get as loud as my ShuttleMax 12 and Epi 310-210 stack with around 900 watts into it. I grock the concept of longer Xmax and all that, but it's still difficult to accept. Is this really the case? If so I am ready to rethink my setup.......yet again.......

There are a lot of variables, but if you use appropriate amplification (at least 500w @ 8 ohms), it will get within a ballpark of 3db throughout the bass spectrum.

The Epis will be louder up top, but only on-axis. Off-axis, the 6" driver will go up to 2500hz without a significant drop in volume, whereas the Epi cabs will drop off starting at 1000hz or less.

In most club environments, the apparent volume to people off-stage will be close to equivalent.

 

[greenboy]

I will give you guys the benefit of the doubt that you are right and I am WRONG.

What your saying above on it's own would lead me to believe that a fEarful 15/6 is going to get to the same volume as two Epifani UL310s; that is a mighty task. I've played two UL310s and I have a very hard time believing this as fact. If you've ever played this rig you would probably understand my scepticism. Now let's take the fEarful 1212/6 and compare that to two Bergantino HS410 cabinets again I have a hard time believing that it gets that loud. I could be wrong I don't claim to know everything.

I have no doubt these cabs get really loud especially considering their form factor it's just very hard for me to believe they really get that loud.

If I am dead wrong and this is absolutely the case why is it that the fEarful design isn't being copied by all the big manufacturers? It's 4 times lighter then my specific examples, as loud according to greenboy and rpsands and less then half the size; not to mention it's about a quarter of the price.

Don't get me wrong if the 15/6 could grind in the mids and Ken could confirm this I would have called Don already. I don't need that kind of volume it's just very hard to grasp the claims and I'm not an EE type who likes reading graphs.

Frankly, if you aren't able to believe - and don't suss anything the slightest bit technical like excursion/mechanical-limited power handling, Theile-Small parameters like Vd or Xmax - then don't. You won't be the first to say you've read a fEarful thread who still hasn't assimilated the key points.

The mainstream manufacturers (many of whom are somehow considered boutique) seem to count on this. They can go on selling things that look an awful lot like that which went before. It involves minimal R&D and technical understanding, and after all, we all can enjoy playing through just about anything that makes our basses sound louder anyway. I am no exception in that regard.

The majority of companies do what most people are comfortable with. They don't want to have to cut deals for premium drivers with Eminence or whomever. They don't want to have to learn how to design effective crossovers. Most of them just want to stuff boxes and enjoy simpler builds and higher profit margins. Many really aren't equipped for the more demanding process unless they have experience in Sound Reinforcement. Nor apparently do they have the disposition to truly do it well unless the market demand itself makes them.

On the other hand, Duke LeJeune of AudioKinesis, and Alex Claber of Barefaced Bass, each are pursuing such designs based on high-displacment woofers and better off-axis representation. I also notice that a lot of other would-be designers who don't really understand a lot of this are nevertheless also trying to do designs that bear at least some surface resemblance. Maybe some will actually research deeper, in time - if the marketplace ever demands that via consumers who are canny and familiarized enough to evaluate how competitive various designs are.

We'll see. It's a bitty marketplace in the grand scheme of things, one which moves quite slowly and has seen poor implementations of this before, and doesn't especially value new-fangled things (even if those newfangled things have been around for many decades in other sectors). But a few people do seem to want something to expand in these directions, and with that, I am content.

For the sake of guys like Alex and Duke though, I hope people will investigate a little deeper. Maybe some will find that the tonal profile and impact and better dispersion at either low or high SPL is more what they desire for a lot of their circumstances.

There's room maybe, for this.

 

[peterpalmieri]

Hey Ryan! You are going to be VERY happy. Here's a few pictures (one with Don and the cab, one with the cover off so you can see the driver, and one with the Markbass F500 on top). The clip was made using my Sadowsky Vintage with Sadowsky singles and well worn in Sadowsky Blue Label steels.

This cab is a wonderful combination (to my ear) of old school and modern articulation.

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]

Here it is.....

 

[rpsands]

Best advice I can give to anyone thinking about the high xmax/mid driver combo:

TRY ONE!

Find a talkbasser who has one in your area and check it out. Anyone who posts regularly is more than welcome to come check mine out. Or you can come see me level the Sail Inn on Monday here in Phoenix

My last cab was a Schroeder 21012R, which is dwarfed in real output by my 15/6 (because I add some bass, which drastically limited the output of the 21012R). Remember that the cabinet is only as loud as its weakest link in the FR spectrum; if you crank up and get super loud in the mids, but you can't play your open E at that volume because it distorts, your cab is not really that loud.

 

[rpsands]

The single 3015 cab is great, and I would recommend it to a lot of people based on their tonal needs. It's craaaazy portable.

But remember midrange dispersion. The 3015 will fill a room with mids better than any 4x10 cab, but it's still limited by the whole pistonic speaker shenanigans: It loses intelligibility rapidly above 1200hz.

 

[BurningSkies]

I also use my rig for reggae - well dub actually and my fEarful style LDS 15/6 is perfect. People that don't really play dub (or even reggae for that matter) just think that you can crank the bass on your amp, turn the rest of the EQ down and you have the right tone.

The reality is that it isn't just bass that you want for dub, but big, round, deep and CLEAN bass. Muddy and boomy bass is NOT what you want. The 15/6 is ideal for me and the Puma 1000 is a great match.

This rig is also phenomenal for my clean fretless. My fretless Stammie sounds a lot like a Thumb and to a lesser extent a Spector fretless so I love getting all the detail from that dry and growly tone.

But I'm really happy at how well it voices effects. Being an effects junkie (overdrive, fuzz, filters, phasers, flangers, LPFs, octavers, delay, tremolo etc) they all come through so well.

If I was playing hard rock, this rig wouldn't be my first choice. I'd likely opt for an Aguilar 751 and Aggie cabs or a GK rig if I wanted solid state growl. And it certainly wouldn't be my choice for a trebly pick punk setup. But for everything I currently play it's exactly what I want.

I've been avoiding posting in this thread because my cab isn't a LDS cab...

While lots of guys who play reggae do roll off everything above about 100hz, over the years I've found this not to be effective on stage. More and more I find myself attenuating the highs and high-mid range, but not all the way gone. Otherwise no one will hear any definition and no one can play with that on stage. On a record, you can get a way with it.

I've been carrying some decent sized rooms with my 15/6 lately. One room in particular, I didn't realize how loud I was out front until I heard a board recording and also an audience recording only to find nary a presence of my bass on the board but it loud in the recording out front. I know every one wants a 'big rig killer', but it may not be for everyone. What this cab does is present a lot more low than what you're used to hearing in a cab. Also the mids-uppers range is fuller due to the mid-speaker rather than the hole you get in a woofer/tweeter arrangement. This means a few things...first off, you don't need to feed it exaggerated lows from your amp (saving some of your headroom). Second, you'll hear some of the above the belt content a lot clearer.

I want a rig that's clear and clean and low. That's my trip. I want a full rich sound that doesn't have any distortion and I want to hit my low lows and have them represented accurately. This is as advertised. My bass' speaking voice is different from most of them. The multi-scale length of my instruments makes this possible, why have a rig that can't reproduce it? The fEarful does do it. Yes I'd like more than 300w into 8ohms for this setup. It can take the wattage, so why not have the headroom so I don't hear amp compression on my lows? I'm not hearing mechanical compression anymore...

Forgot to tell you when we were talking, Ken, that when BurningSkies gave me the "bestestest rig I've ever had" thumbs up when he finished his 15/6 (no waveguide) I was especially thrilled because his gig is reggae - with a Dingwall. His first several gigs with it I think were no PA support, and knowing that one cab with a LMII was doing the big roots vibe really underlined how many ways fEarful can roll without losing a wheel in the process.

The cab is a chameleon. It can do bright and punchy but it also has this ridiculous extended low range that I've never experienced in a cab. You don't have to EQ the lows into a cab, and once you play it, you feel like "ah, this is what I've been missing". I think its loud too. Are you playing in a metal band with 64564 marshall stacks? You might want two and a big power set up. I've been working with my LMII, and it's been plenty loud, but that won't stop me from looking for more headroom and less amp compression in the near future. And it won't stop me from having a 15.6+15sub in the future, because I'll have what amounts to a REALLY MONSTER rig that can do ANYTHING I ask of it. Besides I've always been of the mind that to have the most accurate clean sound, more speakers + plentiful power= pure tone.

 

[KJung]

I've been avoiding posting in this thread because my cab isn't a LDS cab...

While lots of guys who play reggae do roll off everything above about 100hz, over the years I've found this not to be effective on stage. More and more I find myself attenuating the highs and high-mid range, but not all the way gone. Otherwise no one will hear any definition and no one can play with that on stage. On a record, you can get a way with it.

I've been carrying some decent sized rooms with my 15/6 lately. One room in particular, I didn't realize how loud I was out front until I heard a board recording and also an audience recording only to find nary a presence of my bass on the board but it loud in the recording out front. I know every one wants a 'big rig killer', but it may not be for everyone. What this cab does is present a lot more low than what you're used to hearing in a cab. Also the mids-uppers range is fuller due to the mid-speaker rather than the hole you get in a woofer/tweeter arrangement. This means a few things...first off, you don't need to feed it exaggerated lows from your amp (saving some of your headroom). Second, you'll hear some of the above the belt content a lot clearer.

I want a rig that's clear and clean and low. That's my trip. I want a full rich sound that doesn't have any distortion and I want to hit my low lows and have them represented accurately. This is as advertised. My bass' speaking voice is different from most of them. The multi-scale length of my instruments makes this possible, why have a rig that can't reproduce it? The fEarful does do it. Yes I'd like more than 300w into 8ohms for this setup. It can take the wattage, so why not have the headroom so I don't hear amp compression on my lows? I'm not hearing mechanical compression anymore...



The cab is a chameleon. It can do bright and punchy but it also has this ridiculous extended low range that I've never experienced in a cab. You don't have to EQ the lows into a cab, and once you play it, you feel like "ah, this is what I've been missing". I think its loud too. Are you playing in a metal band with 64564 marshall stacks? You might want two and a big power set up. I've been working with my LMII, and it's been plenty loud, but that won't stop me from looking for more headroom and less amp compression in the near future. And it won't stop me from having a 15.6+15sub in the future, because I'll have what amounts to a REALLY MONSTER rig that can do ANYTHING I ask of it. Besides I've always been of the mind that to have the most accurate clean sound, more speakers + plentiful power= pure tone.

+1 to all the above. This cab configuration really does sound quite different from most everything else that I've played. I gigged MANY nights back in the day with early versions of this basic design (the three way EA VL210 and the Acme B210). Those two cabs were the closest thing to a full range tone coming from a small box a decade ago. These cabs also had that big low end and pure, smooth mid response, but IMO they significantly lacked in two areas:

a) Tuning the cabs so low (down to 33 hz or whatever) that you really had problems with the cabs sounding a bit tubby down low, and also sucking a lot of power to replicate those deep, deep frequencies, and

b) (this is the big one), not having mid drivers that could in ANY way keep up with the big low end of the woofers, which resulted in these cabs sounding a bit unbalanced when pushed in a mix (if you actually wanted to hear anything above 800hz through the mix with your bass).

The low end of these cabs with the Eminence LF drivers is a really beautiful thing, and I can see where the dub guys would go crazy for them... deep, NO compression, no tubbiness, plenty of even upper bass and low mid response, and then that wonderful, natural clean response at the higher mid frequencies for nice note articulation without any grind, distortion or sizzle (unless you want it and include a three way crossover and tweeter). VERY nice. I can also see these cabs (with tweeter) being about as good as a 'modern slapper' could hope for. If you are a slapper with that more 'EMG soapbar' tone goal... super clean, super deep, super accurate... like Mark King or whatever, again this design is amazing... NO compression when you wump the E string, and capability of a studio monitor clean top end to my ear.

Again, though, these cabs are NOT for everyone, and the idea that the typical player with a typical amp head with typical EQ capability can 'make them sound like any other cab' is a little misleading IMO and IME. As I posted above, for some tone goals, that upper mid response coming directly from a more 'typical' woofer/tweeter two way cab can be very cool, and a more attenuated low end and more forceful mid response coming from the drivers (i.e., the 'AE410 type' tuning) can just slot a bass in a mix beautifully in some contexts.

However, for those of you who dig the Acme's and the old EA VL cabs, you would be (IMO) absolutely shocked at how much better these designs (with the LF drivers and 18sound mid) deliver that sort of 'smooth, mellow, even, deep but articulate' three way tone, whether you have LDS execute the design or not.

IMO. Very impressive cabs, and every execution I've played to date (all executed by Don at this point) has been fabulous to my ear!

 

[fretno]

More pics ! I can't decide if I should go 1x10 & 1x8 3way or 1x12 * 1 or 2 8's and tweet for a killer mini ? Duratex , tolex , fur , hmm....

 

[KJung]

More pics ! I can't decide if I should go 1x10 & 1x8 3way or 1x12 * 1 or 2 8's and tweet for a killer mini ? Duratex , tolex , fur , hmm....

See post 632 in this thread for a look (and a clip) of a beautiful 112/6 cab. Depending on your tone goals, it is just a beautiful execution of a full sounding, even, small box IMO, and the look of it is just beautiful with that burgandy tolex. A tweet could easily fit in there to make it three way, although that Faital 6" driver had lots going on up top to my ear.

 

[fretno]

See post 632 in this thread for a look (and a clip) of a beautiful 112/6 cab. Depending on your tone goals, it is just a beautiful execution of a full sounding, even, small box IMO, and the look of it is just beautiful with that burgandy tolex. A tweet could easily fit in there to make it three way, although that Faital 6" driver had lots going on up top to my ear.

That is sweet . What are the specs and dimensions on that cabinet ? Thanks man

 

[KJung]

That is sweet . What are the specs and dimensions on that cabinet ? Thanks man

You'd have to check with Don on the exact stuff. I do remember it is a 3012F with a Faital driver, and it is small and light. Not sure of tuning, crossover, and exact size. Nice box though!

It belongs to TBer 'Deb', so you might want to try a PM for some real world feedback.

 

[deb]

That is sweet . What are the specs and dimensions on that cabinet ? Thanks man

It weighs 36 lbs. 16"(D) x 16" (W) x 24" (H). 8 ohms.

3012LF woofer
Faital W6N8-120 mid-driver
LDS custom cross-over: this is loosely based on Passinwind's cross-over (http://www.talkbass.com/wiki/index.php/Passinwind's_passive_crossovers)

Superb sound. Superb workmanship.

 

[fretno]

Thank you deb !

 

[BB75]

I can finally join the club !! I ordered 2 cabs from Don a few months ago and got 1 of them today ! I spoke with him and he's waiting on one small part before he can send the other cab, he said I should have it on Monday. Anyway, I got a neo 210 cab today and couldn't be any happier. A lot more low end than I expected for a neo 210, very clear and powerful. I can't wait to hook up the matching 115. I'll post pictures on Monday when I get the other cab.

 

[bassplayer7770]

I'll post pictures on Monday when I get the other cab.

Cool!

 

[guy n. cognito]

Im contemplating a 15/6.5/1 order. Anyone have LDS with tweed covering? Id like to see a picture..

 

[neptoon]

i am thinking of contacting don about maybe building an alternative to the markbass NY 604...i tried a few out the other day, and was quite impressed with the sound and size...would work great for carrying onboard a submarine...but i was thinking that our CO2 scrubbers use amine to remove carbon dioxide from the air, and that smell gets into everything and is absolutely horrid after a deployment...the line-x would be a great option for me...i haven't scoured the entire thread, but has anyone else thought of a multi-6 box from lds? it is the size preference of that cab rather than the use of 6" drivers, but it had a great sound...

 

[greenboy]

I'd suggest something small instead using the 8" drivers Don has worked with.

 

[KJung]

i am thinking of contacting don about maybe building an alternative to the markbass NY 604...i tried a few out the other day, and was quite impressed with the sound and size...would work great for carrying onboard a submarine...but i was thinking that our CO2 scrubbers use amine to remove carbon dioxide from the air, and that smell gets into everything and is absolutely horrid after a deployment...the line-x would be a great option for me...i haven't scoured the entire thread, but has anyone else thought of a multi-6 box from lds? it is the size preference of that cab rather than the use of 6" drivers, but it had a great sound...

6" drivers won't do it IMO. Don has a WONDERFUL spec on a very small B&C coax 112. It's basically a 14" cube or so and very light... basically just big enough to cram the 12" coax (with the 'under the dome' mounted tweeter and a rear port). Very small, very lightweight, but still full sounding and even. TBer Vision actually has that cab now... you might want to PM him for his impressions.

Also, the little Genz Shuttle 3.0/110 combo is small and reasonably good sounding for very small venues and lower volume... nice small rig. They make a 1x8 version of that combo also, which is really small, but not good for much more than practice at home IMO.

Finally, there is the classic GK MB112.. the very, very small metal box combo. It is quite midrange voiced, but warm and full and surprisingly loud. That might be the smallest option that still sounds good, and would be very small and 'all in one'.

IMO and FYI!