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NEW Acoustic 360/361
- Thread starter goat1927
- Start date
The 408 cab was indeed loud loud loud loud. But also heavy heavy heavy heavy. For my money, I liked the 456 cab, which had two front-facing 15's and a center port. It was merely loud loud loud and heavy heavy heavy. 
Or better yet. Lets set a weight/size limit. Bring as much rig as you can with in those limitations, and go from there. Say a 75 pound total weight limit, and then 100, and then 150 pounds...
MMM...mmm.. Read the topic title.. This is is an Acoustic 361..New Acoustic 361 thread..you guys came in @ page 12....debating about a 408...Next thing... I am jousting with you and CL400 Peavey..while the rest of the crowd just watches..[ THANKS GUYS]...LOL...
I toughened my skin jousting on the DB threads, so no one ever ruffles my feathers any more..you guys are 'light weights' compared to throwing stones at that 'hornets nest'..LOL..
Anyhow..as long as the mods don't object, we can discuss the nuances between using a wet fly VS a nymph...Bamboo rods VS carbon-graphite composite rods.
I toughened my skin jousting on the DB threads, so no one ever ruffles my feathers any more..you guys are 'light weights' compared to throwing stones at that 'hornets nest'..LOL..
Anyhow..as long as the mods don't object, we can discuss the nuances between using a wet fly VS a nymph...Bamboo rods VS carbon-graphite composite rods.
But, bamboo is an easily renewable resource so may be they should come back as the new, E-friendly rods?
Bamboo is carbon
"We are billion year old carbon"
Per volume, weight, cost, reliability, ... modern speaker design do win out. Go to your average concert and FOH is smaller but louder than ever.
"We are billion year old carbon"
Per volume, weight, cost, reliability, ... modern speaker design do win out. Go to your average concert and FOH is smaller but louder than ever.
GOOD..Now we've returned to more fun.. ....RELIEF.
And Bamgoo is EASY to grow..may become a problem as it grows from deep runners.
If you don't have Pandas in your Zoos, like Atlanta does, bamboo may be a viriulent pest.
Although I am in favor of producing more bamboo fly rods..especially if price comes own, due to quantity, basesd on availability of bamboo.
I still say folded horns rule.....So, can someone make a lightweight cab from strands of babmboo sections?
I can't imagine George/ Vetchking reading this and not getting a kick out of it..
GEORGE ..YOU MAY BE BANNED BUT THIS STILL YOUR FAULT!
OK..So how many of you believe your bass heads will be fully functional after 40 years? My 370 is.
And Bamgoo is EASY to grow..may become a problem as it grows from deep runners.
If you don't have Pandas in your Zoos, like Atlanta does, bamboo may be a viriulent pest.
Although I am in favor of producing more bamboo fly rods..especially if price comes own, due to quantity, basesd on availability of bamboo.
I still say folded horns rule.....So, can someone make a lightweight cab from strands of babmboo sections?
I can't imagine George/ Vetchking reading this and not getting a kick out of it..
GEORGE ..YOU MAY BE BANNED BUT THIS STILL YOUR FAULT!
OK..So how many of you believe your bass heads will be fully functional after 40 years? My 370 is.
We do, actually. Please keep it on topic, NEW Acoustic 360/361. There is nothing about 'shootout' in the title. Thanks.
Fair enough, Thor...
I only wish George and his Acoustic USA the best..He has worked so passionately and against all odds.. Years to develop..and pass UL, followed by declining economy and kick in the teeth that a company with no real dog in the fight..bought rights to the name....just before he could release his product out the door.
Expensive?? YES....high sales?? fingers crossed for George and company.. Only time will tell.
See y'all tomorrow... LATER..Z...
I only wish George and his Acoustic USA the best..He has worked so passionately and against all odds.. Years to develop..and pass UL, followed by declining economy and kick in the teeth that a company with no real dog in the fight..bought rights to the name....just before he could release his product out the door.
Expensive?? YES....high sales?? fingers crossed for George and company.. Only time will tell.
See y'all tomorrow... LATER..Z...
Ah, bench racing! That's always fun and I'm game! Since I'm an Acoustic fan, I'd like to join zon's team in this matter. I bring the following to the table: 320, 408, and 301 (all in stock condition).
As for the rules, I suggest not taking this too seriously -- we're just having fun. Also if we use drag racing (bracket racing) as a model, we might consider introducing some handicap to make the game more fair if deemed necessary.
As for the 301, something that's often forgotten today (which is cool -- after all it's been 35+ years since w-bins were all the rage...) is that all practical bass horn systems (something you can load in a car) are modular, where each speaker is a fraction of the full design target. The numbers of speakers/modules needed in a particular application depends on the number of nearby boundaries, which, by means of reflection, act as mirror sources (or "virtual speakers") contributing to the compound horn. Hence, not only the total SPL, but also the system cutoff frequency and the pass band ripple, depends on the number of modules and boundaries at work.
Often w-bins are designed as 1/8 horns, i.e. 8 modules are needed in free space (a rarely occurring situation of course), 4 are needed in half space (i.e. outdoors or on very large stages), 2 are needed when a wall is nearby (ideally put the horns flush against the wall), and finally only 1 is needed for corner placement. Failure to meet these criteria causes less LF output and more ripple than intended by the designer. As for small w-bins like a 301 they're carefully designed compromises, where the horn path really is too short for full horn loading all the way to 40 Hz no matter what, and the above requirement can be relaxed; we see a "graceful degradation". Hence, in practice 2 bins is ok outdoors, and 1 is ok against a wall. It's not by chance the 371 bass system is designed such that the head delivers full power into two bins (and the 360 pre can drive up to 4 361 active bins, something that was probably considered overkill when designing the successor). Also remember that Jaco always used a pair of 360/361:s. Part of it was surely for redundancy, part was to run the delay, chorus and fuzz stuff, but I have a hunch he also wanted to maximize the fidelity of the system.
Link Removed
My apologies for the lengthy post, but if we're racing outdoors I wish zon and I could bring one 370 and two 301:s. You can bring the most badass of the fEARful cabs (2 x 3015LF plus dual mids, right?) and any power amp you wish. Ok -- or do we need to introduce a handicap? (More to follow, but it's bedtime in the old world now.)
As for the rules, I suggest not taking this too seriously -- we're just having fun. Also if we use drag racing (bracket racing) as a model, we might consider introducing some handicap to make the game more fair if deemed necessary.
As for the 301, something that's often forgotten today (which is cool -- after all it's been 35+ years since w-bins were all the rage...) is that all practical bass horn systems (something you can load in a car) are modular, where each speaker is a fraction of the full design target. The numbers of speakers/modules needed in a particular application depends on the number of nearby boundaries, which, by means of reflection, act as mirror sources (or "virtual speakers") contributing to the compound horn. Hence, not only the total SPL, but also the system cutoff frequency and the pass band ripple, depends on the number of modules and boundaries at work.
Often w-bins are designed as 1/8 horns, i.e. 8 modules are needed in free space (a rarely occurring situation of course), 4 are needed in half space (i.e. outdoors or on very large stages), 2 are needed when a wall is nearby (ideally put the horns flush against the wall), and finally only 1 is needed for corner placement. Failure to meet these criteria causes less LF output and more ripple than intended by the designer. As for small w-bins like a 301 they're carefully designed compromises, where the horn path really is too short for full horn loading all the way to 40 Hz no matter what, and the above requirement can be relaxed; we see a "graceful degradation". Hence, in practice 2 bins is ok outdoors, and 1 is ok against a wall. It's not by chance the 371 bass system is designed such that the head delivers full power into two bins (and the 360 pre can drive up to 4 361 active bins, something that was probably considered overkill when designing the successor). Also remember that Jaco always used a pair of 360/361:s. Part of it was surely for redundancy, part was to run the delay, chorus and fuzz stuff, but I have a hunch he also wanted to maximize the fidelity of the system.
Link Removed
My apologies for the lengthy post, but if we're racing outdoors I wish zon and I could bring one 370 and two 301:s. You can bring the most badass of the fEARful cabs (2 x 3015LF plus dual mids, right?) and any power amp you wish. Ok -- or do we need to introduce a handicap? (More to follow, but it's bedtime in the old world now.)
Gaolee
Official leathers tester and crash dummy
As long as we aren't going to have a shoot-out, how about a comparison to things we already have information about. Here's my take on the new 360m vs. the original 360 vs. a 320 head and 408 cabinet.
Loud? Beats me what any of 'em will do. I have never had to turn any of them up much.
Controls. The original 360 had one volume control knob. Turn it up, it got louder. The power amp was running wide open all the time, since there wasn't even an on/off switch on the 361 cabinet. For tone control, there were five (if I remember right) presets for eq profile, a bass pot and a treble pot. Those simple controls were far more versatile than they should have been. The fuzz circuit on my 360 doesn't work very well, and the electronic tuning fork is something that a cheap tuner surpasses, so I don't use either of them. There is a single channel. The 320 has two channels, a five band eq, bright switches and tone pots on each circuit, and the ability to use both circuits with the eq and tone controls set differently for those channels. It's a little complex, but it is a whole lot of fun once you figure out what all that stuff does. The new 360 preamp is more like the original 360 than the 320 head. The variamp control lets you select a frequency range and then either boost or cut that range. It has tone pots, a "growl" circuit, and a compressor. The big change from the original 360 is that it has a preamp gain and main volume control. The power amp is in the cabinet, but the cabinet now has an on/off switch. There's also a high frequency horn that is switchable.
Cabinet. The original 361 is a w-bin with a single 18. The 408 is a behemouth with four 15s. Two fire at each other in a center slot. The new 361m that I own is a w-bin with a 15. There's also a new 361 with an 18, but the original 360 and the 320/408 were both absolutely overkill, so I figured a new big one would be overkill, too. For most purposes, the new smaller one is overkill, too, but I wanted it and had the money. The big one only costs about $100 more, so if you like overkill, that's the way to go.
Weight. Both old and new 360 preamp heads weigh nothing much. All the weight is in the bottom of the speaker cabinet, which has wheels. The 320 head is a beast. I find the 408 cabinet to be bulky, but fairly easy to move around. Loading any of them into a van is straight forward once you figure out the technique of sliding it in on its back. Both old and new 361s have a wood bar across the front of the cabinet bottom, which makes a fantastic handle for levering them into a vehicle. Stairs are a bear no matter which one you are dealing with. Best to have a roadie if you have to haul any of these up more than a flight of stairs.
Sound. That's subjective, so this is my take. The original has a rich, full sound. It could almost be described as a juicy sound, altough that's not right, since it isn't muddy or soft. I have never managed to make it sound harsh and scratchy like a whole lot of other amps. An Acoustic 370 comes to mind for the scratchier sound that I don't like so much. The 320/408 can sound very much like an original 360, but it can do other things because it has more controls. I think it sounds a little more mechanical than the original 360. I can't tell you what that means, since I don't really have words to describe sound accurately. If you think of the original 360 as a blue-purple sound, then the 320/408 has more red and yellow in it. It's not quite as pure sounding. The new one is dryer sounding than either of the others. It is higher fidelity, meaning that you will hear exactly what you play. Things you could get away with if you were playing through one of the older ones won't slide by through this one. Because it has a high frequency horn, you can get more high mids and overtones. Or you can turn it off and sound almost exactly like an original 360.
I have played shows with all of these and haven't ever had a problem with volume. The old ones never got used with the upright, so I can't say how they would do. The new one makes the upright sound like an upright, only projected all the way to the back of the room. There's a little knob twiddling you have to do to make it work, but that's hardly a surprise. I don't use the growl circuit, since I don't like a distorted sound as well as a clean sound. I don't think it is exactly a fuzz circuit, but then I haven't spent the time to figure out exactly what it does. It boosts volume, so if you want to use it to pop all distorted into the foreground from a clean background role, it would work well for that.
All three of them project. There's not much need for FOH reinforcement. The new 360 preamp has a DI plug in the back. I don't remember whether there's any provision for direct out from the 320, but if there is, it isn't a balanced out. I'm sure there's none on the back of the original. You could use the new 360 as a preamp and di box if you wanted to.
Just so you all know how to interpret my comments, I think the original 360 sounds better than an SVT on a refrigerator, and I have heard them side by side. I can't describe the difference except to say that the SVT has a harsher, flatter sound than the 360. The new 360 has the same full, sweetness if you want it. It also can make what you put in louder, without much coloration. It is a w-bin, so it sounds better in the audience than it does on stage. It is also tolerable to stand in front of at decent volumes, since the sound doesn't seem to really reach full strength until somewhere pretty far in front of the cabinet. That's a characteristic of well made w-bins, no mattter who made them.
I hope this is useful. One last thing - if we are going to bench race, I can offer this: a rig that includes all of the above, plus a pair of 811/812 PA cabinets powered by an Acoustic 400 power amp (two 370 power sections). Each 812 has four front firing 15s. That should be enough horsepower to dim the lights in the next county and set off earthquake warnings somewhere.
Loud? Beats me what any of 'em will do. I have never had to turn any of them up much.
Controls. The original 360 had one volume control knob. Turn it up, it got louder. The power amp was running wide open all the time, since there wasn't even an on/off switch on the 361 cabinet. For tone control, there were five (if I remember right) presets for eq profile, a bass pot and a treble pot. Those simple controls were far more versatile than they should have been. The fuzz circuit on my 360 doesn't work very well, and the electronic tuning fork is something that a cheap tuner surpasses, so I don't use either of them. There is a single channel. The 320 has two channels, a five band eq, bright switches and tone pots on each circuit, and the ability to use both circuits with the eq and tone controls set differently for those channels. It's a little complex, but it is a whole lot of fun once you figure out what all that stuff does. The new 360 preamp is more like the original 360 than the 320 head. The variamp control lets you select a frequency range and then either boost or cut that range. It has tone pots, a "growl" circuit, and a compressor. The big change from the original 360 is that it has a preamp gain and main volume control. The power amp is in the cabinet, but the cabinet now has an on/off switch. There's also a high frequency horn that is switchable.
Cabinet. The original 361 is a w-bin with a single 18. The 408 is a behemouth with four 15s. Two fire at each other in a center slot. The new 361m that I own is a w-bin with a 15. There's also a new 361 with an 18, but the original 360 and the 320/408 were both absolutely overkill, so I figured a new big one would be overkill, too. For most purposes, the new smaller one is overkill, too, but I wanted it and had the money. The big one only costs about $100 more, so if you like overkill, that's the way to go.
Weight. Both old and new 360 preamp heads weigh nothing much. All the weight is in the bottom of the speaker cabinet, which has wheels. The 320 head is a beast. I find the 408 cabinet to be bulky, but fairly easy to move around. Loading any of them into a van is straight forward once you figure out the technique of sliding it in on its back. Both old and new 361s have a wood bar across the front of the cabinet bottom, which makes a fantastic handle for levering them into a vehicle. Stairs are a bear no matter which one you are dealing with. Best to have a roadie if you have to haul any of these up more than a flight of stairs.
Sound. That's subjective, so this is my take. The original has a rich, full sound. It could almost be described as a juicy sound, altough that's not right, since it isn't muddy or soft. I have never managed to make it sound harsh and scratchy like a whole lot of other amps. An Acoustic 370 comes to mind for the scratchier sound that I don't like so much. The 320/408 can sound very much like an original 360, but it can do other things because it has more controls. I think it sounds a little more mechanical than the original 360. I can't tell you what that means, since I don't really have words to describe sound accurately. If you think of the original 360 as a blue-purple sound, then the 320/408 has more red and yellow in it. It's not quite as pure sounding. The new one is dryer sounding than either of the others. It is higher fidelity, meaning that you will hear exactly what you play. Things you could get away with if you were playing through one of the older ones won't slide by through this one. Because it has a high frequency horn, you can get more high mids and overtones. Or you can turn it off and sound almost exactly like an original 360.
I have played shows with all of these and haven't ever had a problem with volume. The old ones never got used with the upright, so I can't say how they would do. The new one makes the upright sound like an upright, only projected all the way to the back of the room. There's a little knob twiddling you have to do to make it work, but that's hardly a surprise. I don't use the growl circuit, since I don't like a distorted sound as well as a clean sound. I don't think it is exactly a fuzz circuit, but then I haven't spent the time to figure out exactly what it does. It boosts volume, so if you want to use it to pop all distorted into the foreground from a clean background role, it would work well for that.
All three of them project. There's not much need for FOH reinforcement. The new 360 preamp has a DI plug in the back. I don't remember whether there's any provision for direct out from the 320, but if there is, it isn't a balanced out. I'm sure there's none on the back of the original. You could use the new 360 as a preamp and di box if you wanted to.
Just so you all know how to interpret my comments, I think the original 360 sounds better than an SVT on a refrigerator, and I have heard them side by side. I can't describe the difference except to say that the SVT has a harsher, flatter sound than the 360. The new 360 has the same full, sweetness if you want it. It also can make what you put in louder, without much coloration. It is a w-bin, so it sounds better in the audience than it does on stage. It is also tolerable to stand in front of at decent volumes, since the sound doesn't seem to really reach full strength until somewhere pretty far in front of the cabinet. That's a characteristic of well made w-bins, no mattter who made them.
I hope this is useful. One last thing - if we are going to bench race, I can offer this: a rig that includes all of the above, plus a pair of 811/812 PA cabinets powered by an Acoustic 400 power amp (two 370 power sections). Each 812 has four front firing 15s. That should be enough horsepower to dim the lights in the next county and set off earthquake warnings somewhere.
Mea culpa! Obviously I missed this post. I hope my above post was informative anyway. (It probably doesn't hurt to do a little napkin calculations either, to compare old vs new. No more challenges, though.
)
ifh...
Better late than never!! ...Thanks bro!!
I am original owner of 1974 370 head..never owned a 301, but my old Sunn cab is tone heaven.
I own (2) GC Acoustic b-200 rigs.. better suited for smaller gigs..DI for house support. I like them just fine. Again..other than name and color scheme..no way connected with either vintage or NEW Acoustic.
Again wishing Vetchking and Acoustic U S A the best..he's offering us his best, so...
Better late than never!! ...Thanks bro!!
I am original owner of 1974 370 head..never owned a 301, but my old Sunn cab is tone heaven.
I own (2) GC Acoustic b-200 rigs.. better suited for smaller gigs..DI for house support. I like them just fine. Again..other than name and color scheme..no way connected with either vintage or NEW Acoustic.
Again wishing Vetchking and Acoustic U S A the best..he's offering us his best, so...
Mea culpa! Obviously I missed this post. I hope my above post was informative anyway. (It probably doesn't hurt to do a little napkin calculations either, to compare old vs new. No more challenges, though.
Lol. You left enough meat on the bone to satisfy an owner of a 320 and and of an original 146 (140 +106) 2x15 rig.
Naw, it doesn't fit in my car anymore. Seems like the cars got smaller over the years. It still weighs in at 135 lbs. My ability to lift 135 lbs is non-existent. Why do I keep it? It's got that wooly sound you rarely hear anywhere else.
And gaolee, many comments well taken. Some years back Harvey Gertz (or was it Russ Alle?) posted on here a comment about the design philosophy of the 360. It was intended to be used to provide bass amplification in live arenas and stadiums (especially when used in multiples) at a time when commercially available FOH systems used in those were venues were not capable of delivering the sound reinforcement needed.
Those were big performance requirements, and though many trade-offs were made, the ongoing love affair that many bassists have with the vintage Acoustic gear attests to the excellence of the solutions they delivered.
Lest we forget, this was a time when computer modelling of cabs was unheard of, Thiele and Small had not calculated and published their mathamatical formulas and the IBM mainframe computer took up a city block and had as much computing power as your cheapo calculator of today.
Yet, under these medieval conditions, amps and cabs are produced by guys with slide rules and and an intuitive knack for jackleg engineering. That alone is an impressive feat and worthy of our respect. The corollary is that there were a lot of designs from that era that failed miserably in the performance area.
Mrs. ThunderGod personally saw The Beatles in Shea Stadium and has averred that no one there could hear a darn thing. Now if they had had Acoustic instead of Vox... the memories might be different.
Agreed, THOR...
My first rock show was Beatles Atlanta Stadium.
Barely heard any music..mostyly screams from the crowd..a little song introduction..a little music..NEXT and NEXT.. 20 minutes later..HISTORY.
Would have been a major WIN fr original ACC..only a few years too late.
On my side of town, no one had nor used VOX. Fir us poor kids it wasSears Silvertone. Fender and Kustom.
Yeppp..My first real bass amp..still own it.. was Kustom B200. Probabaly looked rightat ACC 361..and never saw it...All I wanted was that T-N-R bass rig. Still works fine, like my 370.
Again kudos to gaolee and Ifh...
My first rock show was Beatles Atlanta Stadium.
Barely heard any music..mostyly screams from the crowd..a little song introduction..a little music..NEXT and NEXT.. 20 minutes later..HISTORY.
Would have been a major WIN fr original ACC..only a few years too late.
On my side of town, no one had nor used VOX. Fir us poor kids it wasSears Silvertone. Fender and Kustom.
Yeppp..My first real bass amp..still own it.. was Kustom B200. Probabaly looked rightat ACC 361..and never saw it...All I wanted was that T-N-R bass rig. Still works fine, like my 370.
Again kudos to gaolee and Ifh...
Gaolee
Official leathers tester and crash dummy
You just need a van. It hauls everything and keeps it dry. It's also doing its part to turn Seattle into a tropical paradise and make sure all the oil under the Arabian Penninsula is turned into vapor. So there's some tradeoffs. Kinda like bass amps.
I had some ACC gear back in the day and I would have made the same testimonial about my 220 stack.
I have no doubt that this is a good amp. Actually I do have some doubt and would like to remedy that by playing one.
I have no doubt that this is a good amp. Actually I do have some doubt and would like to remedy that by playing one.
Gaolee
Official leathers tester and crash dummy
Tuck 'n' Roll. I really want to upholster the refrigerator in the basement to look like a Kustom amp, with aqua sparkle naugahyde TNR, but unfortunately my wife has good taste and has told me that being a lowlife only goes so far.
