ohms, ohms, ohms...

[cdfolds]

so i'm sure this has been beat to death in another forum...but my eyes started hurting trying to look through them and i cant find a search button on here (pardon my ignorance, new here..).
anyway, has anybody figured out ANY way to safely place an additional load on an amp so you can use a cab that doesn't quite match the optimal load of your amp?
for instance, i have an old acoustic 370...which seems to prefer 2 or 4 ohms...it sounds like crap through my 5.3 ohm epifani alone, but when i add another 4 ohm cab to drop the load to 2.6 ohms it sounds GREAT.
but sometimes i would like to run just a single 8 ohm or 5.3 ohm cab on that amp...hmmm.
i do have an svt which i primarily use so i have to have cab combinations to keep its load between 4 and 8 ohms, while also having the same set of cabs be able to do 2 or 4 ohms on my acoustic.
ugh...makes my head hurt. the ideal thing would be to just have a...uh..."thingy" that would just be a 4 ohm load...does that exist? and if it did, would it be safe for the amp?
i have heard tales of these items but have never had a good answer to the question.

 

[Nick Kay]

Why not just use a pair of 4ohm cabs? You can wire up a series box so you can combine both to form an 8ohm load for use with your SVT, or use them in a regular parallel configuration for a 2ohm load with your Acoustic. And, if you don't feel like lugging both, you can use one cab with either head.

EDIT: Hang on, what the hell kind of SVT only does 4 or 8ohm loads? I thought they were all 2 or 4.

 

[anderbass]

Welcome to Talkbass cdfolds...

To search, click on the "Search" word near the top-right of most all TalkBass pages.
(I think the "Google search TalkBass" choice works best for most searches here)

Here's a current thread discussing the merits of your "additional load" question.
http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=386295

As Nick Kay suggested, your (All-tube) 1974-SVT was designed for use only with 2 or 4-ohm cab loads (not 8-ohms).
Being that your Acoustic 370 also performs its best at 2 or 4-ohms, owning one or two 4-ohm cabs would be the normal and probably best choice for use with either of these two amps.

I'll let someone else comment about the safety merits of running your 5.3-ohm Epifani alone with your SVT.
Although when using this amp/cab with an additional 4 or 8-ohm cab, I believe that daisy-chaining the two cabs together, and then connecting to the SVT's (single) 4-ohm output jack would be the safest method for this particular amp.

If you haven't already read these threads, you should find lots of good info in these links:
http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=144244
http://www.google.com/custom?domain...;S:http://www.talkbass.com;LP:1;FORID:1&hl=en
http://www.google.com/custom?hl=en&...0+ohm&btnG=Search&sitesearch=www.talkbass.com
http://www.google.com/custom?hl=en&...ani++&btnG=Search&sitesearch=www.talkbass.com

 

[BillyB_from_LZ]

Peavey makes an impedance matching autotransformer. Don't know that it has 2.6 and 5.3 ohm taps though as those are recent byproducts of the 3x10 cabinet offerings.

The problem with an impedance matching autotransformer is that unless it's huge and heavy, your low end will suffer as a linear transformer needs lots of iron to reproduce low frequencies well (at low distortion, high power, etc.).

Keep in mind that a cabinet's rated impedance is really a nominal value and the actual impedance that the amp sees varies with frequency.

Perhaps your unhappiness with the tone using just the 3x10 is offset by some complimentary frequency response when adding the 4 ohm cabinet that you mentioned. Perhaps when using the 3x10 by itself you need to rethink your EQ settings.

BTW, 5.3 ohms in parallel with 4 ohms is 2.3 ohms, not 2.6 ohms...not that it matters that much.

 

[cdfolds]

man!!! i'm so glad i read some stuff on here...all of these years i've misunderstood about the ohms on my svt...hmmm. and here i call myself a professional bass player!!! could get kicked out of the club.
anyway, thanks for the help, i know what i have to do now....
have a good holiday!!!!!