Old Ampeg cab question. Model B42X?

[Brendan]

Old Ampeg cab is sitting in a local pawn shop. B42X model number. Google is no help whatsoever. 8 Ohms, 4x12 make; I'm not sure if it's a bass cab, guitar cab, or what. It's frickin' huge, so it might be a bass cab, but I just don't know. Looks like, 60s old.

Any help identifying this cab, and how much it'd be worth?

 

[Brendan]

Seriously...not one person has any clue about this cab?

 

[Brendan]

I hate you all more than I hate learning and church.

 

[Sean S]

Don't know anything about it, but if it's not too much, pick it up...if it's a guitar cab (and you can't use it) you could probably make at least a LITTLE profit off of it...

 

[KingOfAmps]

Old Ampeg cab is sitting in a local pawn shop. B24X model number.

Could it be a B42X? (It's described as a 4x12.) If so, there's some info. on page 150 of the Ampeg book.

 

[Brendan]

Maybe. There's a B42X head, so it might be the matching cab. I was pretty sure I remembered the model number right, but I was looking at it upside down...it's entirely possible I botched it. B42X cabs come up on Google, so at least I'm not insane. Seems to be a late 70s bass cab.

Bass cab being the key thing. I think I'll go give it a try tomorrow, and if it's all working, I might have a new bass cab on hand.

 

[MARK TRAPCHAK]

I bought a b42x head. It is a guitar head,about 55 tube watts perhaps suitable for bass at puactice levels.

 

[Oren Hudson]

Hey Brendon - did you buy this cab? If so, what did you think? I know someone who knows someone that's looking to sell a B42X like you described and I know nothing about them. Any insight?

 

[Tronographic]

Hello,

I have a matching head and cab. the Ampeg B-42x Jupiter is a 55 watt amp with "echo" (reverb), tremolo AND vibrato.

The cab is a huge 4x12 about the size of a 6x12.

Mine has Eminence drivers.

 

[Tronographic]

Sorry... correction. It has CTS drivers with aluminum dust caps
(weird). It has one replaced with a square magnet Eminence from 1980.

here's some pics:

For some reason it's not that strong or loud of a cabinet. It sounds best with guitar. The drivers have typical paper cone and surrounds so likely the Fs of these drivers is around the typical 80-90hz of a guitar speaker. Anton from Witch borrowed it for a gig and used a HiWatt 100w head with it and it scorched... but it's hardly efficient enough or tuned low enough for lower watt bass amps.

I can only imagine it would sound fantastic for Fender VI, baritone or bass guitar if you swapped these drivers out for some Eminence Alphas or Betas... or some Weber Michigans, etc.

I'll measure the cab and the tuning and post ASAP.

 

[Tronographic]

Dimensions:
29" wide
12" deep
40" tall

Ports are 6.37" x 4" x (.75") x2

Internal volume is about 5.712 (ft3)
Port Frequency should be about 75hz

edit: further research finds this cab is more likely tuned to 60hz and NOT 75hz.

 

[JuscalmeSM]

I know this thread is old, but I know of this cabinet and own the head/cab configuration. It is a B-42X cabinet, made for guitar, but as any Ampeg of that era, they ported the cabs very well using bass reflex design and theile-small calculations on some cabs. As you stated it a 4x12, which mates to the B-42X head. Two 7027A output tubes on the amp rated 55W RMS. This amp is dated 1969, and was the fledgling start of the SVT era designs, hence the extruded aluminum faceplate of the amp. They were made for 1 year, there was a companion 2x12 B-22X tall combo amp. The 2x12 stacked much like the bassman cabs, but was a combo amp/cab design. That amp was made for 2 years, there was also a companion B-25 bass head, but it did not use this cabinet. These models were replaced by 1970-71 with the V2/VT40, V4/VT22, and
V4B heads and cabinets, as well as the SVT and V6. The standard compliment of speakers were CTS aluminum dust caps, Altecs were an optional upgrade. The cabinet is not deep enough to generate anything well below 80Hz, it will work for bass, but a 5-string wouldn't do much. The cabinet would need to be twice as deep as it is to operate in that region. This was the era Unimusic owned Ampeg.

 

[R Melgoza]

I know this thread is old, but I know of this cabinet and own the head/cab configuration. It is a B-42X cabinet, made for guitar, but as any Ampeg of that era, they ported the cabs very well using bass reflex design and theile-small calculations on some cabs. As you stated it a 4x12, which mates to the B-42X head. Two 7027A output tubes on the amp rated 55W RMS. This amp is dated 1969, and was the fledgling start of the SVT era designs, hence the extruded aluminum faceplate of the amp. They were made for 1 year, there was a companion 2x12 B-22X tall combo amp. The 2x12 stacked much like the bassman cabs, but was a combo amp/cab design. That amp was made for 2 years, there was also a companion B-25 bass head, but it did not use this cabinet. These models were replaced by 1970-71 with the V2/VT40, V4/VT22, and
V4B heads and cabinets, as well as the SVT and V6. The standard compliment of speakers were CTS aluminum dust caps, Altecs were an optional upgrade. The cabinet is not deep enough to generate anything well below 80Hz, it will work for bass, but a 5-string wouldn't do much. The cabinet would need to be twice as deep as it is to operate in that region. This was the era Unimusic owned Ampeg.

Hey! Thanks this was all helpful information! Since you have an original pair I was hopping you could answer some questions! I bought a b42x head that needs some work. I haven’t even gotten around to fixjing it up when I stumbled across the oversized 4x12 cab to go with it. From my understanding it’s not a v2 cab, but was made for the Jupiter 42 and the st-42. My new cab has fender speakers with one cts. My question for you is what ohms does the head want? I can’t seem to find that answer anywhere. I believe it’s 4 or 8 (my research leans towards 8) but I’m not sure.
One day I hope too fill my cab up with altec 417s (either the b or c models) but some of the altecs I see are 16 ohms or 8 ohms.

I believe that I should be looking for the 8 ohms and configured in series-parallel?? Could you confirm? What ohms is your cab?

 

[beans-on-toast]

The 4x12 speakers are 8 oh each wired astwo series speakers with each pair wired in parallel. It yields 8 ohms. The extension cab should also be 8 oh,s.

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