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One head, 2 cabs = One cab MUCH louder than the other, why?

#62
SactoBass said:
Excellent choice! Lehle makes the best splitters (IMO).

I didn't read every post in this thread, so I'm guessing you plan to use two separate amps: one amp going into your 610 cab and one amp going into your 412 cab. If that is what you plan to do, then I'd say you are going to have one heck of a nice setup! You will be able to dial in different tones for each rig and play through both of them simultaneously. Saweet!!! :thumbsup:
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That's the plan, thanks!
 
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#63
Ummm if your going with 2 amps I think all you need is one of these,
 

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#65
fatNfunky said:
the answer is 'sensitivity',

show 1 speaker/box 10 watts it gets so loud, show a 'more sensitive' speaker/box the same 10 watts, it will get louder.

*but the 'less loud' speaker/box probably will have better 'low end clarity' then the louder speaker/box.

if you want to use mis-matched (different sensitivity) speakers/cabs together, you can, but you will need to find a way to control the signal strength going to each cab. there are several products/ways available to do this do some guitar pedal searches..

****** BUT******

there is a danger you will get CANCELLATION (loss of bass) because the speakers have 'not' been designed to work together.

you cant always just slap a chevy master cylinder in a ford.
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Haha that's all you see at Car shows, Ford Rods and Coupes with Chevy engines..:woot:
 
#70
Kukulkan61 said:
So you hooked up both cabs to the amp without knowing the impedance o_O
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This is why good engineering practices incorporate substantial protection circuitry within the amp. Incidentally, this does add significant cost to the amp.

Thumpin6string said:
Can't give any insight, but you stated both cabs are 4 ohms. I hope the Mesa is 2 ohm stable. I hate to see you damage the head.
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The amp is 2 ohm stable when set to 2 ohm mode.

I strongly encourage the OP to read the manual (please, please, please). There is a lot of helpful information, and the more complicated the set-up, the more important this information is.
 
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#78
agedhorse said:
This is why good engineering practices incorporate substantial protection circuitry within the amp. Incidentally, this does add significant cost to the amp.



The amp is 2 ohm stable when set to 2 ohm mode.

I strongly encourage the OP to read the manual (please, please, please). There is a lot of helpful information, and the more complicated the set-up, the more important this information is.
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Could it be the Mesa cabinet put out considerably less volume because I didn't switch the amp to 2 ohms prior to plugging in the 2nd cabinet?
 
#80
David Sutkin said:
Hey all,

I was hoping I could get some help trying to understand why the following is happening.

Last night at a band rehearsal I tried running my Mesa D800+ head into a Mesa 4x10 "traditional" cabinet (900 watt cab) then I ran a speaker cable out of the Mesa parallel jack port into a GK 6x12 cabinet (1000 watt cab) ... The one Mesa head powering both.

While I was absolutely pushing air out of both cabinets, the GK was shockingly louder than the Mesa cab ... If I had to guess, it sounded like a 75/25 volume output ratio with the 75% coming from the GK cab.

I used to have a Hartke LH1000 head that came with a "leveling" dial and I could manually turn that dial to blend the two volumes but the Mesa D800+ head doesn't have that feature.

Can anyone give me some insight (in layman terms please) as to why the GK cab is pumping such a drastically louder volume?

Is there a better way to run this set up? I have a few other heads and I wouldn't mind buying an ABY splitter and running two separate rigs (1 cab with one head and another cab with another head) to level out the volumes .... but do I need to do that to get the volume levels equal?

Any help would be great, thanks

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If that picture is of the gear you are using, that GK is a 412 cabinet not a 612 cab. That cab will always be louder because your are pushing significantly more air with four 12" speakers than you are with four 10" speakers. Since they are both 4 ohm cabs and are both getting the same amount of power (half of what that amp puts out), another consideration might be the sensitivity of the cabs themselves. Odds are they both have decent sensitivity but one might have better sensitivity than another.

I have two 410 cabs myself and I don't even use one of them anymore because my newer cab is so much louder, clearer, etc. than the other. I had to write to the manufacturer to get the sensitivity specs on the older one and was surprised that it was only 92db 1W/1M. Normally you like to have that rating around 99 to 100db. Sensitivity ratings are a gross comparison at best though because they usually use a 1KHz signal to measure it and we play a lot more than just a 1KHz signal. Still, it's something. The other one is rated at 106db and is night and day louder,to the point I don't even bother using the old 410. So that's an extreme case, but sensitivity of cabs an make a real difference too.

The gist of it is that without either a balance control on the amp or running another amp slaved to your D800 so you can adjust the master on the other cab, you're not going to get the same amount of volume out of both cabs.
 

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