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Pairing an 8 ohm and 4 ohm cab

#21
MattGreer said:
... but I want a balanced full sound, and I just felt the combination of the 10's and 15 gave me that.
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Speaker diameter gives little to no indication of the power and frequency response of those speakers. You are further muddying the waters if you are not using any sort of crossover either, and sending a full-range signal to both sets of speakers. Maybe way back in the mists of time, when cab construction was poorly understood and speaker design was primative then there was a correlation between diameter and speaker behaviour.

It is nothing too unique. I have a bassist buddy who swears that 12s are absolutely no good for any bass rig ever. They are, apparently, the perfect guitar speaker. Any brand, any construction material... I guess he would have a fit if he saw my 2X 112 rig.
 
#22
Here is the formula:

http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-paralresist.htm

Your set up would result in 2.667 ohms. Kinda a problematic load for most heads. I tried to do this with my SVT set on 2 and it worked out. But far from ideal.

And this board has convinced me that mixing drivers is not a great idea for phasing reasons. I have to admit my tone has improved since I started sticking to straight 10s.
 
#23
Pairing an 8R and a 4R cabinet may be sensible if the 8R cab has 2-4dB higher efficiency and a similar frequency response both on, and off, axis.

The idea of mixing driver sizes is confusing as the problem is not mixing driver sizes but rather mixing drivers with different characteristics. So mixing say a Peavey 2x10 with an Ashdown 2x10 May be as bad as mixing any 15 with any 10.
 
#24
rodl2005 said:
You say you could hear a distinct difference when listening to just a 410 then adding a 115. or a 210 & adding a 115 cab. Did you try adding a 410 to a 410 or a 210 to a 210. or a 115 to a 115???
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I didn't try the 410x2 (someone else mentioned this as well). I did notice a nice warm bottom end when I paired the 151P with the 104HR. But I'm sticking with the majority advice on this one. I trust you Internet people for some reason. :D

The whole thing put together is definitely overkill for my regular playing duties at church; my plan is to simply transport the head back and forth from church to home so I can practice and leave one 410 at home and one 410 at church. Maybe someday I'll have a reason to put the whole stack together.

This whole thing started when I went looking for a little practice amp for home as my GK 210 is just too frikkin heavy/annoying to transport all the time. So in the end I picked up a Bongo6 to replace my Stingray5, two 104HR's, a LM III, and a Compressore. Good thing I had a coupon from GC for 20% off!!

Next purchase: chorus pedal and maybe an envelope filter to get my Bootsy funk on!
 
#26
If your amp can handle 2 ohms, then the 2.67 ohm load from pairing a 4 ohm and 8 ohm cabinet would not hurt the amp, however as noted, there can be efficiency/phase/tone problems when doing so.

That said, I've used a "modular 6x10 cab" with success. Specifically, I had a 2x10 and 4x10 from the same manufacturer. The 2x10 was 8 ohms, the 4x10 was 4 ohms. The 4x10 cab got more power than the 2x10 because of the impedance mismatch, but it also has more speakers to handle the power. I'd use both cabs for big gigs, and either the 2x10 or 4x10 alone for smaller gigs.

The other problem with mixing cabs, regardless of impedance, is tone/phase issues that might result in bad sound. Now, I have run mismatched cabs with success. In one case, a hi-fi Mesa 2x10 and punchy Ampeg 2x10 sounded fantastic together, better than either individually (and not because of the increased volume). However you are rolling the dice when you do mix, there's a better chance of getting a lemon than a peach.
 
#29
i am using a Mesa PH2x10 and Mesa PH2x12.
Both at 8ohms.
No phasing issues at all.
Both sound better together than seperate, or should i say, the 2x12 always sounds good on it's own, but the 2x10 added makes for a great tone.
 
#30
MattGreer said:
I didn't try the 410x2 (someone else mentioned this as well). I did notice a nice warm bottom end when I paired the 151P with the 104HR. But I'm sticking with the majority advice on this one. I trust you Internet people for some reason. :D

The whole thing put together is definitely overkill for my regular playing duties at church; my plan is to simply transport the head back and forth from church to home so I can practice and leave one 410 at home and one 410 at church. Maybe someday I'll have a reason to put the whole stack together.

This whole thing started when I went looking for a little practice amp for home as my GK 210 is just too frikkin heavy/annoying to transport all the time. So in the end I picked up a Bongo6 to replace my Stingray5, two 104HR's, a LM III, and a Compressore. Good thing I had a coupon from GC for 20% off!!

Next purchase: chorus pedal and maybe an envelope filter to get my Bootsy funk on!
Click to expand...

You didn't say how big your church is but here's my recent experience with cabs at church - I started with a Peavey TVX 410 and an old Mark VIII XP head. If I turned the volume up past 1/2 way, things started to shake. This is in a medium sized church (~300 people). I sold the 410 and moved a Peavey 115BV BX and a GK MB500 head I already had in it's place, that also was loud enough to make things shake and rattle. This past weekend, I tried an Overton 1x10 with the MB500 and it also was more than loud enough to fill the sanctuary with solid bass sound.

The point here is that even just one of the 410s may be overkill for what you need depending on size and efficiency of the room. In my case, the sanctuary is acoustically very efficient as it was designed to allow soloists to perform without amplification. Don't be afraid to try small to see what you really need if you can do so without making major cash outlays.
 
#31
You might be right Rob. I'll find out in a couple weeks. Push comes to shove I'll swap them out for a couple 102HF's, although that would certainly be a letdown (to my ego, hehehe). But first and foremost my allegiance is to musicality and balance, so if it's too loud back she goes. I shop at GC for a good reason, 30 day return policy.

This is a relatively small room, probably seats about 250 people and we get about 100 regular.

I'm not sure this room was really "designed" as many churches are. Currently my GK 210 is offset, kicked back, up against a wall facing out towards the congregation. The sound in some places is much louder than others, and in some places you can barely hear me. I've been thinking about getting a wireless setup and putting the amp dead smack in the middle of the stage. No room for me on the stage, plus I can wander around the room and hear what I sound like vs. depending on the sound crew, who are fairly new at this sort of thing.
 
#32
MattGreer said:
You might be right Rob. I'll find out in a couple weeks. Push comes to shove I'll swap them out for a couple 102HF's, although that would certainly be a letdown (to my ego, hehehe). But first and foremost my allegiance is to musicality and balance, so if it's too loud back she goes. I shop at GC for a good reason, 30 day return policy.

This is a relatively small room, probably seats about 250 people and we get about 100 regular.

I'm not sure this room was really "designed" as many churches are. Currently my GK 210 is offset, kicked back, up against a wall facing out towards the congregation. The sound in some places is much louder than others, and in some places you can barely hear me. I've been thinking about getting a wireless setup and putting the amp dead smack in the middle of the stage. No room for me on the stage, plus I can wander around the room and hear what I sound like vs. depending on the sound crew, who are fairly new at this sort of thing.
Click to expand...

I was practicing last night with the bell choir (we're doing Wizards in Winter, including electric bass and keyboards) and the 1x10 was hitting it's limit so that's not going to work. I'll have to switch back to the 2x10 Promethean until we get our sound system upgrades done next month.
 
#34
Spino said:
nobody mentioned the possibility of having the 4 ohm Cab fitted with a 4Ohm / 8 Ohm impedence switch ,Barefaced are now doing this !
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Doesn't change the way the calculations are done. You either treat it as a 4 ohm cab or an 8 ohm cab.

Beyond that, the only BF cab I see with switchable impedance is the Two10S and Two10ST. Per the website, these are switchable between 4 ohms and 12 ohms.
 

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