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Peavey 1516 questions

#21
I think its 200 watts per side, 400 total, i have one that's actually died on my sitting at home. I don't blame her though, she's old enough to buy a strong scotch and been through idk how many cowboy bars in wyoming, i got it for free from my uncle and not long afterwards, the 15(a carvin replacement) blew right before one of the 8's. I would pick it up if i had the chance and it was going at a pretty decent price, I wouldn't pay more than $150 and i would try to get it for closer to $100, but it could be a pretty good spare cab for practice or whatever...

bobs
 
#22
GeeBeeVee said:
I may be able to pick one of these up for pretty cheap (well, I think it's a 1516; the guy listed it as having 2 10s). I'd be using it with a Firebass, and I'm a little afraid it'd be kind of wimpy for the amp, ie, I'd be overpowering it.
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First, people sometimes confuse an 18" with a 15" so it could be an 18 and two 10's... But either way, the power rating is mostly for fullrange mode. A 15 black widow is rated at 300 rms, 700 program, etc. The 2 smaller speakers are the wimpy ones, you have to biamp and then be careful to crossover and not send any low bass to them...

With biamping and crossing over low freqs to the bw, you have to be careful not to send underpowered clipping signals to them. The firebass should be great with the DDT and lots of watts and all, but the session bass (200 watts ?) could easily send square waves to the bw and damage it... If it has DDT make sure it is enabled and you will be okay...

Also the cab should be 4 ohms either way - 4 full range, or 4 each bi amp. I would say 300 rms for the bw, 200 rms for the 8's... That being said it is nice to have double the rms power in your amp to avoid 'clipping'...
 
#23
If it's got the original Peavey speakers (I think it was a 15" Scorpion, my second favorite 15" speaker after Electro-Voice) and two farily generic 8" speaker, then it should be a good deal. The head of Peavey's amp program at the time these were new (Jack Sondermeyer) said he used a CS-800 for everything, no matter what the speaker was rated at. You have to LISTEN and turn down if you hear your speakers breaking up, but as long as you're not doing that you're OK.

I was a Peavey dealer unitl 1988 when I left retail. And that was the only Peavey bass cabinet I ever really liked. Small compared to most stuff around at the time, punchy, and reliable. Yes, it's 4 ohms full range. I think it's also 4 ohms on each side when bi-ampped, but I never liked any bi-amp experiements I've done so I don't recall. The good thing is that the jack plate on the back (assuming it's the original one) will tell you what the impedance is.

jte
 
#24
Ah- hrgiger was posting at the same time I was.

They also made a bigger 1810 (later 182) cabinet with an 18" Black Widow and a pair of 10" Scorpions. All of these I've seen had the black Peavey Tolex with the ubiquitious silver panels on either side of the black grill cloth. There was also a big 3620 (two 18" BW and a pair of 10" Scorpions). The 1516 is smaller, had the green-ish brown Tolex and a much more open grill cloth. I could easily move a 1516 by myself without casters, but the 1810 was a two-man job. In my estimation, the 1516 was a great cabinet, but the 1810 was too heavy for what it sounded like- No punch hitting you in the chest, just rumble on the bottom and clank on the highs.

jte
 
#25
First off, thanks to all who've responded. It's very helpful. It seems like the 1516 is a fairly compact workhorse, which is what I'm looking for (really, I'm only looking for a 1x15, but if you can throw a couple 8s into the deal, why not, right?)

JTE, the cab I'm looking at has independent speaker covers as opposed to one large grill--ever come across one like this, or is this an aftermarket job?

Do you know if there's any way of knowing whether it's got a BW or a Scorpion (besides taking the speaker out, of course).

hrgiger--I don't think the Firebass can be biamped, so I'd be running full range.
 
#27
JTE said:
GeeBeeVee-

I've never seen one with separate grilles, so I'd assume it's aftermarket. Probably a good thing if they're metal grilles as the stock grill was kind of flimsy. The BW has a round frame with eight screws holding it to the baffle. The Scorpion has a more squared off frame.

jte
Click to expand...

Once again, thank you for your help. This forum's been a great resource. Hopefully this thing will turn out to be a nice find.
 
#28
Here is a picture of a 1516 with a black widow. This one has the grill cloth removed and some wire mesh installed instead.

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Here is a picture of an 1810, with the 18" black widow and 2 10" scorpions.

40122_U21292.png


The 15" scorpion looks just like the 10" here is one in a pa cab:

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Both scorpions and black widows have aluminum frames. You can look at the edge of the 15, if it is not obviously aluminum (black stamped steel) is is neither...
 
#30
Caca de Kick said:
Mine had a Black Widow 15. Aond come to think of it, all I've ever seen were Black Widows on the 1516's.
I think the BW's had the silver dome in the center of the speaker, while Scorpion only have black domes.
Click to expand...

Actually early black widows had silver domes, and scorpions had black, but later model black widows all have black domes as well...
 
#32
i owned both the 1516 and an 1820 in the last year or so, i'd have to say i preferred the sound of the 1516. not huge on power, but it was punchy and as another poster said, the 8"s are alot warmer than tweeters.

i recently tried to buy back the 1516 i sold, but i was unsuccesful. i'd drop $150 on it for sure, but it never hurts to try and talk the price down.
 
#33
weekendxwarrior said:
i owned both the 1516 and an 1820 in the last year or so, i'd have to say i preferred the sound of the 1516. not huge on power, but it was punchy and as another poster said, the 8"s are alot warmer than tweeters.

i recently tried to buy back the 1516 i sold, but i was unsuccesful. i'd drop $150 on it for sure, but it never hurts to try and talk the price down.
Click to expand...

This is my main concern: the power. Is it gig-worthy? We play places without PA support on occasion, (not huge places or big crowds by any means) and while our guitarist is currently only playing through a combo, he's looking to upgrade to a 4x12 setup soon. Unfortunately, I only have the means to transport one small cab at this time--in your experience, is the 1516 up to the task? Would I be better of getting a more robust Peavey 115 (1505 BW, which seems to be the standard in the old 115s, as opposed to the 1502)?
 
#34
GeeBeeVee said:
Would I be better of getting a more robust Peavey 115 (1505 BW, which seems to be the standard in the old 115s, as opposed to the 1502)?
Click to expand...

I don't think that any of the 115 bass guitar enclosures used the 1505, just the 1502 (which is a fine speaker regardless.) It got a new black dust cap after a while, but is the same speaker basically. If you look at page 4 of this guide (on the left hand side) it lists some applications of the 1502:

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That being said I don't think the 1516 would have any trouble keeping up with a 412 guitar cab, I would imagine he won't be cranking it full blast anyhow...
 
#35
hrgiger said:
I don't think that any of the 115 bass guitar enclosures used the 1505, just the 1502 (which is a fine speaker regardless.) It got a new black dust cap after a while, but is the same speaker basically. If you look at page 4 of this guide (on the left hand side) it lists some applications of the 1502:

Invalid Link Removed

That being said I don't think the 1516 would have any trouble keeping up with a 412 guitar cab, I would imagine he won't be cranking it full blast anyhow...
Click to expand...

hrgiger, once again, thanks! That chart is very helpful. For some reason I thought the 1505 was being used in newer cabs.

I've actually got a Mark III Series combo with the same speaker and quite like it. Thanks for reassuring me about the 1516; it sounds like a good cab for my application. Now, if the seller would only get back to me!
 
#39
GeeBeeVee said:
This is my main concern: the power. Is it gig-worthy? We play places without PA support on occasion, (not huge places or big crowds by any means) and while our guitarist is currently only playing through a combo, he's looking to upgrade to a 4x12 setup soon. Unfortunately, I only have the means to transport one small cab at this time--in your experience, is the 1516 up to the task?
Click to expand...

My experience says no, it's not up to task for live work and no PA support.
 

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