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Stage Monitor Question

RobBrochu

RobBrochu

Sep 17, 2015
124
86
56
La Plata, Missouri
#1
My band has a powered mixer/unpowered main speaker set up. I run DI from my bass amp head into the PA and sing backup for 2 inputs; the drummer uses 6 inputs including his vocal; the lead singer uses 3 inputs: keys, acoustic guitar, and vocals; and the lead guitar mics his cabinet for 1 input. We need to run 3 monitors. I don't really want to buy a separate monitor amp. My thought is to use my speaker outs on my amp to power my 16-ohm 2X15 from 1 out and set it up behind me but beside the drummer, and connect the other out to a 15" 8-ohm stage monitor and then daisy chain to the second 15" 8-ohm stage monitor. I've run the speaker impedance thru a calculator and got a 3.2-ohm result. My amp is rated for 220Watts at 4-ohms. Am I going to let the magic smoke out of my amp if I do this?
 
#3
Zooberwerx said:
Not the best of ideas. Nothing worse than underpowered monitors. You really need to drop the coin on a dedicated monitor amp. On a brighter note, watts be cheap nowadays.

Riis
Click to expand...

I would agree with Zooberwerx on this; I think you're asking a lot of your bass amp, too. Check out some of the lower end Crown Class D amps. For a few hundred bucks, you'll be good to go.

You could also run the mains MONO on one side and the monitors on the other side:

Mixer LEFT->Main A->Main B
Mixer RIGHT->Monitor 1->Monitor 2->Monitor 3

Set all fader pans to LEFT, then move to RIGHT until you achieve desired volume in monitors. Some powered mixers have this capability with the push of a button (ie: they "steal" one of the main channels for use as a monitor channel). Caveat: the above has a lot of limitations -- EQ'ing, feedback control to name a few -- but works in a pinch. Oh, make sure you're not maxing out your powered mixer's load capabilities (do the same Ohm calculations you did for your amp).

What model mixer do you have?
 
#4
At the calculated 3.2 ohm you might have some variables that will put that number up or down a tad, but either way, some components in your amp are likely to get down rite toasty for sure.
Besides, that set-up wont leave you any control on the monitors me thinks.

Like Zooberwerk said, the dedicated monitor amp is the way to go.
 

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