Speaker Ideas

Colby Tipton · From: Crosby, Texas, USA

I have a Peavey 112 Transtube Bandit amplifier that I'm thinking about using for a spare pedal steel amp. The 12" SPEAKER IN IT NOW IS 8 OHM. any ideas on a 12" or 15" speaker for this amp.It is 80 watts rms just like the nashville 112.

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thurlon hopper · From: Elizabethtown Pa. USA

Colby i just sold a Transtube Bandit couple of months ago and tho it is 80 watts it isn't voiced like the N112. it is designed to play guitar thru and i never could get a really satifactory sound from it, although i sometimes used a JBL ext. speaker with it. Very good for guitar though. TJH

Colby Tipton · From: Crosby, Texas, USA

Thurlon,
I know it isn,t voiced for a steel but I figured that a different speaker may work with it. Just like the old Fender Twins sound better playing steel with a 15" voiced for steel.

Colby

David Doggett · Posted 30 Mar 2006 9:36 pm

That amp is voiced too trebly for steel. So instead of using a shallow basket, metal capped guitar 15" speaker, such as the shallow basket Black Widow or JBL D130, try a cloth capped bass speaker. And you'll want to get a lower wattage bass speaker (say 200 watts or less), not one of the stiff 500 watt monsters. Peavey has some to choose from, and Weber has copies of vintage low watt bass speakers.

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 30 March 2006 at 09:38 PM.]

William Peters · From: Effort, Pennsylvania, USA

Is there any reason not to filter out the excess treble by putting a low pass filter between the amp and the speakers that are already in it? Thats what happens naturally with a big 15 incher or even a 10" bass speaker. As far as I can tell, thats what "voiced for steel" seems to mean as speakers go.

I am trying this with a Carvin SX200C I recently bought. The internal speakers have a high frequency cutoff of 7khz, and they really are way too bright. I put a crossover network with a crossover point of 3.5 khz between the amp and speakers, and left the tweeter port open. It improved it dramatically for less than $20.00. I think I will move it a little lower to maybe 3.0 khz, as it is still a little bright.

Jack Stoner · From: Kansas City, MO

Along with the speaker, the amp's EQ really needs modified (Voiced) for the steel's freq range. For many years we used "guitar amps" for steel because nothing else was available and for some this still works well. For others, the amps specifically designed for steel are a much better option.

In "voicing", consider the Nashville 400. It was originally designed to use the 1502 BW speaker, which is now sold as a bass speaker. About 1989 Peavey changed to the current 1501 speaker (that is also used in the Nashville 1000 and 2000) but did not "revoice" the EQ in the amp and thus it had too many highs and not enough lows and the reason John Lemay came up with the tone circuit modifications, and ultimately basically what Peavey implemented in their "factory mod" and incorporated into the Nashville 400 production in mid 1996.

Cutting the frequency response with a bass speaker or a filter to cut out the highs is only part of it. If there is not enough low end (low frequency) response or amplificaton in the amp it will still not have enough lows. Mike Brown mentioned one time that for guitar certain frequencies were boosted and for steel some of these same frequencies needed to be reduced and again the "voicing" concept.

David Doggett · Posted 31 Mar 2006 12:37 pm

I agree with everything Jack says. A guitar has a skinny neck and a neck joint. A steel really has no neck - it's just one big plank for the body and neck - which is much more solid and brings out the high harmonics. Also, most steels only have a single bridge pickup, again emphasizing the high harmonics. As a result, most guitar amps sound too bright for steel. The solution is to boost the low mids and lows in a steel amp. A mid shift control also helps. Using a 15" speaker partially accomplishes this. But the 15 doesn't just filter out the highs. It shifts the whole voice lower. The biggest difference I hear in a 15 is that the low mids are stronger, giving that throaty baritone sound, as opposed to the more tenor-like sound of 12s and 10s.

E9 pedal steel has two strings pitched higher than a regular guitar. Also, a steeler spends more time further up the neck. So it is actually the taming of those high pitches that the lower voiced steel amp and 15" speaker accomplish. Oddly enough, this tends to overdamp the overtones of the low strings, causing them to sound muffled and with too little string separation, especially on C6, uni and extended E9. Turning up the bass does not help with that problem, in fact makes it worse.

The low strings actually sound better to me with the treble and presence turned higher, but then the high strings get too harsh. Picking the low strings closer to the bridge helps. But the natural right hand position has the thumb playing the low strings further from the bridge. I would someday love to try angling the pickup so it is closer to the bridge under the low strings, and further from the bridge for the high strings (just the opposite from the way Tele and Strat bridge pickups are angled). This would seem to give more definition to the low strings, and mellow the high strings. Has anyone ever tried that?

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 31 March 2006 at 12:40 PM.]

William Peters · From: Effort, Pennsylvania, USA

Jack,

While what you said is entirely true, Colby was looking for a way to take an amp he already has and make a spare steel amp out of it. The crossover network is a cheap way to take an amp that is totally unuseable for steel, and turn it into one that is at least useable as a spare or a practice amp. Its certainly cheaper than replacing the speaker.

I am totally satisfied with the change it made to my Carvin, and now the Carvin sounds better with my Mullen than my rack rig, or my Peavey bass amp did.

Also, adding the network can be done as a simple plug in so that it can be removed easily to use the amp for 6 string.

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