Hi folks, just wondering if it's possible to connect 4x10@4ohm + 1x15@8ohm cabs to a 450w 4ohm head?
Thanks Dave
Thanks Dave
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
Welcome to TalkBass! Want to remove ads? Register an account and login to see fewer ads, and become a Supporting Member to remove almost all ads.
connecting 4ohm and 8ohm cabs
- Thread starter daveyboy666
- Start date
No sir dont do it. I think that equals 2.6 ohms dor speakers...lower than your 4 ohm head. You need a head that goes down to 2.6 or 2 ohms
Couldn't you simply connect both to a Palmer Cab Merger then connect the amp to the Series jack? What does that come out to, 12 Ohms? I never tried this, but I'm guessing the output (volume) would be greatly reduced.
If you ran them in series (with external cable/box), yes, you would have a 12 ohm load the head would see... but, I have to believe you would be much happier with just running the 410 by itself @ 4 ohms ....
JMHO ... as always
Edit to add: ... unless of course you prefer the sound of the 115 over the 410 ... then if you need more/want 2 cabs, add another 8 ohm 115 ...
JMHO ... as always
Edit to add: ... unless of course you prefer the sound of the 115 over the 410 ... then if you need more/want 2 cabs, add another 8 ohm 115 ...
Last edited:
+1
If you have to change the way a cab runs in order to allow your amp to safely run 2 cabs. . . . you've negated the whole point of running the 2 cabs in the first place.
- Jun 2, 2012
- 5,769
- 6,761
- 4,961
- Disclosures
- Doner Designs is an alias for Steve Doner
You can buy a box or cable that is series wired but these are specialty items only available from a couple of boutique cable shops. I have one because I run two 6 ohm cabs.
When you mix 4 and 8 ohm cabs, one or the other (I forget which) will see more power than the other, so you are generally better off with a pair of 4's or 8's. Of course if you use a pair of 4's, you would need an amp that's good down to 2 ohms (like the Mesa Subway for example) or find one of those series cables.
Wiring in series cuts your power in half, so what you gain by adding more cone area can be lost by the power reduction unless you have a lot more watts than you need.
Yes, but in general output jacks on amps and the jacks on speaker cabs are all wired in parallel, so even if you "daisy chain" the speakers off of one output jack on your amp the speakers are still in parallel.
You need a special, particular kind of cable to force the series connection of your cabinets, or to rewire the jack plate on one of you cabinets.
The 4 ohm gets twice the power that the 8 ohm cabinet gets as it gets twice the current. So the 4 ohm cab gets 2/3 of the total output power, the 8 ohm gets 1/3 of it.
Ric5
Inactive
- Jan 29, 2008
- 29,773
- 30,319
- 5,141
- Disclosures
- I like 5, 8, 10, and 12 string basses
If you ran them in series (with external cable/box), yes, you would have a 12 ohm load the head would see ... and a good thing would be that the 410 would receive 2x the power of the 115 ... but, I have to believe you would be much happier with just running the 410 by itself @ 4 ohms ....
JMHO ... as always
No it would not! In series the 8Ω load would ‘drop’ twice the voltage of the 4Ω load and thus take twice the power.
Mixing 4 and 8 ohms is like mixing red and white wine. Don't do it
yup... we are in series mode, not parallel ... thanks for catching that .. another a senior moment
Yup, you're right ... we are in series mode, not parallel ... thanks for catching that .. another a senior moment
I know but we Seniors gotta stick together!
As others have pointed out, running a 4 ohm cab and an 8 ohm cab with the industry standard "parallel" connection would give you a 2.66 ohm load and hopefully trigger your amps protection circuits before it melted your amp.
You can get (or make if your OK with soldering) a series/parallel box that will let you hook them up in series, which adds the ohms loads together instead of dropping it. I did that with a Sunn cab that I had for a while. It had both Parallel and Series outputs on the back of the cab. It was a 212, 4 ohm cab, and the 115 was an 8 ohm cab. GK's cheapest amp (250 backline) has an 8 ohms minimum load, so I couldn't even run the Sunn cab by itself from that amp. Running both cabs in series turned it into a 12 ohm load, which was safe but dropped the power by about 1/3. Nonetheless, it was significantly louder and better sounding that running just the 115 because there was far more speaker area by running both cabs and the GK115blx is a terribly boomy cab by itself.
Then I bought a better amp that had a 4 ohm minimum load and an 8 ohm 410 cab to run with the 8 ohm 115, and stopped worrying about it. Now I run a single DNS410 cab because it is far better sounding and louder than that 410/115 stack was and easier to move around too.
You can get (or make if your OK with soldering) a series/parallel box that will let you hook them up in series, which adds the ohms loads together instead of dropping it. I did that with a Sunn cab that I had for a while. It had both Parallel and Series outputs on the back of the cab. It was a 212, 4 ohm cab, and the 115 was an 8 ohm cab. GK's cheapest amp (250 backline) has an 8 ohms minimum load, so I couldn't even run the Sunn cab by itself from that amp. Running both cabs in series turned it into a 12 ohm load, which was safe but dropped the power by about 1/3. Nonetheless, it was significantly louder and better sounding that running just the 115 because there was far more speaker area by running both cabs and the GK115blx is a terribly boomy cab by itself.
Then I bought a better amp that had a 4 ohm minimum load and an 8 ohm 410 cab to run with the 8 ohm 115, and stopped worrying about it. Now I run a single DNS410 cab because it is far better sounding and louder than that 410/115 stack was and easier to move around too.
Last edited:
There are sometimes good reasons for mixing 4Ω and 8Ω cabinets. An example would be a 4Ω 4x10 and an 8Ω 2x10. This would result in a 2.67Ω load. As long as the amp is safe into this impedance all six drivers will given the same amount of power making the combination a viable 6x10.
Another option to consider, if you have a direct out (DI) built into the he'd, is to get a separate power amp, bridge it to 8 ohms to run the 8 ohm cab with it and run the 4 ohm cab with the amphead power section. You can find used lower power at 4 ohms per side stereo power amps, like for around $100 or so, and bridge them to mono for some really decent power to your 8 ohm cab. And if the DI on your head allows you to select pre or post EQ from the preamp section, all the better. Makes your system modular and powerful. And if you still need a DI, buy a separate one and run it between your bass and amphead. The sound guy will like you for it.