Sounds like SWR... but

scubaduba

scubaduba

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#1
I love the SWR sound. Cabs and amps.

I use a SWR Headlite and Amplite with SWR Son of Bertha (1x15) and Goliath Jr III (2x10). This is the tone IMHO. It's that modern punchy, hi-fi, yet full and round tone.

I'd love to find a cabinet that cops the SWR tone but that is lighter weight. I'd probably keep the Headlite (and probably the Amplite) because I love them so much.

Is there such a thing?
 
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#2
There's a fair chance, OK maybe a 90% chance, that I'm wrong, but wasn't the Goliath a Bag End cab? I might well be wrong. I often am :D Maybe check in at the Bag End club thread and see if there is confirmation on this. Heavy, heavy old bastid mine is, but oh, so nice and creamy. More a tone you feel than hear. Mine's an old 18" ELF, YMMV. IMO worth looking into at least.
 
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#3
You may be able to swap out the 10” with SWR Go lite speakers if you can find them. I’m not sure if SWR used a neodymium speaker on their 15” speakers.

I don’t know how different drivers will affect the cab’s tone.

I’ve had success with swapping out the working man’s speakers with SWR PAS speakers in my SWR working mans 410 cab. It still weighs a ton though, but it sounds sweet.
 
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#4
BadExample said:
There's a fair chance, OK maybe a 90% chance, that I'm wrong, but wasn't the Goliath a Bag End cab? I might well be wrong. I often am :D Maybe check in at the Bag End club thread and see if there is confirmation on this. Heavy, heavy old bastid mine is, but oh, so nice and creamy. More a tone you feel than hear. Mine's an old 18" ELF, YMMV. IMO worth looking into at least.
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Check out this page, go down to the Professional Series section for your answer. SWR Sound: Products
:bookworm:
 
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#6
A little background history. Someone might come along and correct my timeline but I think this might be fairly accurate. SWR hired David Nordschow to design their speakers and SWR adopted that basic design. I recently played an SWR Workingman's 15 and it sounded incredibly like my Eden EX110 double stack. David Nordschow went on to form Eden company, and his speaker design is trademark for Eden. Small, portable, light, and powerfully loud. On these ideas I recommend the Eden EX112 x2. You could get a double stack and it will handle 800 watts. Two cabs 30 pounds each and they'll give you a very similar sound to your SWR gear. Highly recommended.

ex112.jpg


My Eden EX110 double stack:

IMG_3231.JPG
 
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#8
alaskaleftybass said:
A little background history. Someone might come along and correct my timeline but I think this might be fairly accurate. SWR hired David Nordschow to design their speakers and SWR adopted that basic design. I recently played an SWR Workingman's 15 and it sounded incredibly like my Eden EX110 double stack. David Nordschow went on to form Eden company, and his speaker design is trademark for Eden. Small, portable, light, and powerfully loud. On these ideas I recommend the Eden EX112 x2. You could get a double stack and it will handle 800 watts. Two cabs 30 pounds each and they'll give you a very similar sound to your SWR gear. Highly recommended.

View attachment 2901071

My Eden EX110 double stack:

View attachment 2901086
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But are the EX series actually David Nordschow's design? I have long thought the EX series is a post Nordschow design. With that said I'm glad to see them getting attention. I was a long time Eden guy once and still have my WTX-260.
 
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#10
sheltjo6 said:
You may be able to swap out the 10” with SWR Go lite speakers if you can find them. I’m not sure if SWR used a neodymium speaker on their 15” speakers.

I don’t know how different drivers will affect the cab’s tone.

I’ve had success with swapping out the working man’s speakers with SWR PAS speakers in my SWR working mans 410 cab. It still weighs a ton though, but it sounds sweet.
Click to expand...

Swapping out drivers is seldom a panacea for success. Many such “upgrades” end up being just the opposite.
 
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#11
Same as others, maybe look into some Eden cabinets, although they're not known for being necessarily lighter. I think any of the high end "super 12s" would fit the bill as well, but give even more real low end. That is, the Baer, fearful, Thunderchild/Haxor, Barefaced, MAS, LDS, Acme, etc. 112 and 212 offerings. The Mesa/Subway cabs might fit the bill, but maybe not, but you could probably find a retailer to try those out for yourself.
 
#13
scowboy said:
But are the EX series actually David Nordschow's design? I have long thought the EX series is a post Nordschow design. With that said I'm glad to see them getting attention. I was a long time Eden guy once and still have my WTX-260.
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The new Eden's are past the Nordschow days to the best of my knowledge. However, I think that a lot of his influence in voicing bass products is part of the Eden and SWR legacy. Much like Steve Rabe's design influences carried forward in more than one company.
 
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#16
Sorry for campaigning for Eden cabinets. I am just blown away by how a couple small cabinets perform so well. If more people gave them a try they would see what I'm talking about. There are some SWR Workingman's 115's and 210's cabinets on the auction site and GC if you want to continue with SWR gear. They will not be light by today's standards, but they are lighter if you are capable of carrying them. After such a positive experience using an SWR Workingman's 15 I can understand why you like the sound. I'm actually kind of stalking a Workingman's 12 online now.

I'm very cheap, actually on a self-imposed budget. I was lucky enough to buy the Edens at an excellent deal. So while I would love to try some David Nordschow cabs the chances of buying a pair are very slim unless two things happen: I find a pair of DNS 112 Micros at an incredible Fire Sale price either here, GC or eBay and the buyer's charges for shipping are reasonable. The stars will really have to make a special alignment for me for that to happen but I have had a few incredible deals drop in my life.

The other TB'ers have made some excellent suggestions and it's worth experimenting with some modern lightweight cabinets to see if in fact you will still get your favorite sound out of some current technology. There's a lot of lightweight speaker magic going on right now in our bass world!

Good luck and keep us posted! :thumbsup:

EDIT: I need to mention that a company called Revsound is getting a lot of positive exposure here nowadays. Might be something to all the buzz. @Stumbo recommends them which is good enough for me-- so you might look into those cabs if you have a chance...
 
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#18
SWR did make GoLight cabinets. 210, 410, 112, 115. You'll find em occasionally on GC's used page. They sound phenomenal. A buddy of mine has a 410 he got outta GC for $100. The 115s are usually about $250. Worth the price. I've been using SWR since 91. I love it! Especially the cabinets. I know a lot of history bout the company. And no cabs, Eden or otherwise, quite capture that sound. Original 10 loaded cabs had Eden drivers and crossovers. Bigger drivers were provided by Bag End. Bag End drivers were, are, made by Eminence. I just put two new Eminence Delta 10" drivers in my old Super Redhead. A very good match for the original driver specs, down to magnet weight. Sound wise there are minor changes, but output, projection and intelligibility are improved. I've no doubt the DeltaLite line would serve the SWR cab design well. And lighten the load considerably.
 
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