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Topic: Liking My Weber 12F150s (but...) |
Dan Beller-McKenna
From:
Durham, New Hampshire, USA
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Posted 10 Jul 2008 12:35 pm |
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My Weber 12F50s arrived yesterday. I popped them in my twin and was very pleased with the sound, both from my 65ri and my '77 (135watt) silverface. Much brighter than the stock re-issue Jensens without being ice-picky. In fact, where the Jensen's tend slightly to get spikey on strings 5 and 4 around the 13th fret or higher, the Webers dig in and growl a little bit instead. I don't know exactly how to describe it, but it sounds more "vintage" to me, more like a '60s sound.
Now: these speakers are rated at 50 watts each. I asked Ted Webber when I was ordering if that is not a little risky with the 135 watt twin and he said "Not with our speakers. They will handle it." Nevertheless, it makes me a bit nervous. Should I just accept that Mr. Weber knows a heck of a lot more about this than I (duh!) and turn it on, turn it up, turn it loose (as Dwight would say)?
In any case (maybe driven subconsciously by my misgivings) I'm thinking of mixing and matching the Jensen's and the Webers. Maybe best of both worlds? We'll see (or "hear," more correctly). Would that also protect me from overtaxing the Weber, since the Jensen is rated at 100 watts?
Any thoughts welcomed.
Dan
_________________
Durham, NH
dbmCk mUSIC |
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Jon Light
From:
Saugerties, NY
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Posted 10 Jul 2008 12:57 pm
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It is my understanding that no, that would not protect you----with a mismatched pair of speakers you still look at the lower rated of the pair, X2, to determine the power handling capability. I.e., a 50 and a 100 does not cover 150W. It covers 100W. However Ted Weber has always claimed that his ratings are more conservative than the industry 'standard' so while everyone else uses their ratings as boasting numbers, he stands behind his as a safe bet, with room to spare.
My inclination is to trust him. It doesn't do him much good to tell you not to worry and have the speaker melt in your amp.
It's a good question and I'm glad you asked him because I've had the same concern with a 135W Vibrosonic Rev that I hope to resurrect.
I would be curious if anyone has mixed one of these with a Cali (or JBL) for a best-of-both-worlds sort of combination. |
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Joe A. Camacho
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Posted 10 Jul 2008 1:06 pm
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| Give 'em plenty of time to break in, you'll be happy with them. |
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Dan Beller-McKenna
From:
Durham, New Hampshire, USA
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Posted 10 Jul 2008 2:15 pm
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Oh, I am happy with then already Joe; just worrying about the power match up and curious about how they would sound mixed with the Jensens.
Dan |
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David Doggett
From:
Bawl'mer, MD (formerly of MS, Nawluns, Gnashville, Knocksville, Lost Angeles, Bahsten. and Philly)
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Posted 10 Jul 2008 2:51 pm
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| Dan, I think for pedal steel you are safe with 100 watt speaker capability in a 100-135 watt amp. The reason is that even if your amp is on 10, you are probably attacking your notes with the volume pedal backed off some, and using the rest for sustain. You would only get into trouble if your amp was on 10 and you were hitting strings hard with your VP full on. And even then, according to Weber, you've got a margin of safety in those speakers. |
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Dan Tyack
From:
Olympia, WA USA
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Posted 12 Jul 2008 8:29 am
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I'm a big fan of mixing speaker types. My favorite cabs have a mix of a JBL type and a Celestion. You get a bigger, more three dimensional sound.I would try mixing the weber and the jensen.
I'm trying to understand how putting in a 50 watt capacity speaker and a 100 watt capacity speaker would give you 100 watts capacity.....Assuming the speakers are of the same impedance they would get the same amount of power, no? |
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Jon Light
From:
Saugerties, NY
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Posted 12 Jul 2008 8:51 am
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Hi Dan---it is my understanding
(emphasis on my understanding....that is, I only know what I read and I only understand half of that)
that when you feed power to two speakers, they each receive half of that power---there is no distributor that portions out appropriate amounts of power to each according to how much it can handle. So if you feed 150 watts into two speakers, they each will get 75W. If that's enough to blow one of the speakers, it will blow---it will not shunt off power to the higher rated speaker. So the rule of thumb is to divide the total power by the number of speakers---that is the minimum rating you want. This will totally vary depending on speaker efficiency.
Of course, output power ratings are non-standardized and often fictitious as are speaker power ratings. The way JBLs were originally rated was to feed power into a speaker until it blew, estimate the amount of power at time of failure and slap the number on the spec sheet (to grossly paraphrase the story as told by the creator of the speaker). |
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Dan Tyack
From:
Olympia, WA USA
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Posted 12 Jul 2008 9:45 am
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| That makes sense, Jon. So to handle a 135 watt amp, the least capable speaker should be able to handle 70 watts or so. If the Weber is very conservatively rated, it should handle it. |
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