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What do I do? Moral/Gear Dilemma

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 9:47 pm
by cobascis
So a while back we bought some Yamaha PA from the 80s or 70s, for 80 bucks. It's still our band practice vocal set up. A while ago, we removed some 'JBL' speaker, it seemed a bit noisy ( it wasn't the speaker, duh ). A quick google revealed it was used in twins and was pretty sought after, cool.

Zoom foward 2 years, I sold my combo, we had the speaker lying around, we made a cab. I was trolling ebay and searched the name. I found this:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 1384wt_956

SHIT. That's a lot of money to be sitting in my homemade cab with my 300 dollar amp. So, what should I do? Is it really worth it for me to keep this around when I could sell it and pick up so more relevant gear, and a cheap speaker? I'd talk to my band, but as it's essentially mine and I'd do the selling..

I guess, what do I do? I could sell it for about 180 or 200, (a guy on HC offered), this is enough to get a jet city matching cab for my head. ORRRRRRRRRRRRR, sell it, buy a cheap weber (whats cheaper? anything?) then spend the other cash on something else. Guitar pedals, new tubes, etc.

HALP

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 9:52 pm
by mickie08
depends, who bought the PA speakers in the first place. Just because you have use of them does not give you right to hawl them for $ unless you paid for them.

Second, what shape is the speaker in. the other day you mentioned it was in rougher shape than the one you posted (I believe). If it is close to needing re-coned, etc then its value drops tremendously.

All that said, if you are going to sell it, and it is still in good condition, you ned up about even by selling it and buying the cab for the Jet City. By the time you buy a reasonable decent speaker to put in your homemade cab, you still willnot have much left over. I would say go for the Jet City. Plus, matching speakers to amps (especially smaller wattage heads) can be a real ourney to find ones that sound good with that particular amp, so buying cheap replacement off Ebay or something may just give you a shitty soundung cab that is worth nothing.

So, either keep it as is, or sell for the Jet city, but only if your bandmates are cool with it.

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 9:57 pm
by robroe
all i know is that JBL's are in fender because Dick Dale used to blow up every kind of speaker Leo would put in Dicks amps. the JBL's were the only thing that didn't melt

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 9:57 pm
by Sloan
Try a regular guitar speaker in your amp to see if you like it. from what i can gather that jbl is more like a pa/bass speaker that's been changed a little to suit guitar stuff? a guitar-specific speaker may sound different.

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:01 pm
by cobascis
We split the PA, then replaced the speaker. I'm not sure how 'closed to needing recone, it is. It works fine but there are DENTS in the cone. Am I screwed as a result?

Weber speaker: 35, 50 or so shipped.

Say I make 180.

180-50=130.

This is all basically me fantasizing about Made by Mike pedals that I don't need..

I'd really like the Jet City 2x12 -- I think that give me more clean head room (by increasing volume a tad? eh?), but I dunno how to get that extra $100.. Selling pedals is drastic :lol:

or the shady Bugera 2x12, but no reviews on it..

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:02 pm
by cobascis
Sloan wrote:Try a regular guitar speaker in your amp to see if you like it. from what i can gather that jbl is more like a pa/bass speaker that's been changed a little to suit guitar stuff? a guitar-specific speaker may sound different.
Yeah I read that it's the non guitar D120, + and f for Fender, basically :). Used in twins, though..

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:19 pm
by dots
if it's worth anything, i don't think there's any problem with you selling it and keeping the money. i mean, it's not like we're talking about a pouch of gold nuggets worth 10's of thousands in there. is a couple hundred bucks. big deal. the bigger question is if you believe in the speaker's mojo for yourself and whether or not $200 is worth that to you.

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:29 pm
by cobascis
dots wrote:if it's worth anything, i don't think there's any problem with you selling it and keeping the money. i mean, it's not like we're talking about a pouch of gold nuggets worth 10's of thousands in there. is a couple hundred bucks. big deal. the bigger question is if you believe in the speaker's mojo for yourself and whether or not $200 is worth that to you.
Problem being, this is

a. the first cabinet I've owned (built)

b. the first 12" speaker I've owned

I have nothing to compare it to. How do speakers blow ? I was thinking due to its age, I might as well cash it in now rather that wait for some rowdy band practice to break it?

Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 11:07 pm
by dots
they blow for a number of reasons, but i think the most common is incorrect impedance. i'd see if you could borrow a speaker from somebody else to see what it sounds like. at the end of the day, you may not feel like fucking with it.

Posted: Thu Jan 21, 2010 2:13 am
by dub
If you're happy with your sound, keep it. The speakers are obviously sought after for a reason, if it suit your purposes and there's no issues, be stoked you've got it. (consider it money in the gear bank for down the line?)

Speakers are the weakest link in my chain right now, because of a silly gear switch. Turns out the neo celestions in a cheap vox cab were way better than the standard marshall T-75s..

Posted: Sun Jan 24, 2010 2:24 am
by Skip
just be careful-- sometimes doing nothing is a great move-- grasshopper

Posted: Sun Jan 24, 2010 5:21 am
by Pens
I say do it, get a Weber, band mates will never question anything. Show up with a new cab and they might ask how you afforded it.

Get a Weber and get some pedals. Done.

Posted: Mon Jan 25, 2010 11:01 am
by NickS
cobascis wrote:How do speakers blow ?
It's pretty hard to blow modern speakers compared with the old days. In my experience of blowing speakers (and dismantling the wreckage), mostly too much power either burns out the coil or damages the insulation so the turns short out resulting in lost power, strange noises if the short is not solid and potential damage to the amp - especially solid-state amps where a brief short can result in fused out. Vice versa - a dead SS amp (ouput short to a DC power rail) can put out large amounts of current and burn out your speaker in a few seconds. That won't happen if the bias screws up on your output valve on a tube amp.

On vintage speakers back in the day the voice coil was laquered to the paper/card former (bobbin) and even a brief overload could result in all or part of the coil becoming detached from the former (I'm thinking particularly of my experience with Fane here), resullting in a very buzzy sound. Epoxy was a leap forward, and tape-wound coils, and modern former materials. I would hope that even new "vintage" speakers would use modern adhesives and formers to make them less likely to blow. I did once rewind a burnt-out coil but I couldn't get the cone centred well enough to work well; there are professional kits available now.