Speaker combination with and Alnico Blue

[bcmatt]

I am building a ceriatone DC30 and am making it a 212 combo amp. I've already bought one speaker that I got for a bit of a deal (not super deal). It's the Celestion Alnico Blue rated at 15 watt.
Anyways, I'm wondering if I have any good options of combining another type of speaker with it.
Tell me if I'm wrong, but it could be dangerous to combine it with a different speaker that is rated more than 5 watts different than it. (Is this true?)
I'm still looking for a second Blue, but I'm wondering if there are other good options.
I've heard that Matchless actually uses a G12H and a V30 (30W and 25W) to get a nice tone from it with the 2 speakers breaking up at different levels.
Anyways, any suggestions on options, or reccomendations? Thanks alot.

[PUCKBOY99]

I've never heard of any problems in mismatching wattage, but in honesty, I've never heard of it being done past the 5w rating of a V30/H30 kinda match.

I love mixing ceramic & alnicos....maybe try a ceramic Blue to mix with the alnico.

Or an H30 mixes nicely with it too.
________
American Recipes

[bcmatt]

OK Thanks. I'll look into those.
I'm not sure if I am understanding this correctly, but I get the idea about the overly mismatched wattages being bad in this case perhaps because it is a 30watt amp and if somehow the 15watt Blue ends up taking in more than half the power somehow if the speakers are different. But really, I don't know how this works, and I'd like to be educated on it.
Maybe the mismatched wattage suggestion I had received was not about the worry of damaging the speaker, but rather about the sound it would produce. Are higher wattage speakers either more or less efficient than lower wattage ones? Thus causing one of the mismatched speakers to put out alot more volume than the other, ruining the point of the 2 speaker combination?
Teach me please.

[Darkbluemurder]

Two speakers in parallel will take the same wattage from an amp (each takes half of it). So the wattage mismatch is not a problem in itself. Just take care that each speaker can handle the assigned load.

Things will be different when the speakers are connected in series. Maybe PRR could comment on this.

[WoodyWorld]

Eminence fang is a great match for the blue. It has a little more brightness to it - but it's been a favourite combination of mine for quite a while.....

I am building a ceriatone DC30 and am making it a 212 combo amp. I've already bought one speaker that I got for a bit of a deal (not super deal). It's the Celestion Alnico Blue rated at 15 watt.
Anyways, I'm wondering if I have any good options of combining another type of speaker with it.
Tell me if I'm wrong, but it could be dangerous to combine it with a different speaker that is rated more than 5 watts different than it. (Is this true?)
I'm still looking for a second Blue, but I'm wondering if there are other good options.
I've heard that Matchless actually uses a G12H and a V30 (30W and 25W) to get a nice tone from it with the 2 speakers breaking up at different levels.
Anyways, any suggestions on options, or reccomendations? Thanks alot.

[philmanatee]

I ran an altec 417 in series with my celestion blue for quite a while, and still go back to that setup occasionally. My blue had been reconed, so the rating was a bit higher than the stock 15watts. I also had a paper dustcap installed on the altec instead of the aluminum one. I ran my express at between 1 and 2 o'clock for quite a few gigs on this setup with no ill effects. Phil

[dartanion]

The Red Fang is a Blue Clone. Not the same but really close.

G12M or G12H Greenback or a G12H30 is a great match for the Blue. Or another Blue

[jedd63]

I have a Blue and a Hellatone 30 (G12H) in my 18 watt TMB. I have no desire to try anything else.

[briane]

well not entirely as it was explained to me...

I think darkbluemurder got it the closest with

Two speakers in parallel will take the same wattage from an amp (each takes half of it)

Now I think this also applies in series, as its really a load issue. Lets look at an example

2x12 - 1 at 15 watts, the other at 30 watts. Each speaker takes 50% of the load, so the 15 watter is drawing twice the juice of the 30 watter, and thus running at half the output impedance....Its also getting twice the output wattage that the 30 watt speaker is, in reference to the amps output wattage. This means the 15 is being pressed twice as hard as the 30 watter. So I think its obvious that with this mismatch the drive levels are drastically different, and so are the speakers response. try it, its very noticable.

I have had some salty sounding cabs when I mismatched by large amouts (say a 15 watt and a 60 watt), but if the speakers are relatively close, then you will never notice the drive and impedance differences, as their quite small.

The only danger is in blowing the smaller speaker. it depends on how powerful the amp is, and how big the mismatch is.

Hopefully I got my pos/neg signs right here, I am somewhat mentally dyslexic, but thats the gist of it.

[Mickey_C]

I wonder...

If the bad speaker goes dead open, then the remaining speaker is now twice the expected impedance (for instance you have two 16ohm speakers wired parallel, amp set for full output into 8 ohms).

The load reflected to the primary is doubled, so the primary impedance is doubled (the amp is still set to 8 ohms... but now only sees one 16 ohm speaker, which is twice the expected load).

Voltage is unchanged of course...

So power is now 1/2.

Just thinking out loud...

[herby660]

I have a DC30 from Nik and I use it through a G12H30 and Alnico Blue

Out of this world!!!!!

My amp sounds better than Matchless ... I hate those V30's

regards

Richard

[bcmatt]

Great guys! Thanks for all your help. This was most helpful. I haven't been here in a while but now I'm back. I did go ahead and choose a G12H to go with the blue and I am happy with it. My cabinet is almost finished to hold these with my amp that I built. While I wait for the cabinet I have played it a bit with the two speakers just sitting facing up on chairs. It seems that they compliment each other well, and I can't wait to get them in the combo cab.
Feel free to check out the site I made to document this whole process:
[/url]http://yeomansinstruments.blogspot.com/

[herby660]

Great Stuff,

They are such a good combination in this amp. very magical.

I run mine at 16 ohm (2 x 8ohm)

This i have discovered is the best as the 16ohm tapping sounds the best on the Ceriatone.

[bcmatt]

Oh really? so you run them in series instead of parallel? I haven't tried that yet. I just figured I would want the tighter sound of parallel.

[Zippy]

Now I think this also applies in series, as its really a load issue. Lets look at an example

2x12 - 1 at 15 watts, the other at 30 watts. Each speaker takes 50% of the load, so the 15 watter is drawing twice the juice of the 30 watter, and thus running at half the output impedance....Its also getting twice the output wattage that the 30 watt speaker is, in reference to the amps output wattage.

No.

Wattage is power handling CAPABILITY - actually a measure of current carrying capacity.

The actual power consumption and load sharing will depend on the real time impedance of each speaker with respect to the frequencies produced - assume them equal for most purposes (ie 8 ohms is 8 ohms). In that case, each speaker will carry the same amount of power. The one with the lower rated wattage will be closer to its limit, that's all. It's not an issue until you exceed the power rating of the lowest rated speaker.