ADDING external speakers...

nasticanasta

nasticanasta

New member
I've been using 2 fender princeton stereo chorus amps (the old red knobs) in series to achieve a 4x10 (2 pairs of 10's in stereo), I'd like to add external speakers (1 left, 1 right) to achieve my 4x10....(again, 2 pairs of 10's in stereo)..... as there is no outlet or jack...Anything special I should do, or do i just add 2 jacks?
 
It's possible to do it, but probably not a good idea. If there's no external speaker jacks on the amp, then the amp prolly is designed for the exact impedance of what the speakers are wired to. Be VERY careful adding speakers, if you make the overall impedance lower you could damage your amp.

If you're gonna wire more speakers, you have to do it in series, or some combination of series/parallel, you can NOT lower the overall impedance that the amp sees! This can NOT be stressed enough! If you wire speakers in parallel, which is how typical cabs are wired, you'll draw more power from the amp at the risk of frying it. You could easily be sucking 200w+ out of that amp if you do it wrong.

The problem with series is the overall impedance will go up, causing total watts delivered to go down.. Totally safe for the amp, but it'll push less total power into even more speakers. You currently have 140w into 2 speakers (70w ea), add a couple speakers, then be pushing 100w into 4 speakers (25w ea). Now you may not be pushing the speakers hard enough to get the sound you're expecting b/c speakers have different sound qualities when they get to the limits of their excursion. The best you could do is to get all 140w into all 4 speakers evenly, which would be 35w/speaker, half the rated power..

Also - If the speakers aren't all the same impedance, some will get more power than the others, so you gotta watch that too...
 
no this is a missconception towards fender princeton stero chorus'.... I don't know why i see this all the time, but a fender stereo chorus is only 50 watts total (51 actualy) its 25.5 watts per side. personaly i wouldnt want more than 50... too much power and since everything is miked and run through the P.A. anymore who cares. Plus I play small bars and clubs it's all I will ever need. I've always loved a stereo sound.... it's either this ( adding one speaker per side to make a 4x10 stereo unit) or buying 2 more princetons or scrap these and go find low wattage units as in allan holdsworths 2 hughes & ketner switchblades both with external speaker cabs. though i prefer 10's to 12's.
 
Oh ok, well I did a quick google search for that amp an saw a 140w version of that amp.. Whatever, everything in my first posts still stands. Lets say you get 2 identical speakers as whats in your amp, which would be ideal.. Ive never been happy with mismatched speakers getting run off one amp. So you have 2 options:

1: Wire em in series with the existing speakers, your impedance will double, and your amp will push less power, prolly 35w total instead of 50.. each speaker's getting less than 10w..

2: Wire em in parallel, your impedance will drop to 1/2 what it is now. Your amp will push more power, prolly something like 80w. Each speaker is getting 20w now, but is your 50w amp capable of delivering 80w without frying?

I've fried many car amps by trying to wire speakers a little lower. A 4-ohm-stable amp will push into a 3 ohm load, and be louder than it woulda been at 4 ohms, for a while... Never tried with PA gear, but the concept applies to any amp. If you can't find any info about minimum load, I wouldn't risk it. You need an amp designed to push into lower loads, which basically means any amp with an ext. speaker jack.
 
I thought so. I will just get 2 more princetons... it's a hell of alot cheaper... I just thought I could cause when you run 2 princetons like I am... the 2nd is just a slave.. no controls work on the slave everything is controled thruogh the main, plus I could have sworn I've seen moded princetons before.
 
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