My 72 Kustom keeps shitting out!!!

blueroommusic

blueroommusic

you want this big boy?
So....my rig is a kustom 3x15 with a 200B head...about 4 months ago I replaced the speakers in it with new ceramic magnet speakers, because I had blown one of the originals...so last night I plug in my bass, and wtf!!! another blown speaker...granted I play very heavy loud stoner rock with a few different distortion pedals (check the English Muff'n out on bass; it fuckin' kills) and other various effects...but should a brand new set of speakers really crap out this quickly?...do you think jensen's have a warranty? It's not like i'm trying to produce the brown note out of this thing...I just don't want to have to buy new speakers every fuckin' year...Any thoughts?
 
It's difficult to say without more details - as in, what are your replacement speakers?
 
well, that's not a bass speaker for one thing .... and it only handles 50 watts which is low for something that you're gonna run bass thru.
You need to get some bass guitar-specific speakers and I'd want them to handle at least 75 watts each and 100 would be better.
 
____________________
Electrical Characteristics
Nominal Impedance 8/16 Ω
Rated Power 100 W
Musical Power 200 W
Sensitivity@1W, 1m 98.0 dB
____________________

and the 200W bass head has 2 channels, so, I think they should be more than sufficient...and it was one of the most trusted amp guys in town...
 
I've had luck with two speakers. 1. Sica makes a 15" that I've abused and it sounds nice for not a lot of money. 2. Jensen makes a Neo 15 for bass that sounds super neutral (so your Kustom would like it as the amp itself is nice) and they probably weigh about 1/3 of your ceramic speakers and they can handle a stupid amount of abuse. I've ran my Sound City 50 plus through a 2x12 of Neos and it handled it without blinking.
 
If you overextend a voice coil on a speaker - easy to do with a non-bass speaker - you can fry it very quickly, considering the transients that a bass can produce.

Also, in your original post you said, "so last night I plug in my bass, and wtf!!! another blown speaker." Does this mean that you have the amp on and turned up when you are plugging your bass guitar into the head? If so, the momentary DC signal presented to the speaker can be very damaging if the amp is turned up. I also wonder if your pedal setup isn't boosting the gain to levels beyond what the speakers are designed for.

Just a few thoughts.

Two reasons that speakers blow are:
-- Too much input wattage, causing the voice coil to overheat and fail
-- DC input, even momentary (like when you plug an instrument into a live amp) causes the voice coil to experience overcurrent and fail
 
no...i don't plug my bass in while the amp is on...it is possible that my pedals are driving things a bit too hard...that being said, I put these ceramic magnet speakers in, because I was told that they would most closely resemble the tone of the originals...I was told this by both Jensen and my amp and guitar guy, who BTW has never ever led me in the wrong direction...I'm kind of at a loss, unless these suckers have a warranty...oh well...guess my college music instructor was right about volume being an aesthetic of a band...just never thought I would have so many speaker problems...maybe i'll just swap them out for some "new-fangled" metal magnet speakers...BTW, the model is the C15K, not the C15N
 
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blueroommusic said:
..BTW, the model is the C15K, not the C15N
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well see, that makes a difference. I couldn't figure out why you were saying they're rated at 100 watts when I was looking at the Jensen site and it said 50 watts! :D
I doubt that plugging your bass in while the amp was on would have any effect on anything. I've done that my whole life and have never harmed anything by doing so.
But the distortion p[edal is another matter. A 5o watt amp, for example, can blow a 100 watt speaker if it's run into clipping because clipping is such a high energy sound. Same thing with distortion pedals ..... very high energy and tough on speakers, especially with bass.
There are other things it could be ..... an old amp like that could have some DC in the output or other electronic issues that'll cook a speaker.
You may need your amp guy to look it over.

ah....memories .... my first real bass rig some 40 years ago was a Kustom with two of the 3-15 cabs. I remember it as a fairly competent bass rig, even by todays' standards.
 
yeah, it's an awesome sounding rig, especially for a solid state...I love the tone even more than the many other ampeg vintage and new rigs i've owned in the past...2 3x15 cabs!!...now that's some monster tone...I've been looking in to getting a set of matching kustom 6x8 cabs to add some punch to my sound...I found a pair of the 6x8 cabs a while back, but they got snatched up within 2 days of being at the store...anyways, thanks for everyone's input...I guess i'll just have to take it to my guy.
 
Lt. Bob said:
I doubt that plugging your bass in while the amp was on would have any effect on anything. I've done that my whole life and have never harmed anything by doing so.
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I've never hurt anything by doing it, either, but the sound hurts me.
 
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