1/4" patchbay for guitar speaker cabs. -load question?

[Jeff16years]

Hello.
in my control room, I have a rack of guitar heads (and combos without speakers). In my Iso booth i have a few gtr cabs (unfortunatly, with different ohm ratings) and I have speaker cables going to and fro

So, I don't know much about ohms, let me say that before I get started.

I'm thinking about getting a blank panel with 1/4" neutrik panelmounts. I would like to have the heads connected to the back of this panel all the time and be able to plug the speaker cables directly into it.
So, if I do this then I think I have to make some kind of a 1/4" connector with a resistor? or something on it to plug in when there is no speaker cab plugged in?

is this right? and if so how do make this load thing?
thanks. -jeff

[Jeff16years]

Geee... i guess I should have put "Neve clone" in the title of this thread????

[XSergeantD]

use your standby switch

[Farview]

Don't play through the amps that are not hooked up to a speaker. You will have to set the amps to the right impedance for the cabinet you are hooking it to.

You can get load resistors, they are big huge things that get very hot, not the best thing to be fooling around with on a patchbay.

[faeflora]

Originally Posted by Jeff16years

Hello.
in my control room, I have a rack of guitar heads (and combos without speakers). In my Iso booth i have a few gtr cabs (unfortunatly, with different ohm ratings) and I have speaker cables going to and fro

So, I don't know much about ohms, let me say that before I get started.

I'm thinking about getting a blank panel with 1/4" neutrik panelmounts. I would like to have the heads connected to the back of this panel all the time and be able to plug the speaker cables directly into it.
So, if I do this then I think I have to make some kind of a 1/4" connector with a resistor? or something on it to plug in when there is no speaker cab plugged in?

is this right? and if so how do make this load thing?
thanks. -jeff

AFAIK you won't have to worry about load. Just make sure you wire everything with SPEAKER WIRE and NOT audio wire. You should have two identical conductors and NO SHIELD for the cable.

BTW if you like pain you can get proco fatmax cable that is 12 gauge and wire the bay and cables with that. Soldering that stuff though is sortta unpleasant but it will help with the dampening factor if you are making huge long runs.

Your runs really shouldn't be over 20 feet tho.

[Jeff16years]

Originally Posted by faeflora

AFAIK you won't have to worry about load. Just make sure you wire everything with SPEAKER WIRE and NOT audio wire. You should have two identical conductors and NO SHIELD for the cable.

BTW if you like pain you can get proco fatmax cable that is 12 gauge and wire the bay and cables with that. Soldering that stuff though is sortta unpleasant but it will help with the dampening factor if you are making huge long runs.

Your runs really shouldn't be over 20 feet tho.

well, what i'm using is definately speaker cable but they are 40' long each, i haven't had a problem yet.

so as long as I put them into standby i will be ok with load?

i thought that as long as they were powered up that there would have to be a load.

BTW what happens if I'm using a 4ohm cab into an 8ohm amp out put (or vise versa)
thanks.
-jeff

[faeflora]

Originally Posted by Jeff16years

well, what i'm using is definately speaker cable but they are 40' long each, i haven't had a problem yet.

so as long as I put them into standby i will be ok with load?

i thought that as long as they were powered up that there would have to be a load.

BTW what happens if I'm using a 4ohm cab into an 8ohm amp out put (or vise versa)
thanks.
-jeff

Yes, if you're in standby you'll be ok.

(someone correct me if i'm wrong) If you're using a 4 ohm cab with an 8 ohm output, that's bad. You could be underpowering the speakers. The reverse would be fine.

While a 40 foot speaker cable will work, it probbaly won't sound as good a 4 footer. Don't believe me? Try it out.

[Berolzheimer]

You NEED to make sure that the various connectors don't have any elctrical connecttion to each other- remember most panel mount 1/4 connectors will have the ground connected to the outer part of the connector, so the grounds of all the speakers will be connected to each other through the metal of the panel- very bad. You might want to use speakon connectors instead, or a wooden panel or something.

[Jeff16years]

Originally Posted by Berolzheimer

You NEED to make sure that the various connectors don't have any elctrical connecttion to each other- remember most panel mount 1/4 connectors will have the ground connected to the outer part of the connector, so the grounds of all the speakers will be connected to each other through the metal of the panel- very bad. You might want to use speakon connectors instead, or a wooden panel or something.

ahh yes thats right. I think that the Neutrik 1/4" that I have used in the past do not connect the shield to the panel, but I will make sure. maybe I'll make a wooden one

[XSergeantD]

Originally Posted by Jeff16years

ahh yes thats right. I think that the Neutrik 1/4" that I have used in the past do not connect the shield to the panel, but I will make sure. maybe I'll make a wooden one

Go with speakon connectors. Try the NLJ2MD, this is a combo jack so it'll take either speakon or 1/4" as input and it fits in a stnd D Series socket (XLR). This way you can make speakon to 1/4" cables for your studio to go from the panel to the head or panel to the cabinet, and nobody will take your nice long 1/4" to 1/4" speaker cables cause they'll be Speakon to 1/4". No more lost cables

[stanislaskasava]

If you don't want to mess with making some kind of load resistor contraption or powerbrake thing, I think you could simply make a dummy speaker cabinet to add in series with the 'real' cabinet...

I think you can usually find a cheap car subwoofer at some pawn shop for $10. Get one that is 4 ohms, put it in a wood box (literally sealed inside the box so you can't see the speaker from the outside) and then add another jack for each column of your 'patch bay'... Make sure you wire the extra jack in series with the other speaker jack and then you can plug in the dummy speaker whenever you use a 4 ohm cabinet with an 8 ohm amp. Because the two cabinets would be in series, the amp will see 4 ohms + 4 ohms = 8 ohms and you won't risk overheating the output transformer. If you use a shorting type jack for the extra jack (don't risk it for the regular speaker jack) then you won't have to make a shorting plug to keep the circuit closed when the dummy isn't connected. Or you could just wire a switch across the extra jack and turn it on when only using one speaker.

The dummy speaker probably won't make a lot of noise because... it's a crappy ineffecient car sub sealed in a box... and you put it far away from the microphone (haha, not in the iso booth). It may also provide you with the 'benefit' of a lower dB in the iso booth when the amp is cranked because part of the power is consumed by the dummy.

If you need to connect 8 ohm cabinets to 4 ohm amps, you won't hurt anything (you'll just lose potential dB volume of the amp) and you won't need the dummy unless you want to make the amp even quieter (then the total load would be 8 ohms + 4 ohms = 12 ohms).

Doesn't your amp rack get hot when all the amps are on? BTW, if you make the dummy thing, you might want to check it periodically, because if the speaker blows, you'll be back to 4 ohms and risking the amp again.

[Jeff16years]

Originally Posted by stanislaskasava

If you don't want to mess with making some kind of load resistor contraption or powerbrake thing, I think you could simply make a dummy speaker cabinet to add in series with the 'real' cabinet...

I think you can usually find a cheap car subwoofer at some pawn shop for $10. Get one that is 4 ohms, put it in a wood box (literally sealed inside the box so you can't see the speaker from the outside) and then add another jack for each column of your 'patch bay'... Make sure you wire the extra jack in series with the other speaker jack and then you can plug in the dummy speaker whenever you use a 4 ohm cabinet with an 8 ohm amp. Because the two cabinets would be in series, the amp will see 4 ohms + 4 ohms = 8 ohms and you won't risk overheating the output transformer. If you use a shorting type jack for the extra jack (don't risk it for the regular speaker jack) then you won't have to make a shorting plug to keep the circuit closed when the dummy isn't connected. Or you could just wire a switch across the extra jack and turn it on when only using one speaker.

The dummy speaker probably won't make a lot of noise because... it's a crappy ineffecient car sub sealed in a box... and you put it far away from the microphone (haha, not in the iso booth). It may also provide you with the 'benefit' of a lower dB in the iso booth when the amp is cranked because part of the power is consumed by the dummy.

If you need to connect 8 ohm cabinets to 4 ohm amps, you won't hurt anything (you'll just lose potential dB volume of the amp) and you won't need the dummy unless you want to make the amp even quieter (then the total load would be 8 ohms + 4 ohms = 12 ohms).

Doesn't your amp rack get hot when all the amps are on? BTW, if you make the dummy thing, you might want to check it periodically, because if the speaker blows, you'll be back to 4 ohms and risking the amp again.

hey thats a good idea,
can you smell smoke? cause you have me thinking. i wonder if i could some how have them half normalled to the dummy cab and break it when i plug in a working cab.

[Farview]

The amp needs to be set at the impedance of the cabinet. Period.

[stanislaskasava]

Haha, it was past my bed time when I said this:

"BTW, if you make the dummy thing, you might want to check it periodically, because if the speaker blows, you'll be back to 4 ohms and risking the amp again."

...if the dummy is wired in series and it blows up (unlikely that a guitar amp would blow a sub), then you would know it instantly because the other speaker would go silent. You wouldn't be back to 4 ohms, but back to 'no speaker connected'. So you would *dive* to the amp and shut it off to avoid risking damage.

"i wonder if i could some how have them half normalled to the dummy cab and break it when i plug in a working cab."

You can't plug in more than one amp to a speaker. You would need a separate dummy for each. I was just thinking that a dummy cab would be easy to find parts for... and not really any circuit design required... maybe some load resistors are more appropriate since they could probably be mounted within the 'patchbay' or the rack and switched in and out.

Something sounds wierd about how you want the system to work. Do you want to connect any amp to any speaker in less than 5 seconds without ever turning an amp off? Did you previously work in a car stereo store? Maybe you should just buy one of those switching matrixes that they use to demo decks and amps vs. speakers.

[Jeff16years]

Originally Posted by stanislaskasava

Haha, it was past my bed time when I said this:

"BTW, if you make the dummy thing, you might want to check it periodically, because if the speaker blows, you'll be back to 4 ohms and risking the amp again."

...if the dummy is wired in series and it blows up (unlikely that a guitar amp would blow a sub), then you would know it instantly because the other speaker would go silent. You wouldn't be back to 4 ohms, but back to 'no speaker connected'. So you would *dive* to the amp and shut it off to avoid risking damage.

"i wonder if i could some how have them half normalled to the dummy cab and break it when i plug in a working cab."

You can't plug in more than one amp to a speaker. You would need a separate dummy for each. I was just thinking that a dummy cab would be easy to find parts for... and not really any circuit design required... maybe some load resistors are more appropriate since they could probably be mounted within the 'patchbay' or the rack and switched in and out.

Something sounds wierd about how you want the system to work. Do you want to connect any amp to any speaker in less than 5 seconds without ever turning an amp off? Did you previously work in a car stereo store? Maybe you should just buy one of those switching matrixes that they use to demo decks and amps vs. speakers.

i think probably what i'll do is make a panel like i described in the original post and use stand by when switching cabinets. that is probably the safest and easyest way to do it.
thanks for all of your help!
-jeff