djk

It looks like a clean sweep for the Ashdown, which was my thought. Hopefully there's no problems either way with the exchange.

I've been offered a choice of these two amps as a swap for a cabinet. My playing consists of the odd open mic night with a friend and a regular small jam session. Being in my 70's I'm not expecting to play the O2 or the Albert Hall so volume isn't high on my list of requirements, in fact I've just built two BassChat BC110 cabs using speakers from an old Asdown 210, each rated at around 150 watts. I'm also about to build a 1x15, again using an Ashdown driver. This time rated at 200 watts, so I'd have the option of running a 1x10 with the 1x15 @ 8 ohms, capable of handing IRO 350 watts if ever there was a need. Both the amps are rated in excess of the capabilities of the drivers, but at 4 ohms. The Warick is rated at 300W @ 4 ohms, the Ashdown 800 watts, again @ 4 ohms. My career was in electronics so I understand all about impedance and that either amp connected to a 16 ohm driver it will produce less volume. Both amps are solid state, so no problems using high impedance drivers as there would be with a tube amp. I'm sensible so will not be cranking up the volume to max. So my question is, which one would you chose? There's agood reason for wanting to swap rather than sell the cabinet, so selling and using the money to buy something else is not an option, otherwise I'd buy another TC Elecronic 250 Thrust, as I have one already and use it with one of the 1x10's Many thanks for your thoughts. (I think I spend as much time building gear as playing these days)

Not perfect but I'm pleased with it. Not your average black cab.

Bigger casters arn't gonna help me get it up these mothers. My music room/studio is above the garage, it was bad enough trying to get a Laney RB8 combo up there, so bad I had to get my son to move it for me. It's got to be chop it or swap it, I did check with the wife but was told I couldn't keep it in the bedroom 😞 Update:- I plugged it into my TC Electronic amp this afternoon and connected up a bass, and...... it made a sound. I wiggled the three way sitch to all three positions and it works. Still not had the back off yet.

First I'd like to thank everyone for their comments and advice, which as usual were very constructive and appreciated. I've been giving what to do some thought and have come up with this plan. As I said at the begining, I'll never use the cabinet as it stands. I will never play a venue that would warrent it, let alone at 72 with dodgy knees and shoulders be able to move it. I agree with those that commented, it would be a sacrilege to chop it about and pull the drivers out. I was given this for free and the very generious person that gave it to me knew that I only wanted it in order to remove the drivers and build them into smaller enclosures. It's just not right for me to try to sell it on, however I do have an plan. I'd be willing to swap the cabinet, as is for either a smaller cabinet, drivers or at a push some other bass gear or guitar. I think that way I can square my conscience. I haven't yet had the oppotunity of plugging in an amp and testing the cabinet or opening it up. But I though I'd put the idea out there and see what others thought. I'm bassed in Essex and if anyone is interested they would have to collect, it took two of us to get it in and out of my car. Once the condition is understood, I'll also post it in the for sale forum.

Thank you for the information, it's very much appreciated. When I get time this week I'm going to take time to check it out, including taking the back off and attempting to identify the drivers. I get a sense that I shouldn't mess with the cabinet, which leaves me wondering what to do with it. I liked the idea of using it to try to raise some money for a charity, but would have no idea of it's value which I guess will vary depending on what is or isn't working. I'm in the UK if that helps.

I've only just collected it today so not yet had a chance to look at what's inside driver wise. From what I can find out on the web the 15" an EEVM, the 10" and Eminence Legend CA10-8 and the 6's are Ampeg or Eminence again. I'll know more when I get the back off, and post the information here.

Last time posted I was looking to build two Basschat 110 cabinets using the speakers from an Ashdown 2x10. Both cabinets are now useable and sound great and I thought that was it for a while, then......... I've been given an old Mesa Boogie 1516 cabinet, that holds 1x15 + 1x10 + 2x6 and a high frequency driver. It's the model with the 3 way switch on the back and a single jack socket. Now there's no way I'm ever going to use this cabinet as is so my thoughts have turned to doing the following, which I'd like to know your thoughts on. The cabinet is actually two distinct enclosures, so I was thinking to remove the smaller drivers and cut the cabinet down to a 1x15 (which I probably still wouldn't have a use for). Build a small enclosure for the 2x6" drivers, along the size of the 110 so I could combine them if needed, and then put the remaining components to one side. I don't want to sell the cabinet as it stands, I was given it for free and feel that it wouldn't be right and anyway once again the tolex is torn and damaged a little. What are your thoughts?

Firstly can I thank all of you for the help, guidance and patience it has been and continues to be much appreciated. Having tried to get my head around everything that's been said here's my plan. I'm more than happy with the two BC110's as they are. I've not run them together but individually they are both fine as is. So I'm going to leave well enough alone and just finish off the appearance (sometime). They are perfect for what I need. I have quite a bit of plywood so I'm going to make a new baffle for the old Ashdown cabinet and put the Eminence 15 in it as a sealed cab. No vent no tweeter, and if it sounds OK the I'll strip down the tolex and cover it in van carpet to match the 110's. I'm only doing this as I have everything at hand to do job. I expect with my clumsiness if the 15 is left lying around I'll only put my foot through the cone t some point. As I mentioned somewhere in this trail, I also have a couple of Laney Richter Combo's that I can use if I every need to. Thanks again to everyone for putting up with my ramblings on the adventure. At some point when (perhaps IF) I finish them I'll post some images. Now its on the finishing the VOX Phantom short scale tribute bass I'm also in the process of building. David

Bill, many thanks. Much appreciated.

David / Phil, Many thanks for the input, it's much appreciated. I've attached images of both the driver and tweeter, my mistake it's not a Celestion but another Eminence. This time it looks like its an ME 15-2008, 8 ohms. A little quick digging and the TSPs are alleged to be : Qts 0.59, Vas 224 l,Qes 0.67 fs 46Hz. That's all I could find quickly. David, to answer the points you raised, no I hadn't used the Ashdown cabinet before I pulled it apart, except for a quick test when I bought it to make sure the drivers weren't blown. The wiring on the panel had been in part disconnected, and one jack socket had disappeared inside. most of the remaining wiring was left in situ so I maybe able to reconstruct hw it was wired given that there are three coloured wires, red, black and orange. The internal dimensions, as best I can measure them, of the old Ashdown cabinet are 55cm x45cm x38cm, which I make around 94L. Without removing the adhesive on the tweeter cap I can't see the value, regarding the resistor (or could it be two?) that looks like 10W 15 ohms. but an image check suggests it may actually be two resistors perhaps in series. I'm happy to remove the adhesive around the components if needed to see if I can actually identify the values, or even remove them and try to measure them as I have a meter that's alleged to measure capacitance. I do hope I'm not taking up too much of your time with all of this, as a child of the 50's repair and restore in engrained in my DNA. 😊 David

The second cabinet is now mostly structurally complete, will add a photograph later. Moving on there are a couple of further things I'd like to do. Firstly, I'd like to put the tweeter that came out of the Ashdown cabinet into one of the 2x10's but will it work? The Eminence 2x10 was 8 ohm, 2 16 ohm speakers in parallel. Will it still be OK to use it in one of the 1x10's? I also have a Celestion 15" speaker, It's in a box at the back of the garage so not sure of model and impedance. I was thinking of cutting down the old Ashdown 2x10 cabinet with a new baffle to use. Am I being stupid? As I've said before my playing now is mainly jam sessions and the odd open mic night. I have the luxury of having a small music room/studio at home so the 1x15 would be used there where volume is not a priority. Also I just like making/repairing/repurposing things and this appeared to be an interesting project to combine two unused items into one unused item 😒 Ayy thoughts

Well, the first cabinet is finished(ish). It just needs covering and tidying up. With a large degree of trepidation I tried it for the first time tonight. I was a little concerned as the amp output is rated for a 4 ohm cabinet and the speaker is 16 ohm. Having spent the whole of my working career in electronics I knew it was safe, as the load was higher which meant the output would be considerably less. But what would it sound like as I'd used a different speaker than the cabinet was designed for. Well it sounds great. With all the EQ controls on the TC Electronic amp set at 12 o/c I had a huge range of tonal control just using the guitars tone control, and as for volume it's all I wanted, enough for my jam sessions and more than enough for small venue gigs or open mic's. I decided to omit the horn on this one, I am thinking of using the tweeter that came out of the damaged Ashdown cabinet in the second build. If it doesn't work I've enough ply left over to make several more front baffles. I didn't extend the port, I used it as it came at 120mm, so perhaps some tweaking there at a later date, but to be honest I don't think it needs it. When I turned it up in the dinning room it rattled the light fitting in the ceiling. I've bought some 4 way stretch camper van carpet and spray glue to cover it, in red to match the amp. Thank you so much to Phil, Bill and everyone involved in the original design and in supporting me during the build.

Bill, according to the Eminence web site these were "Recommended for professional audio and bass guitar applications as a woofer/mid-bass or midrange in vented monitors, satellites and multi-way enclosures." I'm guessing that they were trying to cover all the bases (no pun intended) by implying they could be employed for a wide range of purposes.

Thanks, that makes perfect sense. Hopefully when I speak with Ashdown they can confirm a few things that will make it clearer. So much help and assistance from everyone, I'm quite humbled.

A further bit update. I got an email back from Ashdown and they appear to be quite helpful. Rather than email anything they are going to give me a call, hopefully next week. For a company that is not getting anything, revenue wise, from this I'm really impressed. My background is as an electronics engineer before I retired, I stared off in comms and ended up in IT, so I understand that you can't just throw a speaker into any size of box and expect it to perform well. So off to do some research I went. Now I know that "a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing" but I had a go. Assuming that, as many think, these are Eminence Beta 10-B's, or a derivative of them, I checked the enclosure specs for them on the Eminence website, copy attached. Although the enclosure size and that of the BC110T are close, there is a difference in port numbers and size. I hate to ask for help, but can someone comment on these differences. Could I continue to use the port specified in the BC110T or should I go for the ones recommended in the attached. One further point. Initially I am just going to install the driver, and not the horn. My plan is to go step by step and assess performance one change at a time. Thats the engineer in me. Thanks again P.S. This is as much a project as something to use in anger. I have a couple of decent rig's I can use if I had the opportunity to play in a larger venue. Being retired I need something to occupy my time. I'm also building a VOX Phantom Tribute bass, converting a child's six string acoustic into a UBass and recently bought a Dan Armstrong body blank which will be grafted to a short scale neck I have lying around.

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Bill/Phil, Many thanks for the information. I must admit I did check the Eminence web site and thought they might be these. Cheekily I asked Eminence for the spec and they referred me to Ashdown, who are just down the road away's from where I live. I've asked them the same questions and will see what comes back. I'm going to build to the cab to spec and see how it goes. As I said at the outset these will be just for jam sessions and small pub open mic nights where they don't want a bass through the PA. I quite like the Old School sound, my favourite genre is blues, so it may well work in my favour. Regarding extending the port, I was thinking of using a bit of 4" pipe, slit and taped to slide over the end so I can move it in and out to see how it changes the sound. I've got plenty of ply left, had to buy a full sheet in the end, to make new baffles and change the speakers for the Celestion's further down the line if necessary. Once again thanks everyone for their help and support. David

OK, things have moved on a bit albeit slowly. I decided to go down the build rather than restore route, mainly for weight reasons and that I don't need the full power of the 2x10. I decided to build two of the BC110T cabinets, then I can either use one or two as needed. I have a really good timber merchants nearby who will cut timer to your requirements. So I used OptiCutter, an online layout system to produce a cutting plan for 2 cabinets and sent the PDF to the merchants who cut it for me. Total cost £32. I've manage to build the basics of the first cabinet, some pictures attached. The speakers are now out of the Ashdown cabinet and they have turned out to be from Eminence. I've emailed them to see if they can provide the specs. I have also incuded a photo of the speaker in case anyone here can shed some light on them. It all going well and I'll post further progress as I go along

When I retired I joined the local Men's Shed where we have a range of professional and semi professional woodworking equipment and a decent workshop, which is where I'll be putting them together. I also have a local timber merchant that will cut the ply to plan, they charge 60p a cut. Just hat the quote for all the ply for two cabinets, 12mm, cut to size at around £45. At least I know the panels will be square and it will all fit in the boot of the car. Not sure yet if I'm going to spray the finished cabs with a textured paint or cover with van carpet, fittings will be from AliExpress as I used for the 1x12 I made. All up I expect the cabs to come in at around £50 each, all up. So not too bad.

Phil, Many thanks for the reply. If I need to change the drivers for Celestion ones I can do that once the cabs are built. My plan is to first off use the cross over from the Ashdown cab and see how that goes. Thanks again for the feedback.

I appreciate I'm a little late to this party, but I've decided to use this design (appreciated) to build 2 1x10 cabs. I'm my 7th decade and have only recently, in the last two years, got back into playing bass. I played semi professionally many years ago. My playing now is mainly jam sessions and the occasional open mic with a friend, hopefully more in the future. I've noticed that many venues, I live in Essex in the UK so it's usually pub's and small bars, don't like a bass directly into their PA, which I can understand. So I have a small 30W Laney bass combo that I lug around, but it's not really that good. OK in a small jam session, but gets lost on volume and sound quality, as it would, anywhere else. I also have Laney RB8 and RB5 combo's but at my age these are also too heavy to lug around for a 3 number open mic. So I decided I needed to do something about this, hence the plan to build 1x10's, which will get used with a TC Electronic BQ250 Bass Head. Looking round for speakers, being retired I'm on a tight budget here, I recently came across an Ashdown 2x10 with good speakers, but the cabinet covering had seen better days, for £35. so the plan is to pull the speakers, crossover, etc. and sell the cabinet on. After a bit of a long winded introduction, now to the point of the post. Wanting to have the minimum of wastage when buying the plywood, I used an online tool called OptiCutter,https://www.opticutter.com/, to work this out. It looks like I can get both cabinets out of one half sheet of play and one quarter sheet. I've attached a copy of the cutting layout in case anyone is interested. If it helps I'll update this post as I go along with the build. Once again apologies for the long post. David 10 in speaker cabinet cutting list for two cabinets.pdf

First I'd like to thank those above for their replies so far. It looks like I'll have a go at the Basschat 1x10, or two of them. One with horn and one not. For those interested, this is the state of the cabinet I bought, which I'll look to pass on once the speakers are out.