Any combo or cab speaker driver experimenters out there?

[212Mavguy]

Not that Mesa doesn't have a long history of putting nice parts in their amps, but I just did a speaker sub in my Maverick 2/12.

The installed pair of speakers were a very fresh pair of nearly new old stock JBL MI 12, 8 ohms, wired in series for 16 ohms, stock speaker is pair of 16 ohm Celestion Vintage 30 wired in parallell for 8 ohms.

These JBL's were full in the bottoms and mids, top was detailed, smooth, refined, not ice picky at all, and both clean and dirty tones were expressed with a warm effortless smoothless. They were very efficient. I have rolled quite a few speakers in that amp, the sound of these speakers was a wonderful surprise. Harmonics were abundant, and at the same time well controlled. A good way to explain is to say that if the player has the tones in his mind and fingers, these speakers will smoothly and gracefully express those tones in a particularly pleasant way. Note definition within lead channel dirty tone chords was better than any speaker previously heard in that amp. Despite the wonderful sound of their two g125 big brothers I have in another 2/12 cab, these JBL MI 12's are staying right where they are...in the Maverick. Their sound qualities at stage ang gig volume are jaw dropping. Think that this model of JBL would work well in BA and Mav 1/12.

 

[lyman]

i love a good speaker story! i'm going to revisit the speaker scene in regards to my maverick soon. i'm getting some much needed work on my guitars first, but after that i'm all about speakers.

i have no experience with any JBL model. interesting to hear about definition in the lead channel being better. i always thought that was one of the few weak points of that amp: not as much definition and a certain harshness in the lead channel. i'm usually in the rhythm channel with an overdrive pedal for distortion though (diamond j-drive, which has an OD side and a clean boost side).

one question: you said they're wired in series for 16 ohms. were you going out of the 8 ohm output on the amp?

 

[212Mavguy]

One thing I didn't say earlier is that I use a siemens e83cc in the first positiion of the dirty channel and a very well used Mullard shortplate folowing it in circuit. That produced a major change in the voice of that channel to something quite wonderful from something quite nasty. Use an active volume pedal for my clean boost. Power and rectifier tubes are not stock either. The lead channel is the traditional weak spot on that amp using stock tubes and speakers. I would never use a solid state distortion pedal in front of my Maverick, and I know that there are some great ones out there... but the lead channel tones are too good now. The lead chanel is every bit as special as the clean channel is now. The preamps in each channel of a Maverick are really quite special in their qualities. When given the right tubes, spectacular sounds get sent to the speakers.

JBL made some little known 12 and 15 inch musical instrument speakers that I have tried three models of. All were spectacular in construction and sound quality.

The 8 ohm speaker out on the Maverick is actually labeled 8-16 ohms. Using a greater load still falling within normal operating range results in a slightly more compressed, smooth sounding output. Found that out when swapping in and out some vintage 8 ohm vs. 16 ohm drivers.