celestion break in, or scumback or ???????

[CapnCrunch]

Hey,

I picked up an early to mid nineties Marshall 1960A with English Greenbacks. The guy that I bought it from said his buddy (who is, or was, the guitar player for Smashmouth) gave it to him. I said who? He said; You know the band that did the song for Shrek, you know the animated movie with the green ogre. I think it was All Star. I said, Oh Yeah! I remember. The band I was in 7 or 8 years ago actually did a cover of that song for a while.......

Now, to the point. I picked this cab up for a little under $300 and I bought it for my soon to be completed Rocket. I've been playing it with an AC15 clone, and it sounds great with an attenuator, but it is unmanagably, ear piercingly, bright without the attenuator. According to the guy I bought it from, it has been played a fair amount. So, I'm wondering if it would benefit from some of the break in procedures detailed in other threads here. I actually love the way the cab sounds with the exception of the overbearing high end. Everything else is awesome. It blows away my 2x12 which has a combo of a g12h30 and a Celestion Gold. The 2x12 sounds great, it just doesn't have the 3d thing going on that the 4x12 does.

I'm toying with the idea of trying to sell the g12's and buying scumbacks. Also am toying with the idea of pulling all of the celestions and sending them to Austin Speaker works to have them re-coned. Anybody have any thoughts or ideas about break in that might work, or should I just replace them?

[Scumback Speakers]

Shoot me an email, I have some good, free advice for you.

sales@scumbackspeakers.com

[sliberty]

Maybe all you need is some beam blockers

[Bob-I]

Maybe all you need is some beam blockers

I made up my own beam blockers in the 70s for JBLs. I cut some paper plates the size of the dome, painted them black and taped them inside the grill cloth. I'd give that a try. Honestly they're not as effective as you'd expect. I suspect much of the highs comes from the surround, not the dome.

[tubeswell]

I break in my greenbacks leaving them idling on an intense tremolo setting hooked up to my 5G9 with the OT load resistance set at 10k for a few minutes. This puts an intense iroquois chopper-like sound through the speakers which softens the cones up a bit. Works a treat.

[Structo]

There is a twist to the beam blockers.

Check this out, it was discussed to death at TGP but most agreed it helped with ice pick highs on beam.

[collinsamps]

My personal taste would be two G12H30s and two Celestion blues or golds. I can't stand Greenbacks in anything but a 4x12 being pushed to the limit. As for the current megabuck wonder speaker flavor of the months........No need to go broke to get great tone.

[M Fowler]

Shouldn't you wait for your completed Rocket and test the cabinet with that amp rather than relying on what an AC15 sounded like through the cab? Whole lot of difference between those two amps to my ears.

Also, forget the attenuator.

Mark

[CapnCrunch]

Gents,

I agree that Greenbacks ain't the end all of speakers. And I agree that it would be nice to run my rocket through this cab, but the Rocket isn't done. I have been running a 65 Amps London through it, which is basically a Marshall 18 Watt and an AC 15 in one box. I've played mostly the Vox side through this cab, but both are painful. I have put many hours with this amp into a matching 2x12 cab with a G12h30 and a Celestion Gold Alnico. This is a great sounding 2x12 in my experience, and it is easy to eq the amp with this cab. Not so with the 4x12. This tells me the problem is the cab and not the amp.

I'm not going to voice my Rocket for this cab. I would rather get the cab sorted out, or get rid of it and get another, or replace speakers etc..... I'm not going to run the Rocket clean very much. It is going to be a Rock and Roll Machine, and I really like the 4x12 with Greenbacks for that! That is why I'm fixated on the Greenbacks for now. I also think that the Rocket would be great through a 2x12 cab with JBL's, or EV's but that is for a different sound on another day, and another cab...........

[M Fowler]

I have run my Rocket through 212 open back Z cab with Blues, 212 with G12H30/25w green back, 212 with Vin30s and 4x12 with Vin30s they all sound good to me but I think a 212 with combination of G12H30/green back sounds the best, open back.

I really need to get some scumbacks as I have never heard them before and need to have a variety.

[LeeMo]

Something to try.
Pull all four speakers. Put the G12H30in one top corner. Put the gold in the diagonally opposite bottom corner. Leave the other two corners empty. Put the back on and rock out.

LeeMo

[tubeswell]

Don't be too hasty to write off the little Greenback 20Wers (made in UK). They sound awesome in a low powered tweed combo once they're broken in. I got one in my 5G9 clone, gives it a nice delicate 'woodiness' that snarls when you thwack the strings. You just have to voice the amp right - they don't like too much bass - but this is for a geetar right?

[CapnCrunch]

Just a quick follow up. After I started this thread, Jim from Southbay e.g. Scumback Speakers gave me a couple of tips. In addition to outlining his speaker break in method in detail, he also encouraged me to re-wire this cab. It was wired in the modern marshall fashion for series parallel with the shortest possible wire run, and with 22 guage wire. Cheap, cheap, cheap.

Anyway, he emailed a wiring diagram for the wiring used by Marshall in the late 60's and told me to swap out the 22 guage wire for 16 guage stranded. After turning the garage upside down, I realized I didn't have any 16 gauge but I did have some 14 guage stranded (bigger is better I always say). So, I re-wired the cab last night and fired it up this evening. I was really skeptical that this would have much effect. WOW was I wrong. This made a HUGE improvement. I would encourage anybody with a newer Marshall cabinet to re-wire their cab. I don't know if it cuts the highs so much as it brings the lower and lower mid frequencies up significantly. The cab is much more balanced now, and totally usable where it was pretty much unusable before with out eq'ing most of your high end out.

Thanks Jim for your excellent advice. I'm still going to try the break in procedure. I have to pick up a variac first though

[Scumback Speakers]

Thanks Jim for your excellent advice. I'm still going to try the break in procedure. I have to pick up a variac first though

You're quite welcome, CC. Glad that worked for you. I had the same cab wiring mess and it sounded like ass till I rewired it the old way with bigger wire.

You could also break those speakers in by just playing them loud, you know.

[Structo]

22 ga wire in a 100 watt cab?

Holy moly, that has to heat up a bit with some power through it.