This is a subject I've been curious about for a while now - ever since I read a description from an amplifier manufacturer describing their cabinet with two speakers wired in series as being 'the true voice' of that particular amp. Does wiring a cabinet in series vs. parallel make any difference in tone? Hmm...
What is the difference? Well, in a 2x12 at least, it simply means how the two speakers are connected to both the input & output leads that go from/to your amp head, and also connect to each other. In parallel, the positive and negative wires from the amp connect to only the first speaker; and then jumper cables are used to 'share' that power with the second. In series wiring, the signal passes through both speakers, in order, in one signal flow. (There's diagrams of this in the video!)
You never really want to mix speakers of different impedances in a cabinet - so you'll usually be using either 8ohm or 16ohm speakers. But of course, how you wire them together will absolutely have an effect on the impedance your cabinet then runs at. When wiring speakers in parallel, you take the impedance of the speakers and divide that by the number of speakers you've got...so in a 2x12, and with two 8ohm speakers, that's 8 divided by 2 = a 4 ohm load. But if you wire those two speakers in series, you add the impedances together: 8ohms + 8ohms = a 16ohm load. The same applies for a 4x12 cabinet - often, they use a combination of both series and parallel....but that's a different story!
But assuming you have an amp that can give you both 4ohm and 16ohm loads...does the way your cabinet is wired actually affect how it sounds?!? Today we'll be finding out. Some say that tapping your output transformer at different impedances is a fundamentally different sound anyway, so we can't count that out for creating any differences we may or may not hear....but let's take a look. :-)
What do you think? A subtle tonal difference? Or none at all? Comment below!
Guitars:
- Gibson ES-330 VOS '61 Reissue w/ OX4 P90s
- Fender MIJ Strat w/ Monty's '53 bridge & Bare Knuckle Flat '50 neck
- Gibson Les Paul Standard w/ OX4 Beano PAFs
Guitar recorded through a Dr Z Z-Wreck into a Zilla Studio Pro 2x12 with Celestion AlNiCo Gold and Fane A60 speakers. Mic'ed with 2x sE R1 ribbon mics with a Schoeps CMC6 room mic.
0:00 Intro
2:23 Impedance Calculations
5:08 Comparison
9:59 Outro
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Vector images by freepik.com