Guitar Speakers - Around and Around We Go

Like many other guitarists in the world I am always in search of "the tone."  You know, that perfect sound - that amazing sound - that pure ecstasy sound - ear orgasm sound!

Part of that quest has been to try a lot of amps over the years, a lot of guitars and a lot of different speaker combinations.

Since this little post is about speakers I will save you the sad stories about the amps and guitars I have had and traded or sold over the years. 

BEFORE THE SPEAKER CHANGES

So, I picked up this Fender Blues Junior amp for about $300 a few years ago.  It did not have the sound, but I could hear the sound lurking somewhere inside.  Now, how do I get the sound out. 

I did an online search and read about a bunch of resister and capacitor changes that you could do to the little Blues Junior.  So, I bought a bunch of electronic components and dusted off my soldering gun.  The changes helped a lot, but did not quite nail the sound.

Next, I put in a Mercury output transformer.  The sound was drawing nearer, but was still hiding.

WOW!  A NEW SPEAKER.  REALLY?

After more online searches I found comments about switching out the original Fender Gold Label Eminence Speaker and putting in a different speaker, so I decided to give it a try.

1st Speaker:  Celestion Greenback - Damn, that was the wrong speaker for this amp.  It farted all over the sound - not a good combo.

2nd Speaker:  Celestion Century - Good speaker - really good - but not exactly what I had in mind (it ended up in a Fender Red Knob for a harmonica amp)

3rd Speaker:  Carvin GT12:  Whew!  Surprise!  excellent - but still not quite there.




















4th Speaker:  Celestion Vintage 30 - Ouch!  My ears are bleeding from the high end - great speaker for a dark amp - but not so good for a modified Blues Junior.  My Blues Junior is much darker than the stock amp, but yeow - not good with the Vintage 30.

5th Speaker:  Celestion G12H 30 Anniversary - Woohoo!  This speaker sounds great!  No ice pick highs like the VIN 30, and nice clean lows - good mids - sweet!  It stayed in the amp for several years.

 

 

 

 

MORE MODS

So, the sound was getting so close, but not quite.  That last mod I did was to change the power tube sockets to hold 6V6 tubes instead of the small EL84 tubes (there were a couple big capacitor changes too) and I clipped a bright resister out of the circuits)

 

Damnation - that made a HUGE difference.  The amp is now pushing around 25watts and has a seriously strong sound.

 

Now, the amp has THE SOUND!

 

BUT WAIT - ONE MORE SPEAKER CHANGE

After several years of mods and speaker changes, I decided to go back to the original Fender Gold Label Eminence Speaker.

 

You guessed it - it was as good as the great Celestion G12H 30 Anniversary speaker, maybe even a little better. 

 

The Gold Label did not have quite as much volume as the Celestion G12H, but it had slightly more mids, which I liked a lot.

 

Also, I had to turn the master volume on the amp up a little more (to 4 or 5 instead of 3 or 4).  This helped to get the power tubes pumping juice a little stronger, which feel out the sound with more depth.  I still have plenty of overhead, but the amp opened up with the bump in the volume control, while the speaker did not convert it to more decibels, just a deeper sound.

 

After all of that, back to the Original Fender Gold Label Eminence Speaker!