Any product you would like to have tested before you spend your hard earned money?

Let us know. Brandy Waller at 615 822 5555, or e-mail above. We'll take the chance so you won't have to.

[This message was edited by BobbeSeymour on 29 March 2002 at 07:04 PM.]

Is the "Blazer 158" still in production?

Bobby, Have you tried a "Blazer II" with Steel. It's a 15W 8" Speaker small amp.

Is that what the "Blazer 158" is/was?

You really blue my mind with your
Peavy Bandit 158 recommendation. This being a 15 watt x 8" speaker flies in the face of all I thought was sacred when considering a PSG amp ie, must be at leat 100 watts into at least a 12" speaker. This seems to be the general concensus in all the threads I've seen concerning PSG amp requisites.

For instance, an authorized Peavey dealer that stocks steel guitar amps doesn't necessarily mean that this particular dealer will have a Blazer or other type Peavey amp, or visa versa. If you check with Peavey's web site, they will direct you to a dealer in your area that stocks the type of amplifiers, or other type of Peavey gear you're looking for. This is a nice feature.

Regarding Bobbe's recommendation of the Transtube Blazer amp, I don't think Bobbe was necessarilly suggesting this amp to be used as a "steel guitar" amp, but rather a small, light weight amp that has great features which can be used as a small "practice" amp.

Generally speaking, it's pretty hard to use anything much less than 100 watts for pedal steel guitar applications, especially considering the extreme dynamics of this instrument. The sound spectrum of a pedal steel guitar is huge compared to most other instruments, which is one of the things that causes a lot manufacturers to pull their hair out when trying to design an amplifier to handle all of the sound curves that the steel guitar is capable of producing. This is one of those instruments that require a heluvalot of head room in order to be able to EQ it to produce the huge sound spectrum it's capable of, hence, the 200 to 300 watts of power you see being used on most steel amps, (Peavey, Webb, Evans, etc.)

In this case, we're talking about solid state amps, or in the case of the Nashville 1000, digital or "switch mode" amplifiers. Tubes amps are again a whole other story.

In any event, I hope this helps answer some of your questions/concerns.

[This message was edited by Danny Hullihen on 31 March 2002 at 07:08 PM.]

My $.02 worth.

Ricky

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Emmons LeGrande - 8x4
Session 400 Ltd
Alesis Microverb
Dan-Echo, E-Bow

The Peavey Blazer is 15 watts into an 8" super-duty Blue Marvel speaker. The Blue Marvel is one of Peavey's latest designs, and is being used in several of their amps now.

Also, I would like to mention that at the Texas Steel Guitar Jamboree last weekend, Jeff Newman played through the new Peavey Transtube 112EFX in the Peavey Demo Room. This is the amp that Danny mentions above and this amp performs well in low volume/rehearsal type applications.

I think that peavey also has some older amps out there also named the Classic? If memory serves me these are not tube like the 50212, but transistor. Maybe Bobbe or Mike could clarify.

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Steve Stallings
Bremond, Texas

There is a theory in speakers that goes somnething like this: Each time you double the number of similar speakers, you half the low frequency responce of the unit/assembly.

I really think this is the effect Curly Chalker found when he used two Fender Bassman amps that had 4/10's in each amp. It was the main factor I was looking for in the Texas Sound series and I believe I read once where someone of the Forum said " You would not believe the low end of these speakers " in regards to those units.

I no longer make those things and haven't for years but you have heard them and you know from where I speak. So I think I would say 4/10s have a lower bottom than 2/12s. A guy who played bass with Marty Stuart said the best bass amp made was a Peavey 8/10 but it didn't come with a fork lift.......

Eight seems to be a commonly recurring figure in the number of speakers and maybe that is a question someone else might be more qualified to consider. It just happens too often not to be noticed.

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Keep on Steelin
Carter 4/k 3/p Thanks Larry

The surface area isn't a factor in my speakers since the low responce is created by the multiple elements acting in concert.
Somewhere in front of the baffle board, the waves combine and act that way. You can't change the design parameters of any individual speaker but like an ILS Localizer which uses many yagi antennas, the result is in the space forward of the antennas when all of those signals combine.

The surface area of 8/5" spkrs is 14.2xx inches so actually it is close to a 15 inch unit in surface area. Each speaker is rated at 80 Hz to 15KHz and power at 50 watts continuos. The result is a cabinet capable of 400 watts continuos at 10Hz to 15KHz.

Of the original 400 spkrs, I have never heard of one failure. I think the wiring arrangement of series/parrallel presents a different load to the amp although it is a nominal 4 ohms. Perhaps this is why none have failed to my knowledge.

I know longer make the units and haven't for years. So I'm not looking for kudos or such. If you have some left, they are the last. I still use two with closed backs; infinite baffles. Eddy Thomas still swears by them and a guy in Dallas and one in St Louis still use them to my knowledge. I won't mention names as they may have gone elsewhere as well.

Build a better mouse trap and the world will..... One well known user said I was sitting on a gold mine. I told him to send me a shovel because I couldn't see any !!

Best Regards, Paul

[This message was edited by Paul Graupp on 09 April 2002 at 06:28 AM.]

On the other hand; 4x10s where each would reproduce 80 Hz would go down to 20 Hz. This is where the detractors come flying out at me but if you haven't heard it you could never believe it. Bigger is lower and smaller is higher. Combine them and you get both. Popular Electronics began this principle back in the 60s but until today's modern speakers became a reality, it wouldn't work for music amplification. That's all I did, an old idea with new speakers.

Sorry, Paul

[This message was edited by Paul Graupp on 09 April 2002 at 10:47 AM.]

The speakers were found at MCM Electronics in Dayton, Ohio. We used three different types in the project; paper cones, smooth aluminum cones and wavy aluminum cones. They are all 5 inch units and with exception of the wavy alum which was 35 watts, were all 50 watt units.

Wood was usually 3/4" birch ply with no voids and sometimes we used walnut or oak solid wood. There were many tonal qualities to each wood and speaker used but basically were all very loud and very clear.

The first cabinets were rather crude but later we used a glued datoed structure with the baffle board enclosed by the sides and top & bottom. We experiments with full open backs, half backs or less and fully closed backs (infinite baffles) with no ports.
Had we ever gone into production, we had a design for a removalble baffle board but that never happened.

The first units had 3 spkrs down each side and two in a middle row. We learned that they sounded better or their sides so we then went to 3 on the top and bottom rows and two in the middle.

The cabinets were roughly 17.5" H x 18.5" W x
11" deep and with spkrs, weighed between 33 and 35 pounds. The cabinets were painted or stained and had we gone into production, would have had several other covering options.

All spkrs were 8 ohms. When wired into four legs of two spkrs in series. 8 + 8 = 16/four= 4 ohms nominal output impedance. 50 watt units netted a cabinet with 400 watt capacity continuous/800 watts peak power capacity. And I stated earlier, a calculated frequency bandwidth of 10 Hz to 15 KHz.

Born to soon ?? Born too late ??