Impedance mismatching

[mrbrownstone]

wlaked through this thread and i was curious then.http://www.bossarea.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3960
what are your views on impedance mismatching? have you tried it?
i personally like the effect of running a tube amp into a hicher impedance cab/speaker, it somehow increased the range/responsiveness of the eq controls of the amp, but at the cost of sacrificing the overtones coming from speaker distortion.

[siore]

Tube amps are safest long-term with an exact impedance match.  I won't risk my trannies.

I used to think that of the two, only mismatching with a higher impedance cab was safe (although risky long-term).  But people also write that the other way, that mismatching with a lower impedance cab, is safe!  There's proponents for both camps, each with experts (and technical info!) to back them up.  The result is a flurry of debates about the inner workings of current.   

Thing is, the previous owner of my amp routinely ran 4ohms into an 8ohm cab.  For a while, I ran it that way too.  More robust amps will handle that mismatch, but I understood that there is a risk.  Now that I got everything matched up, I don't think there's a significant change in tone or response, to warrant a possible long-term risk by me going back to a mismatched amp/cab setup.

I dunno about you, but will you risk it?  If that amp you have breaks down, can you afford another one like it?  And for that speaker distortion you want, you can have that by closely matching wattage with your amp/cab.  That warrants another topic though.

[greasykid]

The standard answer you'll get is it's safe to mismatch one step up or down. 

If you look at the speaker output jacks of old Fenders, you won't see any indication of speaker impedance that you should hook up.  I guess in the old days they didn't bother themselves too much about this.  And Fender trannies are robust and could probably take the mismatch anyway.

Anyway, I don't mismatch because my amp has an impedance switch and I have a few speakers to toy with.  I found out, however that I like crunch tones better through the highest impedance.  Crunch seems tighter.   

[william251082]

Question po: yung 2x12 cabinet ko ay may switch na 8ohms--16ohms stereo.

Ang trip ko sana ay dalawang fender pro junior 8 ohms ang speaker output each at ip-plug dun switching to 16ohms stereo.

Impedance mismatch ba yun? o tama lang? sorry ha wala kong alam sa mga ganito eh

[mrbrownstone]

Tube amps are safest long-term with an exact impedance match.  I won't risk my trannies.

I used to think that of the two, only mismatching with a higher impedance cab was safe (although risky long-term).  But people also write that the other way, that mismatching with a lower impedance cab, is safe!  There's proponents for both camps, each with experts (and technical info!) to back them up.  The result is a flurry of debates about the inner workings of current.   

Thing is, the previous owner of my amp routinely ran 4ohms into an 8ohm cab.  For a while, I ran it that way too.  More robust amps will handle that mismatch, but I understood that there is a risk.  Now that I got everything matched up, I don't think there's a significant change in tone or response, to warrant a possible long-term risk by me going back to a mismatched amp/cab setup.

I dunno about you, but will you risk it?   If that amp you have breaks down, can you afford another one like it?  And for that speaker distortion you want, you can have that by closely matching wattage with your amp/cab.  That warrants another topic though.

i really wont, considering the amp's age and that there just but little difference with the tone. wattage matching on the other hand is an intresting topic too. dunno if there are risks to the amp,speaker or both. but i find matching a speaker with a higher wattage than the amplifier really lets the amp do the work, in a positive way