Mixing speaker sizes

[tomjackson]

Has anybody ever tried mixing speaker sizes in a cabinet, say a 1x12 and a 1x10 in the same cab?  I know there was a Gibson Goldtone amp that had a 10 and a 12 but it's not something you see very often. In The Guitar amp Handbook there a section on driver sizes that encourages the reader to experiment so I just wandered if anybody had tried it.

If mixing speakers is the sensitivity rating still relevant for speakers of differing sizes.  For example, would a 30W 98db 10 inch driver sound just as loud as a 30w 98db 12 inch driver?

I quite fancy trying a 10inch Alnico in a cab with a 12 inch ceramic speaker.

[Roobubba]

I run a 4x12 cab and another cab: 2x15" and 2x8" (in a 4x12 sized enclosure).

There are potential issues in a closed-back cab with phasing - in a 4x12 speaker cab, all of the speakers are going 'in' and 'out' in phase, and each moves the same amount of air. For a mixed speaker size cab, the speakers may end up working against each other due to differences in air movement between speaker sizes (although I have not found this to be an issue in my limited experience!).

What I like about this cab is the depth of sound - it's really rich (without losing responsiveness).
Re: sensitivity: I'd imagine they are the same loudness (why measure in dB if not!?), but I don't know for sure and can't say my limited experiments have given me any practical info on this.

I echo the sentiment you mentioned: have a go! :)


Roo

[jpfamps]

There's no obvious reasons why this shouldn't work.

As well as Gibson using this approach, if also seen some THD prototype cabinets with one 12" and two 10" in.