Hi!
Its been about a year since I last upgraded my sound gear. I had purchased a studiomaster powered mixer with a ratig of 200W per channel. My speakers are 2 custom made 2 way enclosures with 15" mid bass drivers and bullet tweeters. These have a power rating of about 400W at 8 ohms. I plan to beef up my amplification since currently my powered mixer is underpowered for the speakers. I have been given 2 options. First I thought of adding a dedicated amplifier
for the speakers. For that I would have to add a better crossover and horn tweeters keeping the Bass drivers the same. The second option was that I could bridge another amplifier along with the powered mixer's amp and keep a BASS bin which would be driven by this new amp while my existing speakers would be driven my my mixer's amp. Acc. to my sound guy, the second option would result in 10X the sound and power as compared to the 1st option. What is ur opinion about the Bass Bins. Do they really pump up the bass to a big extent (we are talking about a single bass bin with a 15" bass driver). I will post some pics later with a clear view of my full sound setup.

Thanx a zillion
Sunny

A Bass bin can make a big difference to the bottom end but with 15's in your main cabs you might do as well with a good amp and a graphic equaliser, unless you really want BIG bass.

You can get bassbins with passive crossovers (so you drive your cabs via the bin), but you'll still need a bigger amp.

Alternatively use an active crossover and a separate bass amp. This assumes you can "break into" the amp channels on your desk so that you can get the full range signal out of the desk and send back the "high" signal from the crossover.

p.s. I hope you DONT mean "Bridge!". A bridge circuit is a way of getting serious mono power out of a stereo amp, not a way of connecting two amps together so as to drive two sets of speakers from a single sound source. "Slave" is the term required, I guess.

I guess active crossovers is the way to go. But Im also a bit bugdet concious...arent the active Xovers expensive stuff?

Sunny,
The absolute cheapest way to beef up the volume and quality is to add a self-powered bass amp to your rig.
Here's how you cut he corners of buying a dedicated crossover:

1) Use your main mixer/amp to power your speakers, as usual...only use the EQ to roll off the low end from about 250Hz and lower.

2) Use the monitor send to feed a signal into the bass amp where the HIGHs are rolled off above 250Hz.
This will essentially give you separate control of what goes to the tops and what goes to the bottom. It works like a charm too.

3) adjust each channel so that you get the amount of bass you desire with the monitor send on the individual channel. Voila !
Psuedo-bi-ampd!

It's so close to perfect, I'm surprised that not more people do this.

Hi Uncle Dave,
I had thought of this idea before. But the problem here is that the Mixer I have (Studiomaster Powerpack 400 DSP) does not support separate control of the bass amp and the existing mixer. If I control the bass from my existing mixer it regulates bass on both my existing speakers and the bass bin. My sound guy suggested that we construct a special Bass Bin with a crossover that totally eliminates all other frequencies emanating from the bass bin and only allowing Lows, but again this, he says, will be expensive. What are your comments?
Thanx
Sunny

Sunny,
1)Does your mixer have a monitor send, or an effects send that isn't being used?
2) Does your mixer have a dedicated EQ, either graphic or individual on each channel?

If you answered "yes" to either ...... you still can benifit from my design. The master EQ does NOT affect the monitor send, so if you feed a signal to a bass amp - it will have independant control over tone.

An effect send will not be a separate feed (it includes any EQ changes made) but still can serve as a level of what is sent to the bass cab.

I tried to find your mixer on line, but had no luck. Give me a pic of the controls or a link to where I can see the features. I'm almost positive you can use my design with great success. A dedicated crossover is great, but it costs more and requires another power source anyway.

Uncle Dave,
I have Emailed youa manual and spec sheet of my mixer. Meanwhile you can see some not so detailed pictures of the mixer here. http://www.capitalkaraoke.com.au/hardw.asp?ID=18

Thanx for your time
Sunny

Yep, active crossovers cost. Over here in the UK you can get something usable for about £130 pounds or less.

Of course, if it's possible with your kit, Uncle Daves technique should work fine.

A passive crossover circuit could cause a problem with a single bass bin as you'd be forced to mono unless you used a dual-coil woofer (that could be still be driven from a stereo crossover). I think Celestion do this with the 18" sub-woofer they have had out over the past couple of years.

The absolute cheapest way to beef up the volume and quality is to add a self-powered bass amp to your rig.

Hi Uncle Dave, Is the self-powered bass amp you're referring to a sub-woofer, or a regular bass amp. The selection of sub-woofers is so limited, I wonder if a bass amp will do as well.

Thanks, John C.

Most bass amps will do just fine. The idea of separating the low freqs from the highs, in itself is a big improvement. Having a bass amp on the floor will give you a very close rival to an actual subwoofoer...if you're on a budget.

Remember - I proposed this as a budget alternative - not the standard or state of the art. It's a really good substitute for a dedicated sub powered by it's own amp and fed through a crossover.