Looking for a higher wattage Vintage 30?

[Boy_Narf]

Hello Everyone!

I'm looking for a set of speakers with at least 85 watts power handling (at 8 ohms) that sounds similar to a Vintage 30. Any suggestions? I was eyeballing the WGSET90, but it's a bit fizzy. I have my eye on the G12K-100, or G12H-150 so far, but not many demos of the 150 yet. Any other suggestions/brands would be lovely.

Thanks everyone

[Jondog]

Eminence Tonker or Man-o-war?
I owned a pair of ET65’s, good speakers but a bit flat compared to a V30. Would guess the same for the 90.

[fiveightandten]

How many speakers are going to be in this "set"? 2 V30s handle 120W. It sounds like you're using more than one speaker. What amp do you have that's putting out more than 120W?

[Jondog]

I’m assuming you pulled the trigger on the Duncan Power Stage and need 170w
The Celesion K100 might do the trick. They also have the mighty Red Back which people are saying is great if you use a lot of pedals.

[lunchbox]

You can get Vintage 60’s from Celestion. They come in some of the Engl cabinets.

[Rlw59]

You can get Vintage 60’s from Celestion. They come in some of the Engl cabinets.

Since Vintage 30's are rated at 60 watts (the Marshall labeled V30's are rated at 70w), what's the wattage of Vintage 60's? 120 watts?

[Rlw59]

You can get Vintage 60’s from Celestion. They come in some of the Engl cabinets.

Since Vintage 30's are rated at 60 watts (the Marshall labeled V30's are rated at 70w), what's the wattage of Vintage 60's? 120 watts?

Nevermind, Google is my friend. The Engl V60 4x12 is rated at 240 watts, so the V60 has the same power handling as the V30.

Reviews say voiced differently though. Darker, smoother, but some suggest less bass. So a much different sounding speaker with the same power handling.

[lunchbox]

Hmmm...I thought they were 120 Watts.

The guys in The Sword use 120 watt V30’s. Maybe they had to special order them?

[Rlw59]

Boy_Narf, I know you've been on this quest for the loudest cleanest tone for a long time. And perhaps you're sticking with the V30 sound just because you want to minimize variables.

I'm a bit prejudiced because I'm not a huge fan of V30's. (I do respect how their dirty sounds cut thru a band.) But I don't think of the V30 as an ideal clean speaker.

You can find used 200 watt EVM12L's for $100~150 pretty easily. (There are also 150 watt versions, and 300 watters that have a huge finned heatsink bolted onto the magnet.)

Eminence makes a couple of EVM clones too.

JBL E120's handle 300 watts. A lot of JBL fans look down on the ceramic E's because they don't have the squishy compression of the alnico D's and K's. But that super high fidelity might be just what you're looking for. And because the snobs don't like them as much you can find them for the same prices as used EVM's.

[Rlw59]

Hmmm...I thought they were 120 Watts.

The guys in The Sword use 120 watt V30’s. Maybe they had to special order them?

Hmmm. Source?

A lot of musicians say inaccurate things. SRV always claimed #1 had overwound hotter pickups than normal, but when the Custom Shop examined it to make their limited run of repros they discovered it actually had underwound weaker pickups than typical.

Plus, when musicians talk to journalists and bloggers who aren't gearheads, sometimes things get misinterpreted.

(Like maybe they said they use 120 watt V30 loaded 2x12's? And he wrote "they use 120 watt V30's".)

[lunchbox]

From their rig rundown. At 10:50:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GpvCRTLFCRI

I guess they’re either 65 or 70 Watts. Their guitar tech doesn’t seem to know. lol

[Boy_Narf]

Hello Everyone,

I have returned!!!

So I've ordered another ISP Stealth UL. If it also has the whining issue I will be putting that money towards a PS170 and possibly upgrading one of the speakers in my cab for something with a bit more wattage. I did want to keep the two speakers the same, but I guess that doesn't really matter if I'm running two different amps most of the time (really should have just picked up two 112 cabs, still an option I guess). Anyway! So I'm looking at the G12K-100, and the new 150 watt redback of course. The K100 seems to have a closer EQ curve to the V30 (in the mid range anyway), so that would be my first pick at this point. It might be nice to have the extra headroom from the 150 aswell, so I'm still deciding/researching.

Regarding the ET90. I put one in a Bandit combo a few months back and while it greatly improved the bass response the mid range is lacking. This was confirmed by the WGS support line who mentioned the mids on the ET series can't compete with the V30. It's a more flat sounding speaker in comparison. I figured this out when all of my tones required the mid knob on the amp to be cranked. I prefer a more mid forward clean sound to help it cut so that speaker is out of the running.

Alternatively I might just run the PS170 with the V30. It won't be cranked up to the point of MAX POWER anyway. I've seen a few 50-60 watt tube amps running with single Vintage 30's, so even if the 170 is pushing a bit more than 60, I think the speaker should be fine. I seem to recall a RV50MKII 112 combo. We all know the RV series is quite underrated especially at higher gain levels, and I didn't ever see any reports of cooked V30's so LET'S SEE WHAT HAPPENS! Probably another few weeks for the UL so I'll of course report back. In car audio land I always preferred to have a bit more power coming out of the amp than recommended by the speaker. It was always easier to detect speaker breakup/distortion, than amp clipping, well aside from the smell of course I've been running a 400RMS 12" woofer with a 500 watt (continuous power) amp in my car for nearly 10 years now. It's never skipped a beat even though the manual put the combo in the DANGER ZONE! I've been careful with my gain/sub level settings so I've not had an issue.

[Jondog]

I figured that much with the ET90. I had a pair of ET65’s which are the same but didn’t want give my opinion in case the 90’s were a bit different. Nice but very flat frequency, a good all purpose speaker or when you don’t know what you want and need a starting point.