[Regor]

I like Speakon jacks. I think they're a great idea. And I don't think Bass players should have all the fun! So I decided with the help of my brother to mod the hell out of my Mesa cabinet and wire it up for Speakon jacks. Mind you, this takes a little more effort than the average person may be able to do (I'll explain as I go).

So first off, my bro ordered up some speakon jacks and plugs. Then at work (he works at a fabrication shop) he made a replacement jack-plate for my cabinet, which looks something like this:

(This is the part that most people won't be able to do easily)
Pic from behind


So, lets get our toolbox ready


And of course, the dog wants to play instead of letting us do our work


Damn drill battery is dead! Luckily we gotz us a spare


So here's the old jack-plate that will be replaced entirely


Step 1 is to remove the old plate by removing the screws


Here's what the wiring scheme looks like, but it won't be necessary


So next, we unsolder the speaker wires, not worrying about the rest of the jack-plate's funky connecting wires


And of course, it's gotta start raining out...


So we went under the overhang of the garage and continued our work. Here you see the side-by-side comparison of the two jack-plates


But it seems the new one is a bit big around the corners


So we'll need to grind them down a bit


Making sure to buff out the edges so we don't cut ourselves


A little hand filing for the finishing touches


And viola! Smooth edges FTW!


Bryan wanted to make sure the holes had enough clearance, so he drilled them out a bit


Next day - Paint that beyotch! It's basically grill paint, but it gives it that cool textured finish.


In the next pic, you'll see several things. First, we had to cut a gasket from some red foam we picked up from Michaels. Also, I painted one of the Speakon jacks red, for the right side of my amp/speakers.


Here, we're putting red electrical tape under the red jack, to make it as easy as possible on a dimly lit stage to see which is the right side jack.


"Please throw the tire!"


Screw in the jacks into the plate


Bust out the soldering iron and start attaching wires. The jacks are labeled "1+", "1-", "2+", "2-" (for internal stereo cables). Connect the white to the 1+ and the black to the 1-, and ignore the 2's.


Using a lighter, cover the connections with shrink wrap tubing, being careful not to actually catch the shrink wrap tubing on fire, like Bryan did.


Line up the gasket and screw the plate back into the cabinet.


Here's the final product. Can't barely tell it's not the way it's supposed to be. Mind you, I can only run this cab in 4 ohm stereo now, but I only use this cab for live band situations, and it's always ran that way. So I had no qualms about doing this mod. I think Speakon jacks are very sturdy and reliable and durable. So it only made sense seeing as how this is my 'touring' cab. Also, what you can't see here, is that the red jack is on the 'right' side, but it's actually wired to the 'opposite' side of the cab, so looking at the cab from the front, it really is the right side speakers (the wires are criss-crossed internally is all I'm saying here). I wanted it to be idiot proof. Red = Right, so I put the Red jack on the Right side.


And this part of our story is done! Now it's time to void some warranties!!

First, we take our Monster P500 10' speaker cables.


And we cut the ends off!

Snip!


Slide the blue collet down the cable


Next, we'll have to trim back the rubber


And expose the inner wires


Next, we have to use a small screwdriver to open up the jack to get to the wire mounts. There's a little tab on the grey collet that you have to push in with the screwdriver.


Here you can see the set screw that holds the wires in place (this means NO SOLDER! YAY!)


This is where you're going to slide the speaker wires into


After cutting some of the inner shielding off in order to expose the copper, you just align the wires and slide them in. There's labeling on the jack itself say "1+" and "1-", the red goes to the + and the black to the -


Clamp them bitches down tight (remember, there's no solder in these jacks, so you wanna make sure they don't go anywhere)


Now you're ready to close the jack up


Slide the grey plastic collet back over the original tab


And screw the blue collet onto the jack, and you have the finished product. 1/4" jacks FTL!!


Do this 2x for stereo, again labeling one of them with red electrical tape. Remember, dimly lit stage, friends who help - but aren't musically inclined!


Hope you enjoyed the show. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

[NegaTiveXero]

I actually found that quite informative and entertaining!

[darren]

Nice picstory!

No red collars for the speakon plugs?

[The Dark Wolf]

That's a pretty cool mod, dude.

And Av looks so cute

[eleven59]

That's a cool mod. I'm guessing no plans to mod the rest of your gear (or even the other ends of those speaker cables and the speaker outs on your poweramp) in a similar fashion?

[sakeido]

Whats a Speakon jack do? I've never heard of them before

[xwmucradiox]

They are locking and aren't necessary for systems running less than 400-500 watts. Basically, a 1/4" plug can be easily forced out via the air pressure created in a high wattage speaker cab at high volumes. The speakon jacks and plugs lock so there is no risk of ejecting the cable, and running the amp at no load.

[Regor]

Originally Posted by darren

No red collars for the speakon plugs?

Hmm... didn't even think of that. Oh well, the red tape gets the job done.

Originally Posted by eleven59

That's a cool mod. I'm guessing no plans to mod the rest of your gear (or even the other ends of those speaker cables and the speaker outs on your poweramp) in a similar fashion?

No, I'm not planning on modding the 2:90's jacks, and therefore I don't plan on modding the other end's 1/4" plugs. Actually, the other end is secured to my rack, and those plugs never get pulled out of the 2:90. So it isn't necessary to do anything with them.

Originally Posted by xwmucradiox

They are locking and aren't necessary for systems running less than 400-500 watts. Basically, a 1/4" plug can be easily forced out via the air pressure created in a high wattage speaker cab at high volumes. The speakon jacks and plugs lock so there is no risk of ejecting the cable, and running the amp at no load.

No, not necessary, but they're more durable than the 1/4" jacks, less likely to get bent accidentally, and way less likely to accidentally get yanked out of the cab from getting tripped over or something like that. It's more of a durability/secure connection thing for me personally.

[darren]

It's nice that they're solderless, too. I was thinking you could do the same thing with a locking XLR connector if it's security you're concerned about, but those don't have the same advantage of being solderless.

[JPMDan]

Awesome Pic Story Roger, Avalanche is looking great as well