Upgrading my Guitar Amp?

Question

I would like to replace the 30 watt speaker with a much more powerful one (Between 150 and 300 watts). My question is: Would I need to replace any other part of the amp to meet the energy demands of a stronger speaker?

Answer 1

While I won't say it's impossible, it is certainly cost-ineffective and extremely difficult to pull off. Let me explain.

Let's take a 15 watt amp with a 30 watt speaker. To make those 15 watts of output, the amp needs quite a bit more energy coming in - this is because the amplification process isn't efficient, at least for the stuff we're talking about. So we might need a 30 and 40 watt power supply to make it happen.

To make more sound we'd need more power, so let's say we just slap a 100 watt power supply in there instead. Well, wait. Do you know how many volts it's supplying? How about the load requirements? How much regulation needs to happen for this particular application?

The reason this stuff is important is that too much voltage will fry a circuit right quick - it costs more to use parts with higher voltage ratings, so manufacturers usually design their products around a certain optimal voltage rating, so their components don't need to be rated any higher... this isn't being stingy, it's good design practice. If I can use 50v rated caps instead of 500v rated caps, and I'm using 10 or 15 caps in a board, and I can save even a few cents on each board by doing so, well, multiply that by a hundred thousand units - or more.

It adds up.

Without getting too technical, I applaud your desire to up the power rating of your amplifier, but it is very difficult to change the power rating of an amplifier unless you are very familiar with not only electronics and the theory underlying guitar amplification, but the schematics of the particular amp, etc etc.

You could use a power soak of some kind to reduce the signal to usable levels, put that into a separate power amp, and run that into a larger speaker.

Of course, you'd need extra filtering and processing equipment to make it sound right, too.

While it's a fascinating topic, just save up and buy a better amp. =)

There's also a very active DIY tube amp community, you can google that.

Saul

Answer 2

Unfortunately, you probably will have to.

It sounds like you have a combo, right? An amplifier with the speaker all in one. If so, a new speaker will do you literally no good.

Amplifier: Supplies the wattage to the speaker

Speaker: the slave to the Amp, does whatever the amp tells it to do, and gives you the output.

So... if your amp is 30 watts, and your speaker can handle 150, you will still only get 30 watt sound coming out of your expensive speaker.

Beware, do not just buy a new amp @ 150 watts without upgrading your speaker, you will blow it out immediately! The Rule of thumb is that you must have a Speaker that can handle a little more than your Amp can dish out. Sorry to give you bad news, but its the way it goes unfortunately