Novice Needs Help Setting Up Church Festival Audio System

[ryanthemick]

At our church Festival, they've been using JBL 4612B cabinets and it has sounded bad. I spent the summer replacing the cones and now at least those sound good. I will list everything I have to work with but I need help on which wires go where, what connects to what and so on.
Ok here goes:
Board- Ramsa WR-S216
Amps- (2) Altec Lansing 9442A
(1) Crown Com-Tech 800
Equalizer- Altec Lansing 8558A
Speakers- (4) Altec Lansing A700
(6) JBL 4612B
Mixer(rack)- Furman 4x1 model MM-4A
Crossover- Altec Lansing(can't remember model)
i can post pics of the rear of the units if that would help.


Any help would would be greatly appreciated and just might get you to heaven. After all, it's for church!


thanks!

[hjames]

What does the job pay?

[Lee in Montreal]

Any help would would be greatly appreciated and just might get you to heaven. After all, it's for church!

I am surprized we are being offered "heaven" in exchange of help when churches are very, very rich. Does it still work?

@ Ryan. What is your congregation?

[grumpy]

Board- Ramsa WR-S216 [16ch mixing board]
Amps- (2) Altec Lansing 9442A [2ch 100w @8ohms]
(1) Crown Com-Tech 800 [2ch 350W @8ohms]
Equalizer- Altec Lansing 8558A [unless it's specifically setup for an install or certain speakers, or you have a computer and program to manipulate it, I'd set it aside].
Speakers- (4) Altec Lansing A700
(6) JBL 4612B
Mixer(rack)- Furman 4x1 model MM-4A [used for what?]
Crossover- Altec Lansing(can't remember model) [not too helpful]


What are you trying to do? A700's for main stage, distributed sound with 4612's? Two separate sound systems?
Multiple mikes? Condenser or dynamic? (makes a difference with the mixer settings).

I'd suggest it worth the investment to hire a sound person that's wiling to work with you to sort your
needs vs. equipment out, perhaps run it one year as a mentor to a responsible person at your church,
and then write up a procedure for you.

There's no reason for things to sound awful if the equipment is working correctly and set up properly.

[ryanthemick]

Church of the Assumption in Bellevue, PA. Roman Catholic.

Ive played in bands my whole life and I'm decent at figuring stuff out. We just have never used anything besides the Ramsa, the Crown amp and the jbl 4612B's. The A700s have been in our festival storage room since the mid 80s. They still work.
Basically, our festival is on both sides of the school and we've been getting by with the 6 jbls. We have a dj booth on one side and run everything from there. I just thought it would be nice to utilize the stuff we have to get some really great sound out of it. I've never set up a system with a crossover or multie power amps.
I might try to see if our theater sound guy could help out if I can't find what I need online. Any help would be awesome. I can't promise heaven really, but maybe I can put in a good word lol

[ryanthemick]

Thanks grumpy

Board- Ramsa WR-S216 [16ch mixing board]
Amps- (2) Altec Lansing 9442A [2ch 100w @8ohms]
(1) Crown Com-Tech 800 [2ch 350W @8ohms]
Equalizer- Altec Lansing 8558A [unless it's specifically setup for an install or certain speakers, or you have a computer and program to manipulate it, I'd set it aside].
Speakers- (4) Altec Lansing A700
(6) JBL 4612B
Mixer(rack)- Furman 4x1 model MM-4A [used for what?]
Crossover- Altec Lansing(can't remember model) [not too helpful]


What are you trying to do? A700's for main stage, distributed sound with 4612's? Two separate sound systems?
Multiple mikes? Condenser or dynamic? (makes a difference with the mixer settings).

I'd suggest it worth the investment to hire a sound person that's wiling to work with you to sort your
needs vs. equipment out, perhaps run it one year as a mentor to a responsible person at your church,
and then write up a procedure for you.

There's no reason for things to sound awful if the equipment is working correctly and set up properly.

[ryanthemick]

Just read this:
Calculate the new impedance before connecting more speakers. For example, two 8-ohm speakers connected to an 8-ohm amplifier will reduce the impedance to 4 ohms. Adding another pair of 8-ohm speakers will cut the amplifier impedance in half once more, down to 2 ohms. Lowering the impedance below 2 ohms can put unnecessary wear on the amp and reduce its lifespan.

so, we've been connecting all six speaker boxes(12 speakers total) to the one power amp. All of the speakers are 8 ohms. I take it this is bad?
can I use multiple power amps together to alleviate the loss of impedance? Would I then connect maybe half to one amp and half to the other? How would I connect the amps together?

Sorry for for the newbie questions.

[hjames]

A combination of series and parallel connections - its kind of cheating, but as long as the amp see 8 ohms, it "should" be ok

Take the speaker boxes in pairs and connect red to red and black to black. [Pair 1]
Do another pair of them exactly the same way. [Pair 2]


Connect from your amp BLACK to Black on Pair 1
Connect from Pair 1 RED to BLACK on Pair 2

Connect from your amp RED to RED on Pair 2

You now have 4 speaker boxes connected to one amp, and the amp will see 8 ohms ...


Gotta scoot

Just read this:
Calculate the new impedance before connecting more speakers. For example, two 8-ohm speakers connected to an 8-ohm amplifier will reduce the impedance to 4 ohms. Adding another pair of 8-ohm speakers will cut the amplifier impedance in half once more, down to 2 ohms. Lowering the impedance below 2 ohms can put unnecessary wear on the amp and reduce its lifespan.

so, we've been connecting all six speaker boxes(12 speakers total) to the one power amp. All of the speakers are 8 ohms. I take it this is bad?
can I use multiple power amps together to alleviate the loss of impedance? Would I then connect maybe half to one amp and half to the other? How would I connect the amps together?

Sorry for for the newbie questions.

[macaroonie]

Assuming that you are using the Crown Com Tech for your cluster of 4612 speakers , as long as you run the amp in stereo mode you will be able to run 3 in parallel on each channel.

The Crown amp will tolerate a 2 ohm load so you will be OK

Just what you feed to each channel on that Crown is entirely up to how you use your mixer and what you route to the Crown.
If you want it all the same and the mixer is not versatile enough to give you multiple outs that are the same ( mono ) then make a splitter cable to split the lines to each channel of the Crown.
This can be done locally at the back of the amp.

[speakerdave]

. . . . can I use multiple power amps together . . . . How would I connect the amps together? . . . .

You don't!

[ryanthemick]

You guys are awesome! Thanks so much. A lot clearer now.

[4343]

You don't!

Well, it is definitely _not_ recommended to connect amplifier outputs together, but bridging inputs is allowed. My Yamaha amps all have dual 1/4" inputs just fro that purpose. Gets a little complicated with the Com-Tech's barrier screw terminals, but it still works the same way

Basically, you need to know the input impedance of your amplifiers and make sure your source is OK with whatever impedance you end up with after paralleling them.

[ryanthemick]

Might as well ask you all one more question. The speaker wires we use are not color coded. Can I use this digital multimeter to figure out which is which? What setting would I use? Which inputs would I use? It's a Cen-tech multimeter(will try attaching photo)
i really appreciate you all helping out.

[turnitdown]

I know how old the thread is, but I'm on my second tryptophan coma in as many days. I used 4612s for a LONG time for SR duty. If you don't use subs, you'll blow them up trying to get the volume you want that has enough bass. POOF!