The ESP Guitar Company

Do you have a cabinet or speaker you KNOW is good to compare it with? Usually if a speaker is blown (or going that way) it's pretty easy to hear. Depending on what's wrong with it the sound may be distorted, the speakers might make odd popping or hissing while playing), or they won't make any sound at all.

^The reason I am asking is because the speakers are about 20 years old, and the previous owner told me that they have seen alot of use. I only spent $125 on the loaded cab, and even though the cab was in pretty bad cosmetic shape, it seems like a set of 4 celestions would cost at least that much.

I guess the question I am trying to ask is, Are speakers the type of thing that wear out over repeated use, or do they pretty much last forever if you dont drive them too hard?

They get softer and hence sound fuller with age. Usually this is kind of preferred by guitar players.

I give you one advice: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." I think you should stick with the cab as it is until you really know that there is another, better cab.

^sounds like i got even more lucky than I thought- Now I just need to get the cab re-tolexed...

Bring your guitar to a store and play new cabinets... compare.

What will you hear if the speaker is blown? Possibly no sound, crackling, scratching, popping. Really there are only a few common ways for a speaker to fail. Probably three most common are surround failure, voice coil wire failure, or voice coil assembly detaching either partially or completely off the cone. I've seen spiders fail and lead wires fail in some cases, but #1 killer on old speakers has got to the the surround. Thats an easy visual inspection. Abusive guitarists could run into fried coils. Voice coil failure is easy to check for by simply checking the impedance of the speaker. If you can't get an ohm reading the coil its shot. If you don't have a multimeter take any 1.5v battery, put one bettery terminal on either speaker terminal, put a short wire on the other side of the battery, and touch it on/off real quick on the other speaker terminal. If its good you'll hear the speaker make a little sound. Not sure? Use a 9V.. just don't leave the battery on the wire or you'll melt the coil. You should see the cone jump pretty good with a 9V too. Voice coil assembly detachment may be harder to see cause its usually under the spider. If that broke or came detached you will usually hear a scratching/popping sound under the music being played. You can use the battery trick here too to force the cone to move in one direction only.

If you are getting strange sounds, the first thing I would recommend doing is going through the cabinet, removing the speakers and verify their considion, reassembly, tighten everything, reseat or solder all crimp-on connectors (speaker wires, etc), laying a bead of caulk around all inside edges that are non-removable panels. That should help eliminate any obvious failures, clean up the old electrical connections, tighten up the cabinet, and reduce odd vibrations/resonances in the cabinet cause its tight again. Don't think teh cab needs it? If you take a screwdriver to any older un-cared for cabinet you'll probably get at least a quarter turn out a good portion of the screws in the thing. They just rattle loose over the years.