Inverted speaker cables?

[GiorgioV]

Hi guys, today I performed a simple fix on a friend's amp, nothing complicated just a little fix for the speaker cable that was nearly brocken off.

Thing is, I paid attention in remembering which cable was the red one (+) and wich was the blue one (-), but I did have to take off the colored plastic things that labeled them in order to fix.

Now I'm wondering, if someone connecte the plus and minus inverted to the speaker what are the consequences? And is there an easy way to tell if one has made such mistake?

Everything seems to work just fine anyway.

Thanks for answering.

[Ugh]

With the speaker leads reversed, the amp will play out of phase - that is the speaker cone will be traveling "out" when it usually goes "in". When playing by yourself, I don't think you'll hear a difference. When playing with a group, you'll be out of phase with everyone else. You'll lose volume and your amp will just sound weird do to phase cancellation.

[sled]

Nothing will happen with only one cab. It's no different than having one extra inverting gain stage in the amp.

If you add another cab with an additional cable amp to cab and the leads on that cable are not switched, the two cabs will be out of phase with each other resulting in a thin tone with little bottom end.


As for the comment about playing with others, it will sound fine. In order for phase cancellation to happen, the signals must be phase coherent. Your guitar signal is not phase coherent with the others in the band.

[R.S.Fraser Sr.]

before this myth gets too much mileage,,,
NO- you will not be out of polarity with everyone else in the band.

[GiorgioV]

Thanks a lot, that was very helpful!

[falconer]

Originally Posted by Ugh

When playing with a group, you'll be out of phase with everyone else. You'll lose volume and your amp will just sound weird do to phase cancellation.

[hogy]

Originally Posted by Ugh

With the speaker leads reversed, the amp will play out of phase

Depends on the amp.

[cap'n'crunch]

Isn't the correct term "reversed polarity" ?

Seems like an inverted cable would be where the 1/4" plug was force inside out up inside the cable.