Should I replace the speakers in my 73 Fender Quad? Looking for advice please

[bencocad]

I have a 1973 Fender quad that has old EV's that have been in it since the early 80's. At what point should I replace them? I know this amp was abused, overdriven at times, etc. They seem to sound fine...no visible damage to the cones or rubber surrounds. I don't know what I'm missing by having old speakers in this amp.

If the advice is to leave it alone...that's cool.

If the advice is to replace the speakers....what should I be looking at.

It has 4 - 12's

100 watt all tube.


Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks - Ben

Here's a pic of the amp

 

[SlyFoxx]

Re: Should I replace the speakers in my 73 Fender Quad? Looking for advice please

EV's as a general rule are a sturdy lot and with 4 bearing the brunt of 100 watts I doubt any damage has been done. If you like the amp keep on rockin'. If you are looking for a change there are so many choices it boggles the mind. Tell us more about what kind of things you do with it...rock, blues...what kind of distortion pedals do you use if any...I think it's safe to say you like slide.

If you move that thing a lot you might want to look into speakers with neodymium magnets....I'm guessing you'll save 40 plus pounds and your back!

 

[bencocad]

Re: Should I replace the speakers in my 73 Fender Quad? Looking for advice please

I play everything from Metallica to Bach.
Huge range of music depending on the mood.
When I gig - 80's rock/blues...AC/DC, Styx, Queen, ZZ-Top, SRV, Clapton.....

Here are the pedals

 

[ES350]

Re: Should I replace the speakers in my 73 Fender Quad? Looking for advice please

I think you have some great speakers in that amp---the old EV's sound great and are pretty efficient. I don't know that you need 3 to 4x power handling than the maximum the amp puts out though...and the weight is a killer if you have to drag it to a gig. I had a Super Reverb with EV 10's and it was way overkill; sounded great, but too heavy and overbuilt. You could probably get more for the speakers than you could for the amp and get a nice efficient set of Weber/Eminence/Celestion/whatever depending on what tone you are shooting for...

 

[jeremy]

Re: Should I replace the speakers in my 73 Fender Quad? Looking for advice please

unless a speaker is blown or worn out you dont need to replace it, reguardless of how old it is.

if they were the original speakers in a vintage amp and you were afraid of blowing them you should replace them and put them in a box so you can sell the amp with the original speakers. i seriously doubt you are going to hurt those ev's even if you ran the amp all the way up for hours on end. they are some heavy duty speakers.

if you want to change the tone then like sly said, "there are so many choices it boggles the mind"