How can I use a Crown PA amp for bass guitar?

[Onebean]

So I need a real cheap bass setup for some potential jamming with some friends. I have a bass speaker in a cabinet, a Crown amp, and a Fender Deluxe Jazz bass. I assume to make this work, I need some kind of a preamp to go between the bass and the amp. This is a garage jam, so volume will be relatively low. It would be cool to have some tone controls, but at this point the cheaper the better.

I have one of those Boss EQ pedals I bought for guitar, would that work? It has 7 or 11 bands with a volume slider. I could easily make a cable that goes from 1/4" mono to barrier strip to connect them.

My guess is, I need an active device to step the signal up so the amp do it's work. Signal straight from the bass will be too low.

Could I use a single channel of a hi-fi preamp? I have some of those sitting around. At least one tube unit and one or 2 solid state units.

I'm pretty resourceful, so if you have other wild ideas about how I could pull this off cheap, let me know.

Thanks,
Onebean

 

[middy]

The eq pedal might be sufficient. It depends on the input sensitivity of the power amp. Any little 4 channel mixer will do. The HiFi preamps might work.

 

[jaybones]

This is a garage jam, so volume will be relatively low.

Crown PA amp? Low volumes?

I have the monitor amp from my last band's PA, a Crown 400 watt amp. We had 2000 watt Crown amps driving the mains.

 

[Onebean]

This Crown amp is 200 watts per channel. Nothing crazy.

 

[clydethecat]

One of those Sansamp or MXR bass preamp pedals would do it.

 

[SoundsGood]

I would try the eq first.

 

[YoGeorge]

Do you have a cheap little bass combo amp or head with a line out? That would give you some basic EQ if your pedal does not have enough output.

I have a couple Crown amps (a D150A mk2 and a Macrotech 600) and have played around with them for guitar--I had an old Marshall rackmout preamp that I sold a long time ago.

My fave cheap bass head is an old Acoustic 150 head that I got for $100. That thing kicks butt.

George

 

[mexicanyella]

I use a Peavey PA amp for bass, and I've gotten workable rock bass tones using the following for "preamps" in front of it:

1) Dean Markely K-20 guitar practice amp, line out into the power amp...low gain settings on the dirty channel with the mids up and the bass cut back a bit make some great grunty rock tones with a P-bass...

2) Peavey Audition 20, same approach, but all EQ knobs dimed on the clean channel...that amp has a weirdly-voiced tonestack in my opinion.

3) Old Peavey powered mixer head, running through the master EQ only, similar EQ settings to option 1 above.

4) Line 6 Pod, Marshall Plexi emulation, similar EQ to option 1 above, no speaker sim selected, touch of internal compression effect, gain at about 9:00.

5) My Peavey Special 150 combo, either running line out into the power amp or driving the bass speakers directly with its internal 150 watt power section. The Special is basically a late 80s bandit with twice the power. Using its clean channel turned up to about noon, with similar EQ settings to option 1 above--set active presence control to taste--sounds pretty good to me.

An EQ pedal with the output cranked can work, but if I recall the Crown amps require a hotter input signal than the Peaveys in order to reach full output. Maybe a Tube Screamer or some other medium-gain dirt pedal into an EQ pedal, to take advantage of some additive signal boosting?

Oddly, I just posted basically this same thing over at Talkbass. I am feeling like one bass-gear-talking mofo right now. As I said over there, all of the above gear piles resulted in a similar clean-to-grunty kind of rock P-bass tone for me. This leads me to think that the grunt I like is pretty easy to get with a passive 3-band tone stack and a pretty clean preamp signal being sent to a power amp that is smacking the speakers around a little bit. When I've tried an actual crunchy preamp signal for bass, it seemed like too much dirt to me...the sizzle was kind of fun but I missed the cleaner low-end punch more than I enjoyed the sizzle.

So basically, find something with a decently hot line-out signal and some EQ control and try it...just make sure you're driving some robust bass-guitar-friendly speakers when you do it.

 

[clydethecat]

An EQ pedal with the output cranked can work, but if I recall the Crown amps require a hotter input signal than the Peaveys in order to reach full output. Maybe a Tube Screamer or some other medium-gain dirt pedal into an EQ pedal, to take advantage of some additive signal boosting?

Depending on which model of Crown it is, some of them have an internal switch to change the input sensitivity to 0.775V.

 

[philosofriend]

Just keep trying preamps out of your pile till one sounds good.
Not cheap, but I've been totally happy in the same situation using a line6 POD (the old red bean-shaped one). Gives me a lot of good sounding tones from Clean to Grand Funk.

 

[Bob M]

I used a Behringer 4 channel mixer I had lying around with an old power amp we used for monitors. It was fine. More than fine actually.

 

[Doghouse_Riley]

For a couple years I gigged with a 2x10 bass cab, a Carvin power amp and a (link removed). If you have the dough it's a great thing to have around. It was my backup "amp" for many years after I got a Little Mark II. I never needed it as a backup but if I did I would have run the Sansamp direct into the PA.

image removed

 

[Peltogyne]

and a Fender Deluxe Jazz bass.

That bass has a preamp in it doesn't it? There are some bass players who have played direct to power amp from the preamp in their bass. Mike Pope the creator of the Mike Pope preamps in the Fodera basses for example.

You may want something else for the tone shaping but for clean sounds it should work.

 

[WireLine]

The $99 Ampeg Classic pre is designed to push a line level power amp..I've just received one and will be putting it thru it's paces this weekend with a Jay Ganz Straight Ahead power amp in just such an application

 

[WireLine]

Just a quick follow up: this lil ol Ampeg Classic Pre is a real jewel. The EQ is killer by itself, but the addition of the SVT like Ultra Hi and Ultra Lo buttons open up ranges that almost make this box idiot proof. The gain is capable of squeaky clean or serious signal pummeling. I put mine at about 1:00 and let my right hand control the rest.

The Jay Ganz Straight Ahead Power amp is smaller than an GK MB200, yet pumps about 500 watts into 4 ohms. Only knob is a volume, all ins and outs on one side. This thing was built originally for pedal steel players, so it is clean clean clean. Weighs next to nothing, and from what I could tell, didn't add any of its own color at all.

Both these things, their power cords/supplies, speaker cable, and guitar cord all fit in the large pocket on my bass' gig bag. Superlative sound, unbeatable convenience, astonishing price

 

[Paul in Colorado]

I have an Ashly rack mount bass preamp that I use for bass into a Carver power amp. Works like a charm. I think it was $100 in a pawn shop many years ago. It's the same model Darryl Jones used.

 

[4mal]

There are quite a few good preamp pedals about there that do line out. For your purpose if you want cheap... scope your local CL for a decent old parametric eq. Rane, Klark, DBX, Ashley, Orban, Furman. You should be able to score in the $100 range ... needs to have something resembling an instrument in. In a pinch, Mic level inputs and a Cheap DI could front end the pre.

Art Tube EQ or Tube PAC would be nice... I just sold off an old Tube Channel at $125 or so... bag are cool...

 

[brogh]

many years ago I've helped set up the gear for a concert with Anthony Jackson, his "amp" at the time was a PA connected to a power amp, to the power amp he had a small rack connected, so i think some sort of preamp/DI, I believe you can find what he uses and do accordingly based on desire/budget.

something like this :

(image removed)

 

[Alamo]

On a budget this will do the trick:

Behringer V-Tone Bass BDI21 - analog modeling bass pre-amp/stompbox with DI recording output

$30 at https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/BDI21

Behringer V-Tone Bass BDI21
​

 

[Zeonoid]

Bass DI is the best way to go.. and of course bass cabinet