PA System Popped

Early B.

OK, so I'm the dedicated AV guy at my church. We have a low-fi PA system - a Yamaha mixer and a pair of Peavey speakers with 12" woofers. Last week I hooked the system to a laptop computer as I usually do via the headphone jack, and as soon as I turned it on, there was a loud POP! One of the speakers was blown, I think. We have been using a laptop for a while for background music and I didn't change any of the settings on the mixer.

A couple of questions --

1) Is the culprit likely to be the laptop, the mixer, the speakers, or the knucklehead operator?

2) What the hell happened?

3) How do I determine the extent of damage to the speaker? I'll be glad to open her up if necessary, but what am I looking for?

Thanks.

ledhed

Well, if your church is anything like mine was (and every other place I've done audio for) EVERYBODY under the age of like 21 want to play with the sliders on the mixer and do so while it is off. If something was being overdriven, it is likely the speakers could blow. Also, is it a powered mixer, powered mains or is there an amp in there somewhere?

I'm sure Sid might be able to shed more light seeing as he works at a place that sells this stuff.

VR3

A thump is pretty normal with PA systems as Ive found...

However to turn on the system and have a LOUD POP and a speaker be blown - it almost sounds like there is a short to me or a cable thats gone out...

How do you know the speaker is blown?

The way PA systems work, if there is a short in one cable, you will lose all your volume and quality -

So investigate your cables... but I dont know of any reason plugging a laptop in and turning on the power would do that... nothing Ive encountered yet would answer that situation -

But I have found that about 60% of problems are cables, 35% equipment failure and the other 5% operator failure....particularly if its Behringer

Early B.

ledhed wrote:

Also, is it a powered mixer, powered mains or is there an amp in there somewhere?

It's a powered mixer.

I'll check the cables.

Dennis Gardner

I agree to start with cabling.

Peavey is/was one of the few that had replacement parts for their drivers. I just replaced the diaphragms on a pair of Peavey horns last week that were purchased in 1983. Their older stuff was built to last..... of course this was prior to the oversees outsourceing.

shack

I vote knucklehead operator...just because I know if something like that happened to me it would be my fault (at least according to my wife everything is my fault :rolleyes:)

tonyb

I vote knucklehead operator...

Betcha his name was Turbo!:)