Swapping speakers
Can you replace the speaker in your Barefaced cab with a different one?
If your Barefaced cab is a bass cab then doing this is a very bad idea - your cab is precisely optimised for maximum tone and performance with the speakers in it. Our Barefaced 12XN550 and 10CR250 are as good as it gets - don't mess with them. In the unlikely event that you blow one then contact us to buy a replacement - warning, they're expensive! There are thousands of 12XN and 10CR drivers in use now and we can count the total number of blown drivers on a few hands.
If your Barefaced cab is a guitar cab then YES, YOU CAN! Guitar speakers and AVD cabinets are far less particular about Thiele Small parameters, enclosure volumes, tuning frequencies and so on (partly due to their reduced low frequency extension but mostly because they're inherently non-linear devices so T/S specs become almost irrelevant above a whisper).
If you want to change the speaker then you need to make sure that the replacement speaker will fit! Please check the details over here:
https://barefacedaudio.com/collections/celestion-12-guitar-range/products/no-speaker-unloaded-cab-12
All Celestion 12" guitar speakers are the same baffle hole size and same bolt circle diameter. Many other 12" guitar speakers are the same because Celestion basically invented guitar speakers and thus set the standard - but please check!
(I need to add one of these for our 10" guitar cabs but they're far out-numbered by the twelves!)
If your replacement speaker is the same nominal impedance as the original speaker then the low cut filter will work as designed. If it is twice the impedance then the low cut filter will be far more subtle as the filter frequency will drop by an octave. If it is half the impedance then the low cut filter will be more extreme as the filter frequency will increase by an octave.
How do I go about swapping a guitar speaker in a Barefaced AVD cab?
We don't build our guitar cabs like anyone else - the AVD makes it impossible to rear-load the speakers. To swap a speaker you need to take the cloth grill off.
1. Loosen the lower pair of front metal corners so they're not in the way of the grill.
2. Insert a screwdriver shaft through the black fabric loop(s) at the bottom of the grill frame and use it as a handle to firmly but slowly pull the grill out. (The grill has foam tape around it to stop buzzes or rattles and velcro on the back). Do not rush, be gentle but persistent!
3. Loosen the speaker bolts a few turns with a PZ2 (pozidrive) screwdriver. If you're in the USA and only have Phillips head available, be extra careful to make sure it doesn't jump out under high torque. You'll need to push hard at this point, we torque them up tight.
4. Stop pushing hard now! Once the bolts no longer feel hard to rotate, gently spin them out of with the screwdriver. If you push hard on the bolt once it has been loosened by more than a few turns you will push out the t-nuts which are in the back of the baffle. Once that happens you will be in a very very bad place indeed.
5. At this point the speaker is unlikely to come out easily - this is because there is foam gasket tape between the speaker frame and the cabinet baffle. The longer the speaker has been in there, the more firmly it will seem to have glued into place. However it just takes sustained tension on one point of the speaker frame and after quite a few seconds it will start to unstick and then "peel" off around the whole speaker. Use your fingertips for this but if you need more leverage you can use a slot-head screwdriver as a lever but you'll need to place something flat and hard under it (like a paint scraper) to protect the baffle. Ask for help/advice rather than damage anything! Try not to damage the foam tape because the speaker to baffle join needs to be airtight.
6. Carefully lift the speaker out until you can reach the spade connectors on the positive and negative speaker terminals. Disconnect the speaker, remove it and place it somewhere safe.
7. Before fitting the new speakers, make sure they have rear gaskets. Sadly many guitar speakers do not come with them fitted but an airtight seal between speaker and baffle is absolutely critical in an AVD cab. Without a gasket you will suffer buzzing and distortion, particularly as you play louder. You can easily make a gasket out of self-adhesive foam tape - as you peel off the paper backing you'll be able to curve the foam tape to follow the circumference of the frame.
Now reverse the operation. The marked cable (black line on white cable) is the positive one. Again, don't push hard on the screwdriver until the bolt is tightening up or you'll push the t-nuts out and be in trouble.
Read this before you do anything and if you're confused then please email us - we're happy to help before you do anything but would rather not have to help you fix your mistakes remotely!