Polytone 101 Speaker Impedances

[Ted]

Got a Polytone 101 Bass combo

here. It has a 15" speaker and two 8" speakers all wired in parallel.

All 3 speakers are dead and open circuit. No impedance markings on any of them.

Anyone know what impedance they ought to be?

[52 Bill]

Polytone power amps are typically designed for a 4 ohm load. My guess would be 8 ohm - 15 inch and 2 x 16 ohm - 8 inch.

[Ted]

Bill - that was my guess too. Just wanted to see if anyone else guessed the same.

[Chuck H]

You could always check the ratio of the OT. This would allow you to figure the primary Z at different speaker loads. The right load should become obvious as it relates to the circuit then. It's probably 4 ohms as noted but it's easy enough to check and be sure.

[Ted]

Sadly it's a transistor amp

[Chuck H]

OOOoohh... Gotcha. I've been here at the forum almost since it's inception. I forget that there's so many transistor threads here now since it really was a tube amp only sort of place for a very long time. With so many modern tube amps using transistors it was bound to happen of course. I'm just a dinosaur.

[Ted]

I know exactly how you feel Chuck. I occasionally get people (young people) bringing me amps and saying "it's really old..." and it turns out to be a 20 year old transistor Fender.

Still can't quite get my head around anything with transistors in it being "vintage" or "classic"....