Another speaker project

[floydfan]

Hi All
Just back from a week of (nearly constant) sun in Rhodes but back to work tomorrow. Picked up a pair of cheap speakers in local charity shop today and wondering if its worth doing them up. They do look nice, in a sort of retro way, with a wooden grill at the front. They are speakers from a Fidelity UA1 radio circa 1973. The bass units are 10 inch Celestions with paper cones and the tweeters are Elac Tw4 again paper. All the drives look good. Almost a total lack of crossover with just a 4.7 cap.
I was wondering if I could just replace the cap with a more modern one, remove foam and steel plate the sides. The only thing I am worried about is that the unit they came from would be pretty low powered and would I need to make modifications if I were using a more powerful amp.
Any comments/advice would be welcome. I don't think these would be used in my main listening set up but may keep me occupied in the long dark nights we get Up North.

[jammy395]

Don't do it Floyd fan - Splash the cash - Charity speakers SUCK.....

The sentiment & thoughts may be in the right place... But yer purchase wont put a bean in a poor wee child's gob..........!!!

Lets just Bomb the Mud Hut Politicians instead........

[floydfan]

Hi Jammy
You sound just like my Dad, he did not trust the big charities, said they spent the money on admin,and would give them nothing but he was the most generous guy I knew and he organised charity events and used the money locally where he could keep track of every penny. I am afraid I am not that good and tend to take the easy way out.
Anyway to get back to the speakers. I am really just messing about and hope to enjoy the process. I don't intend these to be my main speakers although at present I have a pair of kefs which don't seem to agree with my main set up and am looking for a replacement. Don't have much spare cash at the moment but I am doing some research. I did look at the thread in the archive on speakers but most speakers were either too expensive or difficult to get. I will keep on looking and hope "my boat comes in".

[Daniel Quinn]

10 inch drivers sound interesting , though imo with drivers its a suck it and see , I find it inexplicable [ as I am an ignoramus] that bass/mid drivers can sound so different as they are just a copper coil , attached to a material and a magnet. but you cant tell , ive bought some real shitty ones of ebay in the past .

presumably the cap is on the tweeter , as such I'm fairly sure a more powerful amp will not cause it problems , however if you require a technical reason why it wont cause problems you will have to wait for the doc to return from his hols on Wednesday , unless some one can volunteer :D

to remain topical , you could test them out with the Housemartins Flag Day .

[jammy395]

Hi Jammy
You sound just like my Dad, he did not trust the big charities, said they spent the money on admin,and would give them nothing but he was the most generous guy I knew and he organised charity events and used the money locally where he could keep track of every penny. I am afraid I am not that good and tend to take the easy way out.
Anyway to get back to the speakers. I am really just messing about and hope to enjoy the process. I don't intend these to be my main speakers although at present I have a pair of kefs which don't seem to agree with my main set up and am looking for a replacement. Don't have much spare cash at the moment but I am doing some research. I did look at the thread in the archive on speakers but most speakers were either too expensive or difficult to get. I will keep on looking and hope "my boat comes in".

Good to hear ya - Yer Dad was like my dad - Called a spade a spade & Charity always began at home.
My old man's charity of choice was the RNLI being an old Royal Navy man & he gave Blood without fail every second month since 16..............Gallons
Speaker's are a right bug Bear....I luv mine and wont change - But 10inch - 20inch - Active - Passive - Ribbon - OB's - Monitor - BBC - Horn - Etc Etc....Once you get a good pair you wont change.......Much...!!!

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Sorry mate they are crap don't bother.

[Andrew]

You could look out for some dynaco A25s. The last pair on EBay went for a paltry sixty odd pounds. I really rate them and much preferred them against my Audio Note Ks. I didn't have the heart to mod mine, so settled for a cosmetic refurb only.

They use a fab 10 inch bass unit and either a Scanspeak or SEAS tweeter. Both are decent and the speaker just sounds so "right". There's nothing old fashioned about them. If you're curios, there's a thread on here about them.

[floydfan]

Thanks doc for the heads up it will save me a bit of work.
Jammy you were right. I sail on the Clyde and my wife gives a monthly donation to the RNLI. She says to keep me safe but she probably just likes the stickers.
Thanks Andrew I will have a look at the dynaco speakers and keep an eye on ebay. The main problem with speakers is that most of them on ebay are collection only and most are located miles and miles away from me.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Cheap, buy JPW, any of them - the cheapest, usually around £20. And do the mods we recommend here.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

You are really being given the ignorant bollocks treatment at AoS. A good speaker is the one that plays the music in tune with a clean information window and acceptable dynamics. As far as I am concerned it boils down to one thing - does it play music the way *you* want it. You can get cheap little critters like the JPW that sing and with some mods are really good. Yet you can pay thousands to get flat frequency response and neutral presentation and all the other crapology you are being fed with at AoS and the music is dead.

Remember a speaker is a musical instrument, designed to reproduce / produce tonality, it will *always* contribute to that tonality. When everything else is right surprisingly this is the least problem, but still better to contribute less, but not at the expense of the original tonality and music.