Right, £5000 each MING DA mono tube amplifier is a modern Single-Ended type aimed at speakers capable of 160 watts handling whilst the EMI 630 was only 5-watt per channel in stereo pairs. The EMI 630 was an elite item used with some as yet unknown amplifiers and the celebrated sound led mass-market imitations.
Right, Anthony Eden, British elite prime minister of the 1950s Suez Crisis, fluently spoke in Arabic.
Left the American REALISTIC Optimus T-70 with 55Hz lowest low-frequency note was based on the elite only EMI 630 T-slot design for 35Hz. RadioShack called the T-70 a Transmission Line to appeal to the Harvard University IMF speaker people but a T-slot is different. The only available photo of the British establishment's T-slot for the EMI 630 is very small. RadioShack's Fort Worth, Texas engineering team under Bernie Appel sought to equal hi-End equipment at a REALISTIC price and was meant to be modded out by engineers as Hot Rod cars sought to compete with Italian supercars. Below, British Rega ELA Transmission Line for the Creek CAS 4040 shoe-box amplifier.
The Creek CAS 4040 was a narrow, slimline amplifier based on a 1970 year Harversonic Super Sound 10 + 10 using surplus EMI 13 x 8 speakers. REGA ELA used a 5 inch Royd woofer with various Danish, Scanspeak dome tweeters and needs a round transformer in any other matching amplifiers. The ELA is upper peasantry and Royd much more pricey, as middle-class, although its amplifiers, among them NAIM were compared with the REGA ELA in auditions, the Royd were found to be more natural sounding.
I’ve been working on the railroad,
All the live-long day.
I’ve been working on the railroad,
Just to pass the time away.
Right, looking like the US market active EMI DLS-1 with STD.373 (Scientific & Technical Developments) active amplifier, this is a unique and mysterious elite only British market speaker of unknown model. Not active, it uses the REDD.36/CH x-over below from a 1957 design by EMI's Peter Dix. EMI 92390G 13 x 8, (but a 46600 core) and twin GEC presence units give response to 15KHz. The 1960s American Rola Celestion Ditton 120 is a similar speaker with a single HF1300 Ring Radiator presence unit but with cheaper to make round Auxiliary Bass Radiator woofers.
Right, the REDD.36 Studio Monitor for the EMI reel to reel tape recorders, the BRT-1 and BTR-2. Actual cores in the REDD.36 aren't known, an Al-Ni-Co 13 x 8 and two GEC presence units for wide dispersion. These were from the British Empire era when London was capital of a world power dominion, superior to all others. The End of Empire saw England become a ruin bereft of former glories. Although Suez under Anthony Eden is seen by many as the coup de grâce, FDR had opposed Churchill and British imperialism since the 1930s, being seen as a threat to the USA.
Right another little known elite amplifier is the Croft Series V. It appears to be a Leak Stereo 20 in 1970s materials. These will suit the EMI 630 and had pleased the British establishment but it must be noted, the input quality needed, the Garrard 301 turntable and Koetsu Moving Coil cartridge equipment is not a price that many could pay.
Left the Rogers Master of a battleship inspired steel build is seldom seen compared to the Cadet. The Output Transformers bear little resemblance to the Croft above and likely the Master would outperform the Croft. Below REALISTIC Nova 9 is mainly kept for their high efficiency using recycled Heppner church organ baskets with a custom made CTS cone and voice coil. This is a typical lower society collection including a mass-market Carver that is the late 1980s and cheaply made suggesting the internet auction hoard needs to be refurbished.
Right, the custom mfd RadioShack twin cone looks to have been made by ElectroVoice with the popular North American cloth edge favored in the late 1960s suiting amplifiers toned for the US KLH speakers. The Vietnamese seller auditions EMI 630 down the page using the same sources but they're made for different equipment. Below BBC studio PYE germanium amplifier with stud diode rectifier.
Right, 1966 year advert for EMI 630 at US$ 663.95 each in today's money, EMI 650 appearing later, not as a 'DANGEROUS SPEAKER' that used vacuum tube rectifiers of old but subsequent Merciless Speakers series (by Benjamin at Farmingdale N.Y.) using stud diode rectifiers red ringabove in a 1960s British Empire PYE brand, BBC studio amplifier coupled with handmadeBaker's speakers from Croydon near London, but R&A in domestic PYE equipment, the elite stuff seen in New Zealand (and bought over by Philips in 1967) made the first 1950s transistor sets under their PAM trading name. The loss of British Empire led firms after Suez was inevitable.
Left the EMI 650 is known by its red solid capacitor and has a better low-frequency tone for the days of Solid State rectifiers in tube amplifiers. Below the 'roll-edge' EMI 650 Merciless speakers showing some difference in the cone weight.
Right, the 35-42Hz reflects one LF cone differing in weight from the other, EMI trying for the best sounding.
Left, demonstrating EMI 630 cores in Vietnam that survived the US occupation with President JFK hoping to win territory lost by the 1950s French imperialist empire. A Breeze Audio A2, by the Chinese Weiliang Audio copying Marantz circuitry and in the video, British Musical Fidelity A1 amplifier seen behind that was a 'Class A', Damping Factor 14 LF, 17HF.
Left a very rare photo of the Benjamin EMI Model 55 that was followed in some very distinguished American villages and may well have appeared in a T-Slot design for the 1960s elite buyer. The EMI 'Norman' in the Model 55 has a small magnet motor with a long pole voice coil former and is suited to EL84 with powerful rectifiers, able to produce deep bass at a few hundred milliwatts. The lower cost amplifier is unable to feed these speakers with the correct quality of input power.
Below EMI 319 made by Scope New York in the early 1960s. The bigger yet DLS 529 has some old 13 x 8 46600 baskets welded and ground, possibly repaired under an exchange scheme. The later EMI 92390G basket is a new 46600 single steel stamping with no filled hole details and isn't the genuine elite stock but mass-market. So the motor windings won't be so great in the later DLS529. These Scope 'DANGEROUS' speakers were viewed as better than all others using the British THORN made Stereoscope tube amplifier followed by elites and are very mysterious, understated speakers, known in the US as the Abbey Road Studio Monitor. The 319 right is capable of astonishing sound stage effects with very low power, a tiny fraction of a watt but only a pricey low power amplifier will give the effects.
Left, a double cone EMI 550 series (with aluminum centers worth £240 a pair in Japan as seen), the three single cone 550 of the 92390BN type priced alike. Hard PVC tweeters melt in sunlight from a window and these are AlNiCo tweeters suited to 10 watt amplifiers, or to be more precise, very expensive with a Damping Factor of 5, today suited to the EL34 Audio Innovations 700. The high price hints at the sound obtainable by some enthusiasts yet unknown to the majority of buyers. These won't work at all well with amplifiers of a Damping Factor higher than 5, the low frequencies would be muted and the tweeters might sound harsh.
Left double cones in a professional 92390AE. Below, an EMI 92390PF with black EMI 630-type choke is a professional series core very rarely seen and uses the 1961 vintage yellow fiberglass batting in the pattern shown. Note this cabinet is of thick and very pricey plywood that is V-planked at the corners before the days of widespread hobbyist's routers. The baffle too is of plywood and this an elite society speaker. Yellow fiberglass does not suit woofers meant for the later white fiberglass batting. The wrong acoustic loading of the inner cabinet will badly degrade quality. The EMI DLS529X, 92390AL 13 x 8 also suits the original yellowbatting.
Below the early 1960s EMI 92390AG similar to mid-1960s 92390CM and others. Above in elite only versions of the EMI 319 are seen these grey plastic or white-painted metal grilles. Some are a 350, others like this one a 550. Nothing is known about them by anybody who wasn't of an upper class. They have a number of BBC tube amplifier followers. The Leak/EMI RS.141, TL25, etc.
Left the FANE 13 x 8 is exceedingly rare as made mainly for the BBC in England as a Studio Monitor after the demise of the EMI Siemens source, believed to have followed some changes in the German supplier around the year 1966. The FANE Desk Monitor had many 1980s visitors inquiring as to what this awesome speaker was. It was a twin cone but the public had been given the LS3/5A, a domestic speaker design from the outset and despite a whole mass market following believing their home speakers to be an actual BBC monitor, of course they never were. The FANE cone tweeter left is also one of the world's rarest, again mainly used by the BBC in England and details never shared. The equipment that the BBC had used with FANE studio monitors is likely to have been specially made by their engineers and too expensive for any hobbyist listeners.
The early 1950s EMI/HMV 46600N, 13 x 8, Plessey cube alnico.
Goodmans squawker and tweeter using a network-free breadboard point-to-point soldered x-over with an EMI/ DECCA/ HMV 46600 13 x 8. The 13 x 8 was elite only until the year 1964 when it was launched in a few professional versions and soon appeared in mass-market B&W models of the mid-1960s UK. The DLS529 was the first mass-market EMI speaker in the United States but was only bought by elites.
EMI STD.381 stereo power amplifier and 399 controller
Right the Radford STA-7 uses EZ80 and such a low current rectifier is employed whilst the Verdik engineered equivalent of the mono QUAD II using EL84 had EZ81. STA-7 is 7 watts per channel at 3-ohm, EMI 630 can't be overpowered at 15-ohm but as low efficiency, 87dB, 1w, 0.5 meters will need high-quality sources. Right, the wide-band Hi-Fi PYE 5/8 and below the Leak Stereo 20 with its huge BRIMAR tube rectifier delivering much more power from EL84 but suited to the EMI 630, not the speakers for the TL12 like the 13 x 8, 319. With Solid State equipment like the REALISTIC STA-2000 downthe page, we have to be very careful. It's best to leave as much as possible and restore only the power supply. If the smoothing cans are giving you a bad sound, it's not easy to replace these as there are so many types. Snap-in can be chassis mounted but they're designed to stand glued to a printed circuit board. The glue isn't leakage as some YouTube videos suggest but the plastic jackets on these caps need a certain type of glue. It does look just like Evo-Stik but isn't.
Left in the REALISTIC STA-2000 there's a very good 'Class B' version of the 'Class A' Lowther IA20. This photo shows the solid copper heat-sinks in the Japanese early version with its hot finned rectifier later changed for the cold type. Copper heat-sink continues in the Korean STA-2000 but it has a cheaper power switch that fails and gets replaced with the Omron original. Be on the lookout for scrap power switches.
Left, the later cold rectifier STA-2000 and STA-2000D used Elna electrolytic capacitors in all circuits where the original used Nichicon but had suffered bad speaker protection relays and saw a number of improvements in the later issues. The final issue 2000D loses its enclosed tuning capacitor, even though the amplifier part is probably better than the original, Radio Shack staff believed the Korean version cold rectifier version left (for the 4024) wasn't as powerful as the Japanese one above it, the Flagship hot rectifier model or first issue, intended for the Mach One 4024A Lifetime Guarantee speaker model.
Right the Hitachi HA-330 is a very powerful 30 watt and here is showing 1 watt in the center f.s.d. scale. With the EMI 630, we have only 5 watts. Note how half of the f.s.d. meter scale is under 1 watt and how easily we could blow the 630. The pin should be kept under 0.3 and as the amplifier is a wide-band it should deliver.
Left the internal layout of an HA-330. The mains transformer is very good quality as made by Hitachi Metals Inc. and optimized for electrical perfection but they're very often near failure as operated at full power. The smoothing capacitors are Snap-In and there's not much room to fit chassis-mount to a side panel. The copper coils mean long cable runs are possible. This is one of the most powerful 30-watt amplifiers of all time but its suitability for the low-efficiency EMI 630 is questionable. The 330 is really a Home Disco amplifier and suited to some very loudspeakers that Hitachi made.
Right a genuine Hitachi speaker for the HA-330 won't come at a bargain price and will burn your fingers. You're not going to pay what these fetch and will use lower efficiency bargain demon substitutes. SANYO makes some, Akai but you need cone speakers very like these and not horns used by NEC, Eagle, Sansui, Technics, Kenwood, and others. The squawker looks just like a ghetto blaster unit but the Hi-Fi versions of these are just awesome. The high price of the auction Hitachi really needs the intended matching amplifier, also very pricey. The appearances may suggest a speaker that hurts your ears but for the best results, you'll need a huge room. Left, the SANYO SX401 is a genuine Japanese speaker with the porting system of 1950s PYE that gives a wide dispersion as does the ring radiator tweeter. These will be available at a reasonable price compared to genuine Hitachi. But such 1970s vintage speakers are difficult to find and ideally suit SANYO output devices found in Sansui and Pioneer. In the UK market, the genuine tone match is replaced by Goodmans and Wharfedale made speakers that aren't as good. In America, the genuine mass-market Japanese speakers are widely available. The woofer surrounds of SX401 resemble Wharfedale Chevin and many such Japanese speakers whilst much louder than Wharfedale and more efficient with Japanese power quality, need some improvement in cabinet rigidity, caulking with floor tile glue, added side braces, baffle struts, and felt fabric.
Left the 1972 year harman/kardon A 401 was one of the few US audio exports to England, a Hi-Fi quality controller with low power output for sensitive speakers. This mirror over the brushed aluminum version is rare. The A 402 was later made by Hitachi, the mains iron and HA-330 styled heat-sink of the 401 looking to be of Hitachi Metals design too.
.
Left EMI pleated-edge 10 x 6 in a US Ampex speaker system with 97492 alnico tweeters. The baffle is plywood and the batting is a BBC type made of old clothing. The pattern of covering one side panel, loosely fitting at the top and halfway down the other side is the way to properly damp this speaker. Below a Merciless speaker version of the Dangerous speaker left its smaller magnet for the Leak Stereo 20. The Merciless speakers are aimed at Solid State rectifier tube amplifiers like the Beam Echo up the page. Rogers used an ELAC 8 x 5 in 1964 for Damping Factor 20 and the Damping Factor of the EMI rubberized pleated edge 10 x 6 ellipticals is likely similar.
Below EMI 8 x 5 aimed at a long, wide baffle like the Cadet II.
Right a Rogers Cadet II loudspeaker used a 10 x 6-inch ELAC similar to the custom-made ELAC 59 RM 122 below with Al-Ni-Co magnets, one of the first of its day mounted on the front of the baffle, not easy to replace with a similarly styled car unit or even an EMI or other ELAC of similar vintage. The EMI above may give a similar sound but the best matched-up speakers are still capable of awesome sound stage imaging, from a time when engineers were trying to attract customers and develop widespread High Fidelity listening.
Left the upmarket English Plessey cube magnet Al-Ni-Co tweeter is missing in a 1964 year Rogers Cadet II loudspeaker, the core unique in its surround's detail.
The lower social classes used secondhand Rogers Cadet III with used Keesonic Kub down the page. Left, and right the Rogers Cadet II cores, tweeter, and mid-woofer. The Kub was before mass-market Rogers LS3/5A and the social class of modest means, the listening room very small with speakers close together on the floor. Not very inspiring owners, snobbish,
lower society. Below left an elite only EMI 10 x 6 on which Jim Rogers... ...had ELAC of England custom-build his Cadet II Low-Frequency mid-woofer for the lower society mass-market but few remain to share around. These aren't auto sound quality but Hi-Fi. Jim Rogers was dear to the lower market bargain demon and followed by people with Lotus cars. This would be mainly lower band elite schools. Right another ELAC magnet on the same basket of the very similar 10 x 6 speaker below. Note...
...the different cone appearance of the Rogers Cadet II speaker. The elite of the early 1960s is a very long time ago and the significance of detail differences isn't known to many. They're the real speakers made for Rogers Cadet II and III amplifiers that later had secondhand Keesonic Kub below very close together as low powered.
The JORDAN WATTS speakers were made by a middle-class personality from Goodmans Loudspeakers who'd worked at British GEC with a Building qualification instead of an electrical one. Boosey & Hawkes of Middlesex made his 'Modular High-Fidelity Loudspeaker', a medium efficiency 87dB, 1w,m Jordan Watts module of the same loudness as the EMI 650, the Frequency Response not so great, 30-20 at +/- 6dB at 7.5-16-ohms, 0-12 w.r.m.s. The A.T.C. Studio Monitor company of England was begun by Billy Woodman of Goodmans who created the cloth dome Axtent tweeter. Right, the Keesonic Kub 1 by Peter Keeley, followed by Lotus Car type buyers, based on EMI cores.
Left the SEAS brand driven Keesonic Kub 2 with dome tweeter and Bextrene mid/woofer, precisely cut to fit a plywood baffle. Buyers were a bright and merry group from the lower-middle-class; people of Lotus cars and secondhand, A&R Cambridge A60 used with Kub 2, Kolt, Rogers LS3/5A, and Richard Allan's monitors. 'Passport to Pimlico' was an Ealing comedy where the Duke of Burgundy wants an independent state in the UK. Well, these A&R tuners were similarly for city dwellers and people close to broadcast masts with a powerful FM signal, they couldn't be used in places needing the sensitive Japanese brands. The United Kingdom certainly wasn't one market, if it was one state. A&R 60 amplifiers were seen with other tuners in places too far from broadcast masts. Below, the formidable British Audiolab 8000A. Just look at
these red wires, bent like...
...part of a tube circuit. 2 x 50 volt, Elna
10000MFD smoothing cans, a round transformer, not potted, not shielded, a computer ribbon wire, fiberglass board and hybrid Sanken output devices - how is it able to sound so much better than the Philips hybrid output Ariston AX-910? Well, the four small smoothing cans of the 910 replaced by bigger low ESR Elna types and the 910 works best with Japanese speakers like the Technics honeycomb. But turning a 910 into an Audiolab 8000A would be making the proverbial silk purse out of a sow's ear. How many hobbyists would tinker with an AX-910 hoping for an Audiolab 8000A sleeper experience?
Left, Baron Sugar's 8000 Mk III SYSTEM amplifier, British shoe-box for the lower society (and taken very seriously). Plastic and wood improve sound quality, matching the Acousta 1500 speaker system by Goodmans below.
Above any vintage amplifier will sound bad if not serviced and this You Tube presenter probably never heard the system new as he doesn't say what speakers he bought back in the day.The Rogers A100 was a short-lived 1980 year reply to the success of the Cambridge A60 right. A similar styling is planned to appeal to this lower-middle-class buyer.
Left, the Rogers Studio 1 speaker for the A&R 60 above and Rogers A 100 below features a sticky label F.R. very level throughout the range. Medium sensitivity Studio 1 is loud with the A60 but only for large middle-class rooms, just so LOUD at only 86dB for 1 watt, that owners of Wharfedale Glendale couldn't believe it, absolute party speakers and only ever considered by you know, affluent formerly elite school buyers. The Amstrad Acousta by Goodmans above is aimed at much smaller spaces and wallets but depends on its matching amplifier components being in top condition. Old or new speakers have a long run-in time to sound best. Years of sitting idle spoils their sound quality, the amplifiers too need to warm up for fifteen minutes whilst playing a source.
Right and below, AMSTRAD 5050 wooden case receiver based on Executive Series electronics, a capacitor decoupled design similar to QUAD 303's sound, sports the truly remarkable faux high endg.o. mains transformer and wooden case for enhanced sound quality over steel cases, using special TAMON high output speakers, it was a Bestseller.
Left, TAMON of Japan made Solavox PR35 Mk.II has unknown modifications over the Mk.1 but were the deep cabinet early version AMSTRAD speakers best suited to the Executive Series and 5050 receiver above. They're not going to sound like Rogers Studio 1 with A&R Cambridge A60 but would be very impressive if the electronics were restored and working as new. PR35 aren't going to sound so hot with 3-stage amplifiers of the 1980s, care has to be shown in matching any speakers to suitable electronics. Solavox PR45 and the AMSTRAD 450 are the top of the range TAMONExecutive Series speakers but hard to find and shallow speaker cabinet, later AMSTRAD Tower System speakers are inferior for Executive Series use.
Left, after the A&R 60 the company was renamed Arcam making the Alpha based on Baron Sugar's 8000 Mk. III shoe-box amplifier. Below, the British Arcam Alpha speaker has a molded plastic frame to attract lower society buyers.
The British shoe-box buyers had been raised on Mullard 3-3 type amplifiers with low frequencies above 100Hz. They bought 1980s speakers above 70Hz in lower notes and the sound was good but often, had a terrible mains power hum, for which they'd proudly bought gadgets, although the shoe-box amplifier was their problem, a group of buyers who're a minimalist-build cult. Their vinyl record-player was of the Strathearn brand using a direct-drive motor from a child's toy. The NAD 5120 was an all plastic TT like a lower market BSR McDonald cheaper than below, the Sinclair stereo system and early 'British Shoe-box' that were lower middle class.
Left and above, Sinclair stuff had small, full range speakers, the Q14 and Q16, with just 60Hz-16KHz F.R. Nytech amplifiers too were from do-it-yourself record-playing, 'Music Centres'below with a very basic radio set in the today, sought after CT252 but had Belt-Drive Garrard record players as the Sinclair left that marked them out as
slightly...
...above BSR rim drive of the British lower society, not the US market's BSR McDonald. But posh 'Music Centres' were owned by rich people, raised on the Mullard 3 sound. The Mission brand was another shoe-box giving lower priced competition to full featured Technics or SONY. Below a GEC Five-Ten suits late 1940s aluminum cone GEC speakers.
Right, 1957 GEC Octagonal box speaker for the FIVE-TENabove. There was a lot of interest on internet threads how the GECPeriphonic speaker would have sounded with the ideal GEC amplifier above, rather than just any old Mullard 10 design. When Ted Jordan was literally kicked out of GEC, he'd brought with him to Goodmans of England, an obsession with 1940s British Empire elite GEC aluminum coned speakers that he'd later had crafted into his very own JordanWATTS modules. Ted firstly created the Goodmans Axiette speaker for the QUAD II but GEC was an entirely different kettle of fish. Goodmans were middle-class and mass-market whereas GEC had been elitist, the sound they had so obsessed Ted that he could think of nothing else thereafter.
Left the Grampian Type 54 below with EZ81 was based on the Mullard 10 design, the amplifier left with bigger, world mains transformer, the GEC one andthe first Mullard 10 kit above with bigger rectifier tube and Parmeko transformers, all use EL84 tubes but Output Transformers suit only one loudspeaker brand best.
Right, a surprising magnet size for a tube amplifier, Grampian made Public Address amplifiers in the 1950s and this might be 35 watts like the Auditorium below. The huge hand-wound Output Transformers of these sets would have a sound quality unobtainable in the modern era. In the Baker below the screw holes are back-filled with lead metal like the Grampian right and posses one of the huge magnet systems that tube enthusiasts shy away from unless they possess the Cinema amplifiers they would have had. The price to be paid in getting reasonable results is too high for anybody that isn't suitably supported by experienced technicians.
The other problem with such speakers is the cabinet and above we're able to see the very strong corner pieces and mesh opening that was called a 'drone'. Also, the cloth wrap on the rear of the 12-inch above that was a 1950s way of doing things. There's a genius or 'magic' hidden in their construction so that many enthusiasts won't give them the time of day.
LeftJordan modules of the lower middle class are popular today with upstarts but have only 87dB, 1w, 1m. A suitable amplifier needs matched up, one designed back in the day to run with them. The Jordan module is based on GEC speakers that the young Ted Jordan found irresistible before being shipped to Goodmans, ('replaced') as he was merely a building engineer (hence the ugly module). Wharfedale and Leak speakers had the 87dB efficiency needing powerful amplifiers run at volumes higher than with EMI or ELAC used with the Rogers Cadet amplifiers lower middle class (ex-public schoolboys). Below the Flaçon was the most available Jordan speaker, here connected to some tubes. EL34 tube amplifiers do get very lifelike sounds from Billy Woodman's Axtent and plastic-bodied cloth dome tweeters in Magister and Magnum but many YouTube videos of JWatts modules sound harsh and distorted as will a Solid State amplifier with the Woodman doped cloth dome tweeter. Best to use an EL34 Output Tube amplifier with Billy's efforts.
Below elite speakers aimed at a folded horn speaker system with the squawker driving the horn and large speaker adding some lows and highs. Back in the 1950s High Fidelity scene, these folded horn-type speakers were usual and continue today with Lowther.
Below a Dulci 3+3, Single-Ended has a very low Damping Factor and would be used with folded horn designs, the pleated edge for control of the low frequencies, not available from the amplifier's Damping Factor. The magnet on the 13 x 8 is very small to avoid stressing very low power amplifiers like Dulci and the speaker was very loud to make the best use of low power as these were very expensive watts compared to the 1980s Solid State.
Left Pamphonic 2001, a PYE brand. Although rare in the days before eBay, GZ32 and KT66 are available today. In these amplifiers, the windings in the Output Transformer have more effect than the Output Tube and aim at certain speakers. 2001 had a 15-inch R&A that won't be seen much today. Below the size of the box needed for the size of the R&A core. Panels of plywood are secured to the inner and outer chipboard and there's no batting, not caulked but with a green rear panel gasket.
Left an R&A Whizzer, the brand always had extremely small voice coil former tubes and the speech dome is of an ElectroVoice kind. The rarity of R&A PYE has some enthusiasts eager to find another speaker capable of similar results. But of course, there is no equal and the QUAD II is more popular due to its use with the Goodmans loudspeakers that...
...aren't so rare albeit in private collections and expensive. People see a photo of these R&A speakers and want them based on childhood experience. If they know everything about them then just maybe some other, cheaper alternative will be as good. Well, the R&A were electrically tailored for the matching amplifier and nothing else will equal them but tube speakers like Lowther are available at occasional bargain prices, courtesy of their immovable cabinet weight.
Left the alnico magnet size for double-ended KT66. The Pamphonic 2001 isn't really a wide-band, as its power-bandwidth is 15Hz-30KHz and the overall Frequency Response of 2Hz-100KHz that would be wide-band has no +/-dB qualification. So with a stronger input and graphic equalizer, it could deliver but this magnet on the left won't deliver even 15Hz. These are impressively loud at feeble power inputs but not woofers.
Right, R&A 2-way, tweeter and full range loudspeaker, a 'network-free' from the 1950s using a capacitor. These are not 'subs' or woofers but high sensitivity, loud, large diameter speakers for old-fashioned listening rooms with high ceilings and plaster walls. The tweeter is used with a... ...different amplifier than the whizzer or 'parasitic tweeter'. The tweeter seen needs high end accuracy in the hooked up amplifier, basically a suitable Output Transformer.
Left, a tube Output Transformer gives its Frequency Response of 30Hz-20KHz to say it can power a separate tweeter with only 10 watts as full power. Some High Fidelity amplifiers were wide-band with 10Hz-50KHz F.R. suited to tube woofers and small electrostatic tweeters, although the large QUAD ESL-57 electrostatic panels gave only 18KHz top. The whizzer cone is seen instead of a tweeter when the Output Transformer suits only one voice coil motor, maybe it sounded better with a whizzer, a separate tweeter needing more expensive tube power than a single full range speaker.
Right, unique photo of hand-made Baker Superb Mk.II, a 25 watt late 1970s version of the 20 watt with Baker's Selhurst deerskin suspension and not the foam seen in 1970s adverts. 'Superb' were named after a Royal Navy battleship and as tested by the British Elite, passed with flying colors, motor magnet size needs a cinema tube amplifier.
Left, the Baker Superb was built in a speaker cabinet of 360 degree dispersion and more often, where a 45 degree angled wooden reflector beamed sound forwards to listeners. Elite speakers made for radiogram furniture of the day had used EMI speakers that as elliptical were shallower front to back, brand names never mentioned to buyers, cores mounted horizontally giving a wide listening area, the speaker often hidden with grille cloth trims. The elite buyers of those years wasn't similar to conventional lower market buyers with two simple stereo speaker boxes. Aristocrat speakers were found in upper class Town Houses in a time very different from the present, a time when snobbery was proudly flaunted.
Right, very seldom seen Tripletone speaker has foam wedges hold the Whizzer in dumbing down 'shout' and 'screech' effects. The surround is low Damping Factor long-throw combining high, medium, and low tones, hence Tripletone, amplifiers (above and below) used one core to avoid power wasting speaker networks. The higher Damping Factor amplifier and speakers are made to match too.
Left the ubiquitous QUAD II of the lower-middle-class and below the American Heathkit W5M of the lower social classes both use KT66, the Output Transformer wound for Goodmans speakers that owners conclude best with certain models made for the purpose. Whiteley Stentorian has a speaker for the QUAD II, W5M is a lower market but highly prized by owners today.
Right, £5000 each MING DA mono tube amplifier is a modern Single-Ended type aimed at speakers capable of 160 watts handling whilst the EMI 630 was only 5-watt per channel in stereo pairs. The EMI 630 was an elite item used with some as yet unknown amplifiers and the celebrated sound led mass-market imitations.
Left the American REALISTIC Optimus T-70 with 55Hz lowest low-frequency note was based on the elite only EMI 630 T-slot design for 35Hz. RadioShack called the T-70 a Transmission Line to appeal to the Harvard University IMF speaker people but a T-slot is different. The only available photo of the British establishment's T-slot for the EMI 630 is very small. RadioShack's Fort Worth, Texas engineering team under Bernie Appel sought to equal hi-End equipment at a REALISTIC price and was meant to be modded out by engineers as Hot Rod cars sought to compete with Italian supercars. Below, British Rega ELA Transmission Line for the Creek CAS 4040 shoe-box amplifier.-min.png)
I’ve been working on the railroad,
Left a very rare photo of the Benjamin EMI Model 55 that was followed in some very distinguished American villages and may well have appeared in a T-Slot design for the 1960s elite buyer. The EMI 'Norman' in the Model 55 has a small magnet motor with a long pole voice coil former and is suited to EL84 with powerful rectifiers, able to produce deep bass at a few hundred milliwatts. The lower cost amplifier is unable to feed these speakers with the correct quality of input power.
Below EMI 319 made by Scope New York in the early 1960s. The bigger yet DLS 529 has some old 13 x 8 46600 baskets welded and ground, possibly repaired under an exchange scheme. The later EMI 92390G basket is a new 46600 single steel stamping with no filled hole details and isn't the genuine elite stock but mass-market. So the motor windings won't be so great in the later DLS529. These Scope 'DANGEROUS' speakers were viewed as better than all others using the British THORN made Stereoscope tube amplifier followed by elites and are very mysterious, understated speakers, known in the US as the Abbey Road Studio Monitor. The 319 right is capable of astonishing sound stage effects with very low power, a tiny fraction of a watt but only a pricey low power amplifier will give the effects.
Goodmans squawker and tweeter using a network-free breadboard point-to-point soldered x-over with an EMI/ DECCA/ HMV 46600 13 x 8. The 13 x 8 was elite only until the year 1964 when it was launched in a few professional versions and soon appeared in mass-market B&W models of the mid-1960s UK. The DLS529 was the first mass-market EMI speaker in the United States but was only bought by elites.
Left in the REALISTIC STA-2000 there's a very good 'Class B' version of the 'Class A' Lowther IA20. This photo shows the solid copper heat-sinks in the Japanese early version with its hot finned rectifier later changed for the cold type. Copper heat-sink continues in the Korean STA-2000 but it has a cheaper power switch that fails and gets replaced with the Omron original. Be on the lookout for scrap power switches.
Left EMI pleated-edge 10 x 6 in a US Ampex speaker system with 97492 alnico tweeters. The baffle is plywood and the batting is a BBC type made of old clothing. The pattern of covering one side panel, loosely fitting at the top and halfway down the other side is the way to properly damp this speaker. Below a Merciless speaker version of the Dangerous speaker left its smaller magnet for the Leak Stereo 20. The Merciless speakers are aimed at Solid State rectifier tube amplifiers like the Beam Echo up the page. Rogers used an ELAC 8 x 5 in 1964 for Damping Factor 20 and the Damping Factor of the EMI rubberized pleated edge 10 x 6 ellipticals is likely similar.
The lower social classes used secondhand Rogers Cadet III with used Keesonic Kub down the page. Left, and right the Rogers Cadet II cores, tweeter, and mid-woofer. The Kub was before mass-market Rogers LS3/5A and the social class of modest means, the listening room very small with speakers close together on the floor. Not very inspiring owners, snobbish,
lower society. Below left an elite only EMI 10 x 6 on which Jim Rogers...
...had ELAC of England custom-build his Cadet II Low-Frequency mid-woofer for the lower society mass-market but few remain to share around. These aren't auto sound quality but Hi-Fi. Jim Rogers was dear to the lower market bargain demon and followed by people with Lotus cars. This would be mainly lower band elite schools. Right another ELAC magnet on the same basket of the very similar 10 x 6 speaker below. Note...
.jpg)
de(1).jpg)
Left, Baron Sugar's 8000 Mk III SYSTEM amplifier, British shoe-box for the lower society (and taken very seriously). Plastic and wood improve sound quality, matching the Acousta 1500 speaker system by Goodmans below.b(1).jpg)
.jpg)
.png)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.png)
Left Jordan modules of the lower middle class are popular today with upstarts but have only 87dB, 1w, 1m. A suitable amplifier needs matched up, one designed back in the day to run with them. The Jordan module is based on GEC speakers that the young Ted Jordan found irresistible before being shipped to Goodmans, ('replaced') as he was merely a building engineer (hence the ugly module). Wharfedale and Leak speakers had the 87dB efficiency needing powerful amplifiers run at volumes higher than with EMI or ELAC used with the Rogers Cadet amplifiers lower middle class (ex-public schoolboys). Below the Flaçon was the most available Jordan speaker, here connected to some tubes. EL34 tube amplifiers do get very lifelike sounds from Billy Woodman's Axtent and plastic-bodied cloth dome tweeters in Magister and Magnum but many YouTube videos of JWatts modules sound harsh and distorted as will a Solid State amplifier with the Woodman doped cloth dome tweeter. Best to use an EL34 Output Tube amplifier with Billy's efforts.
Left Pamphonic 2001, a PYE brand. Although rare in the days before eBay, GZ32 and KT66 are available today. In these amplifiers, the windings in the Output Transformer have more effect than the Output Tube and aim at certain speakers. 2001 had a 15-inch R&A that won't be seen much today. Below the size of the box needed for the size of the R&A core. Panels of plywood are secured to the inner and outer chipboard and there's no batting, not caulked but with a green rear panel gasket.
Left an R&A Whizzer, the brand always had extremely small voice coil former tubes and the speech dome is of an ElectroVoice kind. The rarity of R&A PYE has some enthusiasts eager to find another speaker capable of similar results. But of course, there is no equal and the QUAD II is more popular due to its use with the Goodmans loudspeakers that... 
Right, R&A 2-way, tweeter and full range loudspeaker, a 'network-free' from the 1950s using a capacitor. These are not 'subs' or woofers but high sensitivity, loud, large diameter speakers for old-fashioned listening rooms with high ceilings and plaster walls. The tweeter is used with a... ...different amplifier than the whizzer or 'parasitic tweeter'. The tweeter seen needs high end accuracy in the hooked up amplifier, basically a suitable Output Transformer.
.jpg){kind=link}
No comments:
Post a Comment