JBL Lancer 99~ LE14A Question

Qtronic

Active Member
75E8C167-377B-4940-9E2D-F0467533AB58.jpeg 1AD9D4E2-A0B2-4D44-86EF-F7A05613EFBA.jpeg 47B82C3A-6232-48C0-A343-AF7B2FEA8A82.jpeg 78C6A8C9-F5A8-49A4-A783-9D7443AE66C3.jpeg Hi folks,

I purchased these JBL Type S99 Lancer 99s about 7 years ago knowing they were worth restoration, and I just dug them out of storage and had my secondish critical look at them. Have one question, the woofers are LE14A, and compared to pics of majority online, the cones are different on these, they have a darker grey/nearer black look, slathered in a shiny substance. And it refreshed my memory that I had tried to research it years ago and the best explanation I found was that this is what you got when you sent them back to the factory for new surrounds, it was surrounds with new cones as the only option, and these are the cones you’d get back? I could be wrong on that and that research memory could be from a completely different set of researched speakers, I’ve certainly owned enough in my day....

Anyway anyone who has insight I’d like to understand why these seem to appear different than most.

Thanks!
 
I have a pair of these that were also recently in storage. Hardened yellow surround on white cones. Honestly not sure when or if I'll get to mine or if some estate sale shopper will buy them when I'm long gone.
 
Hi and Welcome Qtronic! There are a potential number of reasons why these LE14A's look different and I'll try to cover them.

The original LE14A usually had a white front color on the cone because the original black cone was covered in a white coating called Aquaplas. It had the properties of stiffening the cone as well as adding damping and mass. Some LE14A cones were white both back and front. The surround usually was a white-turned yellow with age foam like material called Lansaloy. These surrounds were flexible and great when new, however, they aged rapidly turning yellow and quite stiff. When stiff they didn't allow movement for bass notes and severely affected the overall speakers sound. After stiffening, if driven hard, they were then prone to crack and breakdown.

Some later production LE14A-LE14H (ceramic magnet) drivers had black cones with black Aquaplas material added to the back of the cones. All JBL cones had a 5 digit part number printed on the backs of the cones. Originals usually had no other writing. If the speaker was reconed by a typical JBL service center during the 80's - early 2000's, the tech usually wrote the date plus driver or cone model on the back of the cone in grease pencil to document the work. OEM JBL recone kits also had the 5 digit cone part number printed on it and already had the foam surround glued onto the backside of the outer cone edge. NO OEM JBL cones ever came with a shiny (and likely soft or slightly stick cone coating as seen on your examples.

The most common issue with older JBL LE14A's is if the cone or surround was damaged, reconing was recommended. IF these were later LE14H cones, you should be able to find the 5 digit part number plus some tech written evidence of the recone date. If cost was an issue, the owner may instead have opted for aftermarket recone kits which superficially appear similar - however, in the past, the aftermarket kits varied widely in performance compared to OEM JBL kits. Some aftermarket kits didn't have an Aquaplas coating on either side, or had some other type of mass or damping material. It is not clear if any aftermarket recone kit can duplicate even closely the total technical Thiele-Small parameters of the OEM JBL kits once installed. AFAIK, no aftermarket kits had any shiny coatings on them normally so IMO, the coatings front and back were from a zealous owner or tech wanting to "improve" their woofers with a damping coating or so-called "wet look" coating (used to come clear or black). An alternative coating could also have been improvised from water diluted white glue or Mod-Podge (similar PVA material) applied thinly to the cones. However, most of these materials can and many times will add significant mass which again will alter the driver performance parameters.

My best guess is, without other photographic evidence, that these have been aftermarket reconed and then had an aftermarket cone coating applied at some point. They may sound decent, but they may not be original sounding. If budget is tight, then I'd say strip off all remnants of the old surround from cone and frame, then purchase new correct LE14 surrounds from Rick Cobb and refoam to back of cone using his tone CD for centering. You may get a fairly decent sounding speaker with a minimum of cash outlay. If you're a stickler for detail, the next level would be to have new and much closer aftermarket recone kits installed by a good and known JBL tech center or service center like Speaker Repair Pros in Garden Grove, CA. Finally, to get fully OEM JBL sound, you could then source either a couple of newly refoamed used LE14A's or seek out a hard to find pair of LE14 OEM JBL recone kits (which may now cost more than the used driver pair) and have those installed.

However, know that the S99 is a nice sounding speaker but not nearly the best sounding in JBL's history - these were designed and marketed in the early 60's with a fairly rudimentary crossover and tweeter design. Up to you to decide where you want to go with what you have. The S99 is a very good candidate for an E-Wave conversion, see AudioKarma E-wave thread.
 
I have a pair of these that were also recently in storage. Hardened yellow surround on white cones. Honestly not sure when or if I'll get to mine or if some estate sale shopper will buy them when I'm long gone.

Hey XplicitActs, Welcome also to AK! The yellow surrounds can be softened temporarily with a careful thin application of DOT3 brake fluid applied only to the surround and not to the areas where glued to the cone or the frame. The softening will last about 5-6 months in most climates. Some will re-do them periodically. However, the surround can still eventually crack. Most performance minded JBL owners will either swap/sell them for LE14's that have already been refoamed with current black polyether foams, or will remove the foams (as much as possible except maybe from the front of the cone - hard to remove without damaging the white cone coating) and then refoam - here applying and gluing the foam to the front of the cone, not the back. This is opposite of the usual JBL placement). As usual, recommended to get foams from Rick Cobb.

See my above post and previous posts about LE14 refoaming.

Oh, and definitely you want to use your nice Concept 16.5 and Dynaco metered ST400 to drive your JBL speakers!! Nice setup!
 
OP:

I agree completely with Mech's opinion above.

My suggestion, if you would like to restore, is to find a good re-cone kit or have it re-coned (again as Mech suggested), the best way to get (close to) original performance and value for these speakers. What you have there is an un-known for sound quality.
 
Thanks everyone!
Super great write up Mech, thank you!
The cabinets on these are nice enough to restore, I would want to be as much a stickler for originality as I know JBL fanatics are, but it’s a bummer the cones are questionable, I looked and found no writing anywhere on the cones. And that suggests to me that this set is likely going to be better pushed off to someone who wants to restore or use them for parts. Best thing going for them is one nearly perfect wood grill, I think I’m off to bartertown.......I’ve got 2 young boys and no time for how far I’d want to take them to have them right. Sigh. I appreciate the fast response on the strange looking cones question!
Cheers all....
 
Hey Q, a nice quick refoam will get you good working speakers which can at least allow you to evaluate the S99 while you decide what to do. If you have the fretwork grilles, they are very nice and spares do show up one at from time to time.
 
Some speakers models are better than the sum of the parts....as is the case with l26.

Some speakers parts are better than the sum......as is the case with the s99.

LE14a is a nice woofer, it has a nice tweeter, and a nice cabinet. But the combo is ok at best.
 
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