Stephens Tru-Sonic 15" woofers in Ampex Signature

Found one!

Henredon Furniture Buffet Ampex Signature 4.jpg

A couple of years ago I saw one of these advertised on Craigslist at an estate sale. The ad had a photo but didn’t describe what it was. I didn’t get a response to my email asking if it was a stereo – and after later reading that there was also a four-door cabinet style (I hadn't yet seen the 1961 model with what appears as six doors) I wondered for some time if I had snoozed. The only four-door cabinet I’ve ever seen is the 1961 model in the pictures above...(it’s a four-door if one considers each bifold door as a single door),

Many of the details of this Henredon are remarkably similar. If Henredon was not the original manufacturer of the Signature cabinet, it’s easy to imagine that a Henredon Buffet like this one was used as a reference for the Signature’s design.

The piano hinges on the doors are different. But the grain and color of the parquet wood looks nearly identical (and as I mentioned in an earlier post, much of the color comes from the colored varnish etc.) When I saw the inlays on the top I realized you may very well have found the manufacturer of the Signature cabinets.
 

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I sent an email inquiry to Henredon:

"For historical purposes we're trying to establish whether Henredon was the OEM manufacturer of stereo console cabinetry for Ampex Audio Inc in Sunnyvale California during 1958-1961. The construction and finish of one of your vintage parquet buffets is, upon close inspection, strikingly similar to the work on the "Ampex Signature" stereo console cabinets. I have pictures of both cabinets and would be happy to email them. If Henredon was indeed the original manufacturer, we (as collectors of this vintage equipment having an online discussion) would like to give the company credit for its extremely fine craftsmanship on these collectible stereo cabinets. You'll find a photo of a Signature cabinet at the below link -- scroll down until you find the parquet cabinet:

http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/my-ampex-stereo-consoles.466756/

Thanks!!!"
 
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This is cool. Amazing what you can learn here. My money is with Henredon. Hopefully they can verify it. Some of the higher end Motorola consoles of this era were made by Drexel. For what the Signature cost you could buy a brand new TR-3 and for $400 more a brand new Austin Healey 3000 or his and her Fiat 500's with $500 left over. I doubt if the average worker made more than $5K per year in '59.
 
Henredon Furniture and Frank Lloyd Wright. Henredon Furniture was founded in 1945 by four partners who had previously worked as executives at Drexel Heritage Furniture. The name Henredon is a derivative of three of the founders' names, Henry Wilson, Ralph Edward and Don Van Noppen.


Henredon was founded in Morganton, North Carolina in 1945 by four men determined to build furniture of custom quality. The initial product line consisted of just three chests. It has since mushroomed into hundreds of beautiful wood and upholstery designs for every room.
 
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My money is with Henredon. Hopefully they can verify it. Some of the higher end Motorola consoles of this era were made by Drexel...I doubt if the average worker made more than $5K per year in '59.

Henredon seems a pretty safe bet. Not much information to be found, but it looks like in 1960 Henredon was an OEM manufacturer of furniture for some RCA consoles:

Billboard Sept 12 1960.jpg

Your warranty card hints at 1959 earnings.

Owner Survey Card.jpg

A 1959 Ampex Signature would cost about $23K in 2018 dollars...That qualifies as "exclusive"!
 
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Henredon was founded in Morganton, North Carolina ...

The next mystery is where these consoles were assembled. It makes sense that the finished cabinetry was freighted to Ampex to be built into a stereo -- but I was surprised to see a recent ad for a painted-finish Ampex Custom that hints otherwise. The finish appears to be original - with over-spray appearing much the same as shown on page 26 of the owners manual. Looking closely at the pictures one can see that although the cabinet appears to have been painted prior to the installation of the tuner/preamp/turntable, there is paint overspray on at least the right channel amplifier.

I just noticed that the crossovers for this unit are mounted next to the amplifiers. Each appears to be just a single capacitor.
1990354-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990355-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990357-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990358-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990359-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990360-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990361-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg 1990351-ampex-stereo-console-pick-up-only.jpg
 
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The next mystery is where these consoles were assembled. It makes sense that the finished cabinetry was freighted to Ampex to be built into a stereo --

Great info!!! @CoastinHome

I'm glad this was brought up because I've often wondered who built the cabinetry for my Crescendo

Reading you most recent posts got me to thinking. If someone was paying the kind of money, back in the late 50's early 60's, for an Ampex console would it be wise to assume that when you purchased one you had to wait until it was built? the reason I say this is because about 10 years ago I purchased a Drexel Heritage Bedroom set from a local well thought of furniture store. I was able to physically view/inspect the floor model and then the sales person advised if I purchased I would have to wait many weeks (I wanna say 6, I could be wrong though) until it was actually built and shipped from NC which I didn't realize at the time plus it was a decent 4 figure purchase.

If I had to wait 6 weeks 10 years ago what was the turnaround time back then? I'm guessing that Drexel and Henreddon back then weren't just mass producing cabinets back then and Ampex wasn't just ordering 100's? maybe 1000's?, with a percentage of this or that wood grain, or a percentage of this style, the different door types sliding/folding, installing the equipment and then distributing them to their various dealers.
 
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Looks like there might be some overspray on the aluminum shelf bracket where the tuner and preamp rests. My thoughts are it was done professionally per a customer request. I can't believe Ampex would have been too lazy to remove the amps. The only ads I've seen refer to "French Provincial in cherry fruitwood"....nothing painted. BTW I've spent more time reviewing ads and the first ads I see for the Custom series and Signature appear beginning in Oct '58. Have found nothing earlier so I think the consoles began production in '58 as '59 models. When I get time I'll begin the process of trying to read date codes on my unit. This ad is from Oct 4 1958.
1958_1004_NYer_p104_ampex_ad.jpg
 
another ad from Oct '58 easier to read....
58_ad_closer.jpg

BTW you might notice different Dept number in the response address.....that is an old trick to track ad effectiveness.
 
The first console offering from Ampex was the A423 :

Ampex A423 Manual.jpg

A423 Brochure.jpg

The earliest advertising I found for the A423 was February 1957:

A423 Audio Magazine February 1957.jpg


The A423 had a monaural Fisher 80R AM-FM tuner (with several changes made for Ampex including revising the input selector to a band selector and deleting the Fisher logo from the dial glass) -- sharing a faceplate with what appears as an Ampex monaural preamp.

Fisher 80R.jpg

Ampex Preamp from A423 Console 1.jpg

I'm kinda stumped on the early marketing of the A423 as being a "Stereophonic" console. It seems that these were delivered as monophonic units with two amplifiers to be later retrofit for stereo. Note the single-gang volume control in the preamplifier (etc.) and the inclusion of only one EV636 microphone with the console. Was the mono preamp initially fed through the mono record / stereo playback A-Series reel to reel and the only stereo capability the reel to reel? But that would conflict with the tape loop.

Ampex Preamp from A423 Console 2.jpg

July 1957: "Ampex announced a new line of home music systems incorporating a new stereophonic recorder with a universal head assembly which made possible the playback of all single-track, two-track and four-track prerecorded tapes on a single machine." (Ampex Factbook 1970)

June 1, 1958: A "Model 401 Stereophonic Phono Pre-Amplifier Kit" was made available to allow the preamp and Garrard Model A (and later RC88/4) changer to be modified for stereo use.

This is all I have and it's hard to tell what's entailed -- but it wouldn't be as simple as these instructions to convert the above into a full dual-channel preamp. Was Ampex offering a drop-in stereo replacement preamp?

Ampex A423 Stereo Update.jpg

By October 1957 the A423 was marketed as a "Crescendo"

Oct 1957 Tape Recording Magazine pg 43 clip.jpg

The original A423 evolved into the Ampex Modern Crescendo - and three other furniture styles were added. Perhaps these were the 1958 models:

Crescendo 423 Series.jpg

At some point the Modern Crescendo was dropped from the line and a Contemporary Teak model was added.

Ampex A-423 Riverside 5.jpg
 
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The above brochure (with the Signature on the left) was delivered with this Contemporary Teak console:

1.JPG

Ampex A-423 Riverside 2.jpg

The console uses a pair of Ampex/JBL 8" drivers:
3.JPG 4.JPG

The 6V6 amplifiers have an elaborate feedback network to compensate for driver limitations so as to obtain a broader flat response from the drivers.
Ampex A423 Cresendo Console 2 (2).jpg

This unit came with hand-drawn schematics and many service bulletins.
Ampex A-423 Riverside 4.jpg

This 1958 A423K Modern Crescendo is representative of the very first stereo consoles on the market.

Ampex A423 Console 3.jpg

Ampex A423 Console 2.jpg

This unit has been restored and had the finish color changed in the process. The original finish looked like this unit which belonged to Les Paul:

Les Paul Ampex Console.jpg

Here's a 6-minute Youtube video of the restored A423:

 
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My thoughts are it was done professionally per a customer request...The only ads I've seen refer to "French Provincial in cherry fruitwood"....nothing painted...

I'd have to agree.

With that version of the 403 preamp, the console would have to be a 1960 or early 1961. It's currently on the market in Palm Springs CA.
 
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Here is another curious detail of my Henredon console

The tape drawer has been drilled for two different mountings, the Ampex and another unknown
Tape drawer holes.JPG

Both sets of holes look like quality professional work
Both sets are counter sunk on the bottom to repress the screws
 
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I looked at mine and it only has the one set of holes. First time I paid any attention to my 954 since I brought it home and discovered it is missing the forward/reverse direction lever knob. Always something.
 
Here is another curious detail of my Henredon console

I looked at three different drawers:

The empty 1959 (8002 - 2x 12", Ampex mid, T35B) and late 1960 (8102 - 15"+8" Stephens, T35B) "Henredons" (as I will begin using to refer to the empty cabinets) do not have these holes.

The 1961 (8202-2 -- my intact console) does have the additional four holes. They are not countersunk, though -- and are not being used for anything.

Given the lineage I would expect these to be a production improvement. I haven’t had the experience of installing or removing one of these decks from a drawer yet, but I can imagine that it would improve Ampex’s manufacturing efficiency to create an alignment jig with pins that extend through these four holes during assembly to guide the deck into alignment with the mounting holes and avoid the problem of misaligning the mounting spacers/rubber washers on the wood mounting pedestals. (I haven’t measured a deck to see if my reasoning makes sense).
 
I looked at three different drawers:
Given the lineage I would expect these to be a production improvement. I haven’t had the experience of installing or removing one of these decks from a drawer yet, but I can imagine that it would improve Ampex’s manufacturing efficiency to create an alignment jig with pins that extend through these four holes during assembly to guide the deck into alignment with the mounting holes and avoid the problem of misaligning the mounting spacers/rubber washers on the wood mounting pedestals. (I haven’t measured a deck to see if my reasoning makes sense).

That sounds logical
 
Here's a pair of 2-way speakers from an early fr. provincial from a craigslist seller. These 15" have the same cross marks on the dust covers as my 12" woofers.

IMG_6944.JPG
 
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Here's a pair of 2-way speakers from an early fr. provincial from a craigslist seller. These 15" have the same cross marks on the dust covers as my 12" woofers.

@matt e.
Those are more likely 12" drivers - both in relative size to the tweeter and in what driver combinations were available. To my knowledge only the Signature had 15" drivers.

I would venture a guess that both the woofers and these mystery tweeters are the same as in your console.
 
I thought the 2 way models got 15" woofers and only the Signature got the pair of 12"? Tweeters look the same as what I have. Owner is a collector and is going to part out. If reasonable I may buy the tweeters from him to have as spares. I think he's got a model 4018.
4018.jpg 2way_xover.jpg
fr_prov_ampex.jpg
 
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