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Bose 601 speakers - old school!!

I am certain that it's not the amp. The foam surrounds appear to be in fairly decent condition. In a perfect world, they could be replaced. As for the wiring, I can pull out one of the drivers and see if anything has rattled loose. When they were playing, all the drivers seemd to be working. They were moving and felt and sounded like they were working. Just very little bass.
 
thedelihaus said:
I don't hate 'em. Actually had a pair of 601s myself- but the woofers were damaged beyond repair. I donated the tweeters to a fella's project elsewhere, who had damaged tweeters.


These are a fun speaker, and will be an enjoyable project, and I completely support you with it.


Keep an eye out for other 601s on craigslist, or watch eBay for a few woofers.

And check with Parts Express- who knows, those drivers might not cost you much. I was amazed at what I got for my money there.
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Those original 601 aren't bad.
 
out of phase. Try reversing the polarity on one speaker and give it a listen. Or the replacement driver could be a different impedance.
 
Phasing is correct. The foam surrounds are intact. Is this just the characteristics of the speakers? I'm not expecting thunderous bass out of them, but they sound as though the tweeters are so much louder than the rest.
 
I have to join in this unusual parade of Bose praising (for this place)- when I was first buying my own stereo components, at age 16, with money from my night job, I clearly remember lumping the 601s into the "have the full sound I like, but too expensive although not insanely so" list. So I liked them, and they would have been contenders had dishwashing at a steak house paid any better. That's a compliment if you can't tell.

I would guess looking for original components even in need of refoaming would not only be the most cost effective strategy but also the most satisfying sonically for reasons TheDelihaus has already given.
 
schabot said:
Phasing is correct. The foam surrounds are intact. Is this just the characteristics of the speakers? I'm not expecting thunderous bass out of them, but they sound as though the tweeters are so much louder than the rest.
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Something is definitely off, that isn't how they should sound.
 
After I refoamed my 601's (series II) a few years ago, one of the speakers had quite a bit less bass than the other, I opened it back up and one of the crossover wires had broken off. The crossover contains some rectangular ceramic type material resistors, and the wire broke off right at the edge of the resistor. I replaced it and the speaker came back to life.
 
OK - So I have been trying different placement with these just to see if perhaps that might be the problem. I have them hooked up to my 100w Yamaha A/V reciver just to test. I was playing a song, not crazy loud, but letting them stretch their legs a bit. I happened to look inside the port and noticed a red light flashing inside. Any ideas what the hell that is? :scratch2: Hopefully I wasn't frying something.
 
schabot said:
OK - So I have been trying different placement with these just to see if perhaps that might be the problem. I have them hooked up to my 100w Yamaha A/V reciver just to test. I was playing a song, not crazy loud, but letting them stretch their legs a bit. I happened to look inside the port and noticed a red light flashing inside. Any ideas what the hell that is? :scratch2: Hopefully I wasn't frying something.
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It's a thermally variable resistor (aka a light bulb) that Bose used for tweeter protection. It's normal.
 
Those who are down on the series one 601 simply have not heard a pair in good condition. Having just re-foamed the woofers to a series one pair of 601 speakers they are well worth restoration, but having seen a seriess iii 601 I can see why they have a bad rap as the quality of the tweeters have markedly decreased from my series one 601, a shame. It seems that marketing and entrophy will eventually win.
 
Have you verified that both woofers are actually moving?
It could be that one of them got disconnected - maybe?
Not very likely but it's worth a shot to make sure both are responding to signal.
 
Ishmael said:
Those who are down on the series one 601 simply have not heard a pair in good condition. Having just re-foamed the woofers to a series one pair of 601 speakers they are well worth restoration, but having seen a seriess iii 601 I can see why they have a bad rap as the quality of the tweeters have markedly decreased from my series one 601, a shame. It seems that marketing and entrophy will eventually win.
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As far as I'm concerned, the original 601 is the best speaker Bose ever made.
 
Those were the first speakers I purchased when they came out in the late 70's and I still have and use my original 601's. They have a really nice warmth and definition with excellent spatial sound. I later heard a series 2 and they had killed them by using plastic cabinet parts that took away the richness that the wood cabinets provided. They sounded dry and had lost that spatial effect. Well built and designed speakers.
 
Doesn't seem to be a lot of the originals around anymore, if I saw some, I may pick them up for sentimental reasons. A buddy of mine had a pair in the late 70's, they were a nice rock & roll speaker, not anything like Mach Ones but they made a lot of noise!
 
I had a set of original 601's, I went against the prevalent opinion and picked them up for $50. I took them home a hooked them up, they sounded like crap. I pulled the drivers out and found that they were some 8 ohm Radio Shack poly woofers. I figured I couldn't base any opinion on non-original speakers. I searched and waited and picked up original woofers, I seem to recall they were 12 ohm :scratch2:, I re-foamed them, and hooked them up. Wow! they sounded so much better! I cleaned up the cabinets, replaced the damaged grills, and listened to them for about 6 months, they sounded great. I think I had about $150 in to them.

Then my brother brought me his Marantz 4230 to restore, I ran it with the 601's, and with only 30 watts they still sounded good. When he picked it up he really liked the sound of the 601's, and since I had just acquired some Infinity RS4b's, I gave them to him as an early Christmas present. He is very happy with them.

I would recommend finding the correct drivers, to really hear what they sound like.
 
Original 601 woofers are 16 ohm and run in parallel. In the series II, the woofers are 4 ohm and are in series.
 
found mine for $20.Refoamed all 4 woofers and redid the cabinets w/ some Olde English Polish and they were great.Not as placement nutty like the 901s and they do have a switch on the rear terminal screws that allows you to either throw the sound front firing or bounce it off the walls hence the all around sound. Yes they like a good clean powerful amp.Mine were the series 1 and are the best and were the best speaker BOSE ever made.There are so many detractors now it's amazing how they built this giant company on a few models that were problematic like the 901s.Old thread still chuggin
 
I have a pair of series I 601s that I bought new in '77. Drove them with a Sansui 9090 for quite a while with good results. Soon after I brought them home, a friend got a pair of Genesis speakers. Those domed tweeters made me instantly jealous, so I picked up a pair of super tweeters from Radio Shack. The additional high end was a significant improvement. A few years ago, the foam on the woofers faded away. Since I need to repair the speakers quickly, I threw a couple of cheap replacement from Radio Shack into them. The sound was noticeably affected for the worse. Maybe a little discussion here will prod me into getting some better replacements. Incidentally, the old drivers were beyond repair since the leads to the voice coils broke. I'm thinking that getting a pair of drivers with the correct impedance will make them sound good again. Seems like a good project for this winter!!
 
dbx.rocks said:
I have a pair of series I 601s that I bought new in '77. Drove them with a Sansui 9090 for quite a while with good results. Soon after I brought them home, a friend got a pair of Genesis speakers. Those domed tweeters made me instantly jealous, so I picked up a pair of super tweeters from Radio Shack. The additional high end was a significant improvement. A few years ago, the foam on the woofers faded away. Since I need to repair the speakers quickly, I threw a couple of cheap replacement from Radio Shack into them. The sound was noticeably affected for the worse. Maybe a little discussion here will prod me into getting some better replacements. Incidentally, the old drivers were beyond repair since the leads to the voice coils broke. I'm thinking that getting a pair of drivers with the correct impedance will make them sound good again. Seems like a good project for this winter!!
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Get the volume of the enclosure and PE can likely pick a good match. As long as the driver is a match for the enclosure AND meets the network crossover you can get as good or possibly better than original. And if you can get late model with rubber surrounds, all the better.
 
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