Cornwall Vertical Decorators

[rshadley]

Picked up a pair of Cornwall Vertical Decorators in raw plywood. The crossovers and tweeters have been upgraded with Bob Crites products. I have the original tweeters and crossovers. They have sequential serial numbers and they are from 72. The woofers have been replaced with a pair of Jensens from 65. They are in great shape but I plan to do a light sanding and add some walnut veneer to everything except the back. I will also build some removable grills using the parts express grill pegs and inserts as I don’t want to destroy the look of front when they are removed.

 

[rshadley]

Prepping the boxes

 

[twiiii]

I thought that version was made to be used horizontally.

 

[rshadley]

No, they were meant for vertical placement. The horns have better dispersion mounted vertically

 

[rshadley]

Going to have to modify the back of the cabinets so that the tops and bottoms can receive the veneer

 

[rshadley]

Removed the speaker terminals so that I can remove 3/4” from top and bottom of the back. Ai noticed that the input leads to the crossovers were reversed on one of the speaker terminals Notice the soldered in clips are upside down on the one on the left as I reversed the wires to correct the polarity

 

[rshadley]

Used a biscuit joiner to reattach the 3/4” pieces that were removed from the original back cover

 

[ImolaRed]

Well done!

I just picked up a pair too, my first CW but mine are the extra sexy painted black

 

[rshadley]

I hope to have these reveneered by this week end. It really is not the hard. Stay tuned.

 

[ImolaRed]

I hope to have these reveneered by this week end. It really is not the hard. Stay tuned.

Update us on how it goes, want to see how you handle the top/back section. I'm going to put grills on my decorators and maybe veneer but just the tops and sides only.

 

[rshadley]

For rhe top/back section I just trimmed 3/4” off the top and bottom of the back and used biscuit joints and glue to reattach. Added a firing strip to the inside of the cabinet on the top and bottom. Notice the grain is different but will get veneered. I had to take back a piece of 8’ veneer and order a 10’ piece as the two sides and top are just over 96” inches

 

[rshadley]

Coming along nicely

 

[usedto]

SWEET!!

My decorators could use a facelift like that.

 

[fromtheashes]

Coming along nicely

Did you veneer using Titebond or a contact cement?

 

[rshadley]

Titebond and is hot iron

 

[rshadley]

One of the grill frames, need to put the Klipsch speaker grill material on next

 

[Coytee]

(not that it matters) but I thought they were made to sit EITHER tall or wide. If you set them tall, the tweeter is in the correct orientation but the Midrange is sideways... if you set them wide, then the midrange is in the correct orientation but the tweeter is sideways.

Don't know that this is gospel, just what I had heard over the years. I've seen pictures of the backside of some of them and on the back was an arrow or two...

^
|__>

something like that indicating that you can put it in either of those directions.

 

[rshadley]

Speaker fronts with grill inserts installed

 

[rshadley]

Close up

 

[rshadley]

One grill complete. Got to order more material from Bob Crites