H. H. Scott S-15 Speakers...opinions, knowledge?

[MarkAnderson]

East coast sound, KLH-like; a good thing IMHO.

More Scott speakers, some pics

Seems the earlier models like yours had inward-slanted front edges; mine shown here are all flatter-front. The 3-way 11D has polycell tweeters; more modern sounding than the cone tweet especially with the thick tweed grills off.

The other two pairs are S-10B's and S-197B's, no?

 

[Susurus]

Aww, you looked at the back sides eh?

 

[soundmotor]

I had a set of S196's for a time. Quite surprising as to how good they were. They succumbed during my garage purge unfortunately.

 

[Susurus]

Did you compare these to others in the same setup? How'd they fare?

My 10 and 11D's are in the KLH-AR league, they are pretty good knock-offs and they held up over time.

My take on the timeline here FWIW. 196/197 seems just after the peak quality era. To compete in showrooms with Sansui/Kabuki/Mach1-ishness, Marketing stuck a long-throw 15" in there. It looks impressive. Mine has destroyed surrounds so I don't know what they're supposed to sound like. Very large-radius surrounds with some shiny green coating over foam? It doesn't look easy to restore exactly and I haven't tried yet. Likely has Boomyness and the woobblies compared with my other vintage 12's and 15's.

Although not as high quality as my smaller Scotts, some other features prove these aren't completly over the Kabuki-abyss. 50+ pound sealed, not ported, cabinets; thick baffles and plenty deep enough. Not as furniture-quality (routered) finished as the 60's sets like the OP has.

But the tweet is amazing, good Belgian Philips. I got these for a tenner just for the tweets. I may try a 12" in there, probably a better match to the 3-ft^3 cab size.

 

[albowlly]

I spotted a pair of Scott SP 310's in a thrift today but the surrounds were completely gone. Thought I'd check here before expressing any interest. These have a champhered edge with a couple of additional tweeters. Anybody familiar with these? They look a bit more modern than what's posted here.
Tom

 

[5th beatle]

H.H. Scott S-15 Speakers...Opinions, knowledge?

Hey, all, I have the smaller 8" 2-way version of the S-15's which is the S-17. Sweet! About same size as Small Advent with more bass punch. Would love to come upon a pair of the S-15's.

As earlier mentioned, these 60's-early 70's speakers were well-built and still provide me with hours of non-fatiguing listening pleasure. I raised mine two feet off ground to get tweets near ear level. No drop off in bass umph.

 

[Teradacto58]

I have a pair of vintage S-10's I believe...paid $10.00 for them a while back! They sounded pretty sweet on my Heathkit tube amp....both are now in storage...Hopefully I will have a place for them both in the next year or two...my vintage audio room in the near future!!

 

[Susurus]

It's time, I think, for a 'pecking order' comparing the older 60s-early 70s Hermon Hosmer Scott (HH Scott) speakers.

Since I have several of them I'll start.

(1) Acoustic Suspension, non-fatiguing, very KLH-like.

(2) The 11D is tops for tonal quality and balance of my pairs.

Its cab is proportioned well for its drivers, and the polycell tweet doesn't drop off as early as the paper cone tweet on my 2-way models like the 10's. Of course if you've got vinyl you might not want HF hiss. Ten bucks? What a deal Teradacto58! :yes:

Now that I've put new binding posts on my KLH-20's I can match them up against my Scott 10's which are very similar speakers, even in the Xovers (no coincidence).

You could go simply by MSRP from the Scott Vintage website. The error on their site is saying the model 11 has a 12" woofer; I have 2 pairs of 11D's--they have 10" woofers.

But sometimes a 4-way is harder to do well than a 3-way. Extend that reasoning further, and you end up with Lothar single-drivers... :yes:

 

[audiojones]

HH Scott S-20 Speakers

Well, count me in among the HH Scott speaker fans. I thought I'd bring up this old thread yet again to show you guys these HH Scott speakers a nice local couple who were moving gave me (along with a pair of Wharfedale W60-Ds). These Scott S-20s have the ugliest grills I have ever seen, but pop them off and they are a great sounding 2 way speaker. I'm going to refinish the cabs in walnut to get rid of the pickled oak finish and I'm going to make a new grill board from masonite and cover it with some off-white linen. The wood frames with the plastic wrought iron and red fabric grills are getting tossed in the dumpster - they really screw up the tweeter output (plus they are really gaudy looking). It actually sounds like someone is cupping their hand over the tweeter when the grill is in place.
The date stamp on these is Nov 22 1968. These are voiced kind of like a KLH Seventeen only brighter and bassier. They are a very respectable sounding speaker, in addition to the fairly bright presentation and abundant bass the midrange is also very much present without over-doing it. Very enjoyable to listen to all day, no headaches. These have a tweeter potentiometer control rather than a switch, and they also feature rca and screw terminal inputs. The tweeter control has a very slight effect on the tweeter, it's not like a drastic change between full cw and full ccw. They're pretty heavy for their size, and they seem to be able to take a decent amount of power - I was driving them with an Adcom GFA-555 and they were playing some rather bass heavy jazz at a pretty decent volume with no trouble. Nice sounding speakers, but pickled oak with red fabric under plastic wrought iron grills, blech! :yuck:

 

[Guest158]

Found a pair of S-14s at GW couple of weeks ago. 2 ways from 1969.Picked them up for vintage garage display at 4.99 not expecting much for sound.Only listened to them once,wow! They are still hooked up awaiting my next visit.Very impressed listening to them with a 12" sub & newer Onkyo recvr. Definately will pick any more Scotts up I see.

 

[Susurus]

audiojones thanks for the pics.

I see both RCA and wire terminals in back there...

So now do we have representatives of all of the best-era vintage HH Scott models designed by that Ukranian(?) guy?

 

[richd860]

Hello,everyone.I just picked up my first set of scott speakers,and they happen to be the S-15's.Whats really nice ,is the fact that they were free!!! Someone had set them out for the trash,but I saved them.Cabinets are beautiful,as are the grill covers.I gently removed the grill covers,and noticed right away,that the 10" woofers had foam surrounds,and both need refoaming.On the back of the grills,are stamped the dates of manufacture: May 17 1973,and May 18,1973.Now,I guess I will have to have the woofers refoamed,before I can enjoy these beautiful speakers. Does anyone know what the S-15's are rated for??? Max input??? Thanks. Rich

 

[catch 22]

Wow... I thought I was the only one who listened to HH Scott speakers, right now I have a pair of HH Scott Monitor 70's hooked up to my Mitsubishi system and really like the sound, and I have S-101's mated to a Kenwood KA-6000 downstairs that will just melt your heart. Glade to see some interest in these speakers.

 

[eurasian]

Do any of you Scott guys know if the mids in those 15's are the same speakers BOSE used in the original 901's? They sure look like they could be.

 

[Pickoid]

I picked up some spiffy little HH Scott S-19 bookshelf speakers at a thrift store a couple weeks ago. This is a 2-way design that uses the same tweeter as the S-15s pictured in this thread along with a 6 1/2" woofer. The cabinets and grilles were in excellent shape, and the drivers looked fine, but one of the tweeters didn't play. I swapped the tweeters and found that both tweeters actually worked, so I traced the problem to (you guessed it) bad caps in the crossovers. This is probably the least cost-effective upgrade ever, but I replaced both caps in both speakers with some Daytons from Parts Express. I have about 3 times as much invested in the capacitors for these speakers as their purchase price from the thrift store... Anyway, it was good practice for me. I have never recapped crossovers before, and these seemed like good candidates to experiment on. I also replaced all the 22 gauge crap that passed for wire inside the cabinets with some 16-gauge wire. So now they play fine, but they sure don't have a lot of extension at either end. They sound OK, maybe a little better with a healthy treble boost at the amp. For the time being, I'm using them on my desk at work. If nothing else, they are a reasonably attractive conversation piece. I can't seem to find a single shred of information about Scott S-19's anywhere on the web, so I figured I would bury it in this thread.

 

[blhagstrom]

old thread old speakers

I joined the Scott speaker club today with a pair of S-15s. I passed on the first stop at the GW, then changed my mind and went back. Figured out how to peak under the grill and things looked OK, so $15 and they came home. Hooked them up to a Pioneer QX-8000A that came home too and WOW. Right up there with the KLH-AR speakers of the time (1970ish).

Nice 3-way, excellent bass. Decent volume for the 20wpc that the QX-8000A has, Need more listening and a good finish re-work.

Definitly have to try them on tube later.

 

[jack13]

Freq response and other specifics

hello this is my first post,

The Scott s-15 speakers have a frequency response of 35-20000 hz

I know this after researching the S-15's as i have purchased a pair, i hope they are in good condition, i paid just under £15 and will probably collect them in a week or less.

Hear is the website i eventually found the specs on, although it is in french which i cant read, certain specs are recognizable to me, such as frequency response.

http://www.audiovintage.fr/leforum/viewtopic.php?t=27809

it is a french advert that has the info on

Today i also purchased a pair of marantz imperial 6's which i paid £15 for

 

[Whaleman]

hello this is my first post,

The Scott s-15 speakers have a frequency response of 35-20000 hz

I know this after researching the S-15's as i have purchased a pair, i hope they are in good condition, i paid just under £15 and will probably collect them in a week or less.

Hear is the website i eventually found the specs on, although it is in french which i cant read, certain specs are recognizable to me, such as frequency response.

http://www.audiovintage.fr/leforum/viewtopic.php?t=27809

it is a french advert that has the info on

Today i also purchased a pair of marantz imperial 6's which i paid £15 for

Thanks for posting that information. Congrats on your purchase, after 6 years, I still have mine. Some of the best 40 dollars I spent. I may just have to hook them up tonight.

 

[abraxasaudio]

Scott S-10 S-15

I've had a pair of S-10 for going on 10 years.
I use them in my shop every day. Absolutely love them.
Very efficient and easy to drive. Even my 3/4W Darling amp
drives these. Very listenable for long periods. Due I think to
the nice even balance. No frizzy, screeching top end, deep
bass is missing, but what is there is smooth. Would never
give these up. I have voiced over 75 tube amp on these!

 

[je1991]

Hi All! Looking for help on a thrift store sighting, a pair of H. H. Scott speakers, model S-15. They appear to be of early 60's vintage, beautiful, heavy cabinets (reminds me of KLH-17 in look and feel). Could not (easily) remove the grilles so I don't know the driver configuration, surround type, etc.

I've been to the amazing H. H. Scott vintage website (http://www.hhscott.com/Default.htm) but even they don't have much about Scott speakers.

Thanks for any help in advance!

i got a pair of s15s and these babies are nothing to give away cheap . 20 dollars you better grab them and hold on to them. these s15s that i got are in my pickup with a small amp and let me tell you for only one speaker this thing pumps and i tried several speakers in my days mine arent goin anywhere hope i find another pair for spares they dont make them like these anymore thats why they wiegh about 40 lbs each need two people to carry the damn things to mr scott or whoever it was that designed and now has passed away may he rest in peace and thank you
for your ingenuity i will cherish these till I join you mr. scott