Yvan_donald
Well-Known Member
Hi, yes evertone can't complain at listening their IMF,perfect way to past the time and doing some little work in the same time.
IMF owners thread!
- Thread starter canuckaudiog
- Start date
IMF_Pioneer
Super Member
Seeing the Mk IV's and 7's sitting side by side just reaffirms my opinion that the IV's look so much better than the 7's and this is all about that gawdy looking big lettered silver plate at the bottom compared to the discrete black one use on the Mk IV's.
In saying the above I've always liked the appearance of the 128/20 over the B139 and as such the best combination IMHO is the "Mk Iv Improved" variant.
In saying the above I've always liked the appearance of the 128/20 over the B139 and as such the best combination IMHO is the "Mk Iv Improved" variant.
IMF_Pioneer
Super Member
Must admit I must get my set of CM2's out of their original packing box and set them up in the bedroom until my SL6 Celestion's are ready.
Tor-S
Member
Yes the MK4 looks good. Especially this pair look mint, quite dark in the wood, no scratches, no bumps in the B139 and the original tweeters.
Both sound good, but mk7 is extremly natural.
The elac tweeters and the mid in mk7 is an amazing combo. They mix so well together.
Tor-S
Member
Yeah, get them up running
Deiniol ap D
New Member
Hi,
Just joined this forum: great to see so many 80 enthusiasts! I fell in love with these back in the 70's, when all I could afford were KEF kit 3 equivalents. I actually bought my units from Wilmslow Audio, when, from memory, the B139's were £10.77 each (Possibly £15?). I had two home made chipboard cabinets with EMI 13" by 8" elliptical units (remember those?), which i jigsawed out to fit the KEFs. I then bought a pair of cabinets that had been made to KEF kit 3 dimensions and transferred the units over, I had to alter them slightly, as my B!39's were the older cast chassis version.
Anyway fast forward to 1999, when I found a pair of 80's for £300, in a bookshop that also sold secondhand hi-fi. Heard them, fell in love, passed over the cash! Mine are the Professional monitor version, without the twiddle control on the back, and with castors on. I have them sitting on two concrete kerbstones, so the castors don't touch the floor. An IncaTech Claymore currently drives them, with a Linn Basik turntable with Axis platter, along with Grundig MiniDisc player (which I can't find a manual for anywhere) and a Cambridge Audio DAB tuner.
And of course they sound awesome! However since they are 50 years old, I'm currently planning on redoing the crossovers with the Falcon kits. Is it worth going for the higher tolerance caps? I probably will anyway for the small extra cost. I have to go inside to find which crossover I have before ordering them, but on a week's leave and not going out due to COVID so that's a job for tomorrow. Any thoughts?
Dan.
Just joined this forum: great to see so many 80 enthusiasts! I fell in love with these back in the 70's, when all I could afford were KEF kit 3 equivalents. I actually bought my units from Wilmslow Audio, when, from memory, the B139's were £10.77 each (Possibly £15?). I had two home made chipboard cabinets with EMI 13" by 8" elliptical units (remember those?), which i jigsawed out to fit the KEFs. I then bought a pair of cabinets that had been made to KEF kit 3 dimensions and transferred the units over, I had to alter them slightly, as my B!39's were the older cast chassis version.
Anyway fast forward to 1999, when I found a pair of 80's for £300, in a bookshop that also sold secondhand hi-fi. Heard them, fell in love, passed over the cash! Mine are the Professional monitor version, without the twiddle control on the back, and with castors on. I have them sitting on two concrete kerbstones, so the castors don't touch the floor. An IncaTech Claymore currently drives them, with a Linn Basik turntable with Axis platter, along with Grundig MiniDisc player (which I can't find a manual for anywhere) and a Cambridge Audio DAB tuner.
And of course they sound awesome! However since they are 50 years old, I'm currently planning on redoing the crossovers with the Falcon kits. Is it worth going for the higher tolerance caps? I probably will anyway for the small extra cost. I have to go inside to find which crossover I have before ordering them, but on a week's leave and not going out due to COVID so that's a job for tomorrow. Any thoughts?
Dan.
Not bad after the re cap and new tweeter. These are more suited as a near field speaker. I use them when i need to test gear i'm working on.
They are a bit bright but after a few days of listening you forget they are
Nashou
IMF_Pioneer
Super Member
Hi, you refer to 80's and from that I gather you mean TLS-80's ? The original Professional Monitors are not 80's as you seem to imply. They are a bigger variant of similar line design but somewhat different in the electronics area.
Deiniol ap D
New Member
OK, well I live and learn! And there's me been calling them TLS-80's for 21 years. So this is why the Falcon capacitor kit is cheaper than I remember from previous visits.
Different speaker. DUH! Obviously less capacitors due to the lack of tilt control. I've always thought I preferred my PM's (as I must learn to call them!) without the tilt, as I have always subscribed to minimal electronics: back in the 1980's I used to run my NAD 3020 through a home-built passive pre-amp to eliminate the tone controls, and I've never owned or wanted a graphic equaliser. I once spent a fruitless ten minutes arguing this case with a GE enthusiast I met through an eBay purchase, who maintained that his system sounded 'better' with all its little tweaks to the frequency response.
Now a little bit of me wants a pair of 80's to check this out, but I haven't got the space for another pair. Like most members of this forum, I already own quite a few pairs of speakers that I never use but got because they were cheap and I wanted to hear them.
I have two pairs of Mission 2 way speakers, one of which was £5 in a charity shop, and the other £30 in another charity shop, and a pair of Leak Sandwich (70's version) bookshelf speakers that I used for several years in various flats while my KEF's were stored in my cousin's loft. I also inherited a pair of KEF Concords from my mother who had bought them off a friend of hers to run her cheapo rack system through - they came with their original boxes and stands. I lent these to a friend, who misused them, by running them in parallel with another pair something, and used to love playing them loud: eventually one failed completely, blowing both voice coils. I passed these onto a friend who has a BNIB pair of B139's, but they are still sitting in his room awaiting the transplant, and of course he needs to find a T15 from somewhere! Is there anything else out there that will replace a T15? Of course the Concords were always compromised because the B139 was asked to go higher than it was designed for and the T15 wasn't really suited to mid range. My Mum liked them though!
Spent quite a lump of last night reading my way through this forum: got to page 32 before turning in for the night. What a wealth of knowledge to tap into.
Dan.
Different speaker. DUH! Obviously less capacitors due to the lack of tilt control. I've always thought I preferred my PM's (as I must learn to call them!) without the tilt, as I have always subscribed to minimal electronics: back in the 1980's I used to run my NAD 3020 through a home-built passive pre-amp to eliminate the tone controls, and I've never owned or wanted a graphic equaliser. I once spent a fruitless ten minutes arguing this case with a GE enthusiast I met through an eBay purchase, who maintained that his system sounded 'better' with all its little tweaks to the frequency response.
Now a little bit of me wants a pair of 80's to check this out, but I haven't got the space for another pair. Like most members of this forum, I already own quite a few pairs of speakers that I never use but got because they were cheap and I wanted to hear them.
I have two pairs of Mission 2 way speakers, one of which was £5 in a charity shop, and the other £30 in another charity shop, and a pair of Leak Sandwich (70's version) bookshelf speakers that I used for several years in various flats while my KEF's were stored in my cousin's loft. I also inherited a pair of KEF Concords from my mother who had bought them off a friend of hers to run her cheapo rack system through - they came with their original boxes and stands. I lent these to a friend, who misused them, by running them in parallel with another pair something, and used to love playing them loud: eventually one failed completely, blowing both voice coils. I passed these onto a friend who has a BNIB pair of B139's, but they are still sitting in his room awaiting the transplant, and of course he needs to find a T15 from somewhere! Is there anything else out there that will replace a T15? Of course the Concords were always compromised because the B139 was asked to go higher than it was designed for and the T15 wasn't really suited to mid range. My Mum liked them though!
Spent quite a lump of last night reading my way through this forum: got to page 32 before turning in for the night. What a wealth of knowledge to tap into.
Dan.
Yvan_donald
Well-Known Member
Hi Deiniol and welcome ,please put some pictures of yours speakers,best regards,Yvan.
IMF_Pioneer
Super Member
Hi all,
Yes Yvan is absolutely correct.....please put some photos up here of your particular IMF's.
This then creates a great database for other members in the future to identify and compare what they have to what's already been identified previously. In general it's just good to have images as us "males" are visually orientated in all facets of life as far as we've always been told and know. LOL !!
Yes Yvan is absolutely correct.....please put some photos up here of your particular IMF's.
This then creates a great database for other members in the future to identify and compare what they have to what's already been identified previously. In general it's just good to have images as us "males" are visually orientated in all facets of life as far as we've always been told and know. LOL !!
IMF_Pioneer
Super Member
Massive crossover isn't it ? LOL
Actually hasn't it already had a capacitor changed at some stage with a newer 6uf Alcap ?
Actually hasn't it already had a capacitor changed at some stage with a newer 6uf Alcap ?
Tor-S
Member
Less is more?
Yeah, looks like its changed. But im about to replace all capacitors to Mundorf Alu In Oil Supreme.
Deiniol ap D
New Member
Hi Yvan and IMF_Pioneer, and others,
You want pics? ROGER>>>>>WILLCO! (but not yet!)
I don’t know the history of these before 1999: whether they were domestic or in a studio. Cosmetically they are pretty good, with no obvious abuse, cigarette burns, cup rings etc, and all the drivers seem to be working, Don’t hear a lot from the super tweeters but then my ears are temporally challenged since I’m a few years older than them, I don’t think I’ve ever polished them, and though I’ve got the grille covers I prefer them naked!
I’m going to remove the B139 soon, so I can check out which crossover I’ve got, before I send to Falcon for the caps. Obviously I will photograph them for the thread. I’ll probably rehang the B139, assuming the wires are long enough, although I may renew the wiring while I’m in there, (any thoughts on this?)
At the moment they are technically the wrong way around. I currently have the tweeters on the outside because I thought I’d get a wider soundstage. I know, I know…..it seemed like a good idea at the time!
Besides once you’ve put them down you don’t want to move them, although since they are on castors that’s no big deal.
Actually about 18 years ago, somebody asked me if I could supply a PA system for a charity music gig in a local church hall. As I had a trailer with a ramp, I agreed. I used a chunky MOSFET PA amp I had, along with a small desk and about three mics.
From memory they sounded good in the bigger space, and I took my cassette deck, and probably some Steely Dan or Donald Fagan to show how cool I was! They survived the gig, didn’t blow anything, and they haven’t been out of the house since. I’d love to get them out in the garden though. Last century I was living in a shared house and we had a summer party, so one of my KEF kit 3’s was placed out of the first floor window on the downstairs bay window roof, and it sounded AWESOME. Once you take away the room, speakers can really breathe.
When I recap I will put the PM’s the right way round. I’ll do them one at a time, so I can evaluate the results. Having slogged through all 96 (YEESH!) pages of this thread, I will be interested to hear the difference. People’s mileage on this seems to vary: some report a great improvement, some not. I’m hoping for an obvious improvement, but I don’t feel the need to go for any Rolls Royce caps, like Yvan has!
I will go for the 2% tolerance though: for the few extra pennies it’s a no-brainer. It’s been a few years since I wielded a soldering iron (I love the smell of flux in the workshop!), but I still have a stock of real solder for the job, and one of those fancy sucker things to extract the old stuff. Be good practise for when I get my Claymore on the bench, since that has an intermittently noisy capacitor in its RH channel power amp.
I also have a 60’s Fisher tuner amp (the one with Nuvistors in, along with valves), that somebody gave me to look at about the time I bought the PM’s. From memory, it was dead on one channel, but I diagnosed it as just needing a new coupling cap between preamp and power amp. It is still in its original box, and after 20 years it may well need further work - certainly will need careful powering up with the variac. Also have a Leak Troughline 2 tuner that I would like to get going while we still have FM radio. When I retire…. Yes I love my older hifi! A bigger house would be helpful though.
How do I put a photo on my ID BTW? At the moment I’ve just got the generic symbol. And also how do I get a blue line under which I can list my system details? Generally I’m just a lurker on forums (fora? - my Latin O level just kicked in!), so I’m not really au fait with how this stuff is done.
Dan.
.
You want pics? ROGER>>>>>WILLCO! (but not yet!)
I don’t know the history of these before 1999: whether they were domestic or in a studio. Cosmetically they are pretty good, with no obvious abuse, cigarette burns, cup rings etc, and all the drivers seem to be working, Don’t hear a lot from the super tweeters but then my ears are temporally challenged since I’m a few years older than them, I don’t think I’ve ever polished them, and though I’ve got the grille covers I prefer them naked!
I’m going to remove the B139 soon, so I can check out which crossover I’ve got, before I send to Falcon for the caps. Obviously I will photograph them for the thread. I’ll probably rehang the B139, assuming the wires are long enough, although I may renew the wiring while I’m in there, (any thoughts on this?)
At the moment they are technically the wrong way around. I currently have the tweeters on the outside because I thought I’d get a wider soundstage. I know, I know…..it seemed like a good idea at the time!
Besides once you’ve put them down you don’t want to move them, although since they are on castors that’s no big deal.
Actually about 18 years ago, somebody asked me if I could supply a PA system for a charity music gig in a local church hall. As I had a trailer with a ramp, I agreed. I used a chunky MOSFET PA amp I had, along with a small desk and about three mics.
From memory they sounded good in the bigger space, and I took my cassette deck, and probably some Steely Dan or Donald Fagan to show how cool I was! They survived the gig, didn’t blow anything, and they haven’t been out of the house since. I’d love to get them out in the garden though. Last century I was living in a shared house and we had a summer party, so one of my KEF kit 3’s was placed out of the first floor window on the downstairs bay window roof, and it sounded AWESOME. Once you take away the room, speakers can really breathe.
When I recap I will put the PM’s the right way round. I’ll do them one at a time, so I can evaluate the results. Having slogged through all 96 (YEESH!) pages of this thread, I will be interested to hear the difference. People’s mileage on this seems to vary: some report a great improvement, some not. I’m hoping for an obvious improvement, but I don’t feel the need to go for any Rolls Royce caps, like Yvan has!
I will go for the 2% tolerance though: for the few extra pennies it’s a no-brainer. It’s been a few years since I wielded a soldering iron (I love the smell of flux in the workshop!), but I still have a stock of real solder for the job, and one of those fancy sucker things to extract the old stuff. Be good practise for when I get my Claymore on the bench, since that has an intermittently noisy capacitor in its RH channel power amp.
I also have a 60’s Fisher tuner amp (the one with Nuvistors in, along with valves), that somebody gave me to look at about the time I bought the PM’s. From memory, it was dead on one channel, but I diagnosed it as just needing a new coupling cap between preamp and power amp. It is still in its original box, and after 20 years it may well need further work - certainly will need careful powering up with the variac. Also have a Leak Troughline 2 tuner that I would like to get going while we still have FM radio. When I retire…. Yes I love my older hifi! A bigger house would be helpful though.
How do I put a photo on my ID BTW? At the moment I’ve just got the generic symbol. And also how do I get a blue line under which I can list my system details? Generally I’m just a lurker on forums (fora? - my Latin O level just kicked in!), so I’m not really au fait with how this stuff is done.
Dan.
.
Last edited:
Yvan_donald
Well-Known Member
Hi, for the avatar go to your profile clic on avatar box to put a picture you already have or go to internet copie a picture,take a picture?
Deiniol ap D
New Member
Thanks
Guys, I need some help undesrtanding the RSPM x-over schematic: I am not sure I understand these 100uF caps - I guess those ten caps are only relevant if the filter is engaged, correct? So if set to flat, the only important caps for the bass section are C4 and C9 - is that so? So if I'd want to experiment with a different film cap in the bass section it would be C9 and not C2 - can you confirm? Thanks in advance for your response.