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KLH Model Six Restoration

bawhega

bawhega

New Member
Greetings all! Just picked up a pair of these classic beauties for a mere $10.00! I hooked them up and they have a good amount of bottom end, but not a lot upstairs. (no pun intended...as far as you know) I'm assuming they will need to be recapped and they will definitely need to be refinished. I'm posting a few pics and as you can see, the corners are pretty tight except for one as you can plainly see. The serial number on one of them is 33998. I'm assuming early 70's? I could really use advice on the best way to strip and refinish. Can they be sanded? Looks like real wood, but is it a veneer? Also, can the grilles be removed? Any and all help would be most appreciated! :)
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I'm not an expert on KLH history, but the plywood cabinets suggest to me mid 1960s. Same with the way the aluminum plate is attached on the back. Others will be weighing in shortly.
 
bawhega said:
Also, can the grilles be removed?
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No, the grilles on early ones like yours are wrapped around the baffles and then attached from the inside. Also the woofers are glued to the baffle via 'legs' (no rim). None of this is a problem as long as the drivers are good. It does mean you will have to recap it by going though the back panel, and deal with the epoxy Mary Jane stuff to get at the caps and resistors, and the switch. It is tedious and borderline painful, but it can be done and it is worth it. These speakers are so well balanced.

I tried both heat-gunning and chisling out the epoxy stuff. What I recommend a combination of the two. Turn the speaker on its side, breaking up the epoxy with a hammer and chisel. The stuff will fall into the cabinet, but not onto the drivers. Then heatgun the inside edges of the hole to smooth it out. You'll need this, because your arms are going to make many trips inside the cabinet, and this little hatch is the only access!
 
Get those up to speed and you won't ever want to get rid of them! Fun speakers, for sure! My son has a pair of them, and I have the Model Twenty-Three's. Hard to beat for that "East-Coast" sound. And, $10 is a real SCROE!

Oh, and WELCOME!
 
So, somewhere around 1963 to 1964 KLH moved from the expoxied drivers in steps to screwed in drivers. What are the serial numbers? Glenn's early Sixes were in the transition years of 1963 to 1964, I think. They also eventually transitioned to removable grills. There is a lot of help here for those early Sixes and well worth restoring.
 
Tim D said:
So, somewhere around 1963 to 1964 KLH moved from the expoxied drivers in steps to screwed in drivers. What are the serial numbers? Glenn's early Sixes were in the transition years of 1963 to 1964, I think. They also eventually transitioned to removable grills. There is a lot of help here for those early Sixes and well worth restoring.
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Mine are circa 1963. Got them from the original owners wife who was tossing them. The glued tweeters transitioned to screw mount, as mine have both tweeter versions. 1965 screw mounted woofers were phased in. I'm assuming removable grills happened this time as well, makes sense.
 
Removable drivers and grilles happened after serial 70161 and before 96758. Sorta.
Tweeters aren't continuous. 68038 and 96758's were removable, 68987 weren't, etc.
Recessed terminal plate happened after 133811, 4/15/69, but before 135387.
One of OP's is 33998, so ~mid-run for the early style. Would be curious if it/they have
the PIO caps, but they may not be old enough. The latest I've seen reported is 18049.
 
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My first Model Six project the epoxy stuff, peanut brittle was poured onto the CO plate in place and was stuck to the wood, this will be fun with no entry from the front.
Hopefully they didn't get to overzealous with the epoxy?
But oh yes some nice warm melted butter bass comes out of these ladies, way worth the effort.
 
bawhega said:
Greetings all! Just picked up a pair of these classic beauties for a mere $10.00! I hooked them up and they have a good amount of bottom end, but not a lot upstairs. (no pun intended...as far as you know) I'm assuming they will need to be recapped and they will definitely need to be refinished. I'm posting a few pics and as you can see, the corners are pretty tight except for one as you can plainly see. The serial number on one of them is 33998. I'm assuming early 70's? I could really use advice on the best way to strip and refinish. Can they be sanded? Looks like real wood, but is it a veneer? Also, can the grilles be removed? Any and all help would be most appreciated! :)
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If a recap doesn't fix the missing HF, the front panel will need to be removed to repair the tweeter. I pulled mine off to find there were oil caps installed (still in good working condition) but the dead HF was due to burnt lead wires on the tweeter. A bit of micro soldering fixed them up like new.

The front panel is secured by a mixture of sealant/glue and (2) 6 penny finish nails at 3 and 9 o/clock. A few passes with a heat gun and a length of 1" x 1" wood to strike the back of the panel through that tiny back opening, right next to the nails, will open it quickly and without any damage. I propped up the cabinet on 2 parallel 2x4 with towels beneath to give space for the panel to fall and a clean surface to land on. If you get the glue soft enough, you can even reuse the original fabric since it will readily detach from the glue bed without tearing.
 
Ramseybella said:
My first Model Six project the epoxy stuff, peanut brittle was poured onto the CO plate in place and was stuck to the wood, this will be fun with no entry from the front.
Hopefully they didn't get to overzealous with the epoxy?
But oh yes some nice warm melted butter bass comes out of these ladies, way worth the effort.
Click to expand...
Don't worry about the epoxy tub, stuff is very brittle, and chips apart very easily. Took like 10 minutes per speaker to remove.
 
You must have good luck, it took like a two hours each to get to the caps on mine.
Finally took a dermal and a cutter and cleaned it away from the caps.
Again worth all the doing.
 
Ramseybella said:
You must have good luck, it took like a two hours each to get to the caps on mine.
Finally took a dermal and a cutter and cleaned it away from the caps.
Again worth all the doing.
Click to expand...
That was the basic removal. Definitely took maybe another 1/2 hour or so removing it from the remaining crossover parts. Maybe I was lucky with mine. From what I had read before tackling mine, I expected the worst. I as pretty surprised at how easily the stuff broke up.
As you said, definitely worth the effort!
Glenn
 
I see a wide range of asking prices on craigslist. Don't know what they're getting. A pair started at $180 in dc last year and disappeared at $60 after about 6 months.
 
I picked up an early set with the epoxied drivers for even cheaper, but one of the speakers had the back cut out in a not-so-nice way. It's sitting in my garage waiting for me to get to it. Maybe I'll dig into it this weekend just to see what they did to it. Sometimes cheap is for a reason. Watch out for problems. I'm a hobbyist though and I am in it for the journey + destination.
 
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