Mystery Speaker Help

[rauridh]

Hi. I am hoping somebody knows what these speakers are. I do not want to sell them, they sound wonderful. I have had them for six months and have yet to find anything other than an ebay post from about a year ago selling a pair (maybe the same pair) but the seller did not know what they were either. Description:

Philips tweeter and midrange (12" woofer is aftermarket Korean speaker)
Xover caps are one T.I. 7.5 mfd and one unmarked glossy white cap
wood laminate
rear port
tweeter adjustment pot

I assume they are Philips, but any ideas on what model?

Thanks for your help.

 

[rauridh]

Thanks for the confirmation botrytis, that is why I bought them. Still looking for what model of Philips speakers they are.

 

[toxcrusadr]

They are not necessarily a Philips speaker just because they have Philips drivers. In the 70s there were a lot of store brands and other obscure names, sometimes without good labeling or labels that fell off over time. If that's real walnut veneer, you did pretty good. Either way if you like em, keep em and enjoy. I would recommend replacing those caps though. It usually opens up the top end. If the white one is physically smaller, it's probably the tweeter cap and will be a lower value, perhaps 2 uF range. If you had a cap meter you could test both and one of them is probably close enough to nominal to make a good guess.

 

[rauridh]

Thank you for the information toxcrusadr, good points and yes they are real walnut veneer, thick enough to sand down a bit. I did replace the T.I. cap because it had the values on it. The other cap is unmarked so it is difficult to know what to put in place of it. Even if I test it, I have no clue how far it has, or if it has, drifted from the original value. The new caps did little, they did and still sound great. They are keepers, just wish I knew their name.

 

[toxcrusadr]

If you can trace out the connections you can figure out whether the second cap is in the tweeter or mid section. Usually the tweeter cap makes the most difference in sound when replaced. Anyway caps come in standard increments - doubtful they used something weird in such a speaker. So if you were to test the same cap in both speakers, one end disconnected from the circuit, I bet it would not be hard to determine.

Glad you like em!

Oh - the punched in tweeter dome can be sucked out with GENTLE use of a vacuum cleaner or even by mouth.

 

[audiomagnate]

Tweeter and midrange are Philips drivers - 70's models. Definitely not home brew speakers.

They look a little home brew to me:

> The cutouts for the L-Pad/connectors looks like they were done by hand with a jig saw
> The silver screws on the black drivers look like they came from a hardware store
> The way the Velcro is attached looks amateurish
> The exposed joint/unpainted back panel is not something you see on a production speaker

I bet they sound pretty good, and the cabinet work looks fine (from the front anyway).

 

[toxcrusadr]

Could be, audiomagnate. OTOH some speakers of that era looked like that. Consider the Original Advent.

As for an unfinished rear panel...I'm sure I've seen some of them on production speakers although I can't produce a picture.

One would think that a DIY'er skilled enough to make walnut veneer look good could cut out a nice looking hole. But then you would expect a production company to do the same, so who knows!

 

[Nat]

I'm inclined to think a repurposed cabinet might be the explanation. The silver screws don't seem professionally made, and the lack of any label suggests DIY to some degree.
What I want to know is what is that thing that looks like a cut out above the midrange? Is it the vent for a subenclosure? If so, I'm definitely leaning towards ambitious DIY.