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Non working Valencias, are they worth it?

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Let's clear this up:

The speaker pictured in post #8 of this thread is the Altec Valencia 846A.

The speaker pictured in post #10 of this thread is the Altec Valencia 846B.

Both speakers are ported.

The 846A(in post #8)has the ports either side of the horn(the vertical rectangular gaps).

The 846B(in post #10)has the ports on the baffle flanking the woofer.

The woofer and horn in the 846A are back-mounted.Accessible via the removable rear panel.

From the picture in post #10,the woofer in the 846B appears to be back-mounted,only this time it appears that the front baffle is removable.

I own the 846As(have for nearly 5 years now).They measure deficient in the treble,but sound glorious.
GLORIOUS.
They give insight into the ability of the preceding components like no other speaker in my experience(not saying they are the 'best' at this,just IME).
They'll sound 'good' hooked-up anything decent.
The better the components they are hooked-up to,the better the system is sorted-out,the better they will sound.
Garbage In,Garbage Out.
Buy them.Try them out.If you don't like them,sell them. :yes:
 
Actually, unlike the Cornwalls, I find that even poor-quality recordings are still pretty palatable on the Valencias... although I haven't tested this in extremis.

Normally, speakers that make bad program material sound good are quite fundamentally flawed. I don't think this is the case with the vintage Altec drivers. They simply excel at reproducing the sounds that our auditory system is most evolutionarily adapted to care about.

The realness of the midrange (e.g., and especially, vocals) from the Altec horns is quite remarkable.
 
Thank You, theophile!!
That's the info I'm going with then.

And, a big 'thanks' to everyone who contributed, Tom, Zilch, avguy, bowtie, etc.!!
I'm going to look at them in an hour or so. I'll report back.
 
Listening test, progress report:

I went over and tested them out! Here's what I've found.

The good news. They work, sorta!!! At least the woofers do.
They are definitely 8 ohm, B's. But appear to be an earlier version, than the ones avguy posted a pic of. These have fiberglass batting, not foam, completely surrounding the semi-gloss black horn.
But, the fiberglass is spray painted with a very light coat of something, or maybe it's just flat black paint. Two round ports on either side of the woofers.

The cabinets are a very dark color, walnut. In, if not mint, than very near absolutely mint condition. Not a single scratch, ding, or gouge ANYWHERE! Not even on the bottoms or bottom edges. The front baffle is semi gloss black. The woofer loads from behind the removable baffle.
The woofer baffle is held in by about 10 phillips head wood screws.
The have an attenuating N800K network in the rear upper left hand corner.

Now the bad news.
They must've originally had black or gray foam grills. Which are 80% rotted away/shredded.
There are few big chunks hanging on the masonite. But these will need new grill material, of some sort, to look their best, and correct.
With the grills on they look kind of shabby. With the grills off, they look brand new!

And the worst news obviously!
Nothing from the horns at all, pardon the pun but, zilch, nada, nothing!! And even though they do work, the woofers seem strangely subdued with extremely boomy, muddy bass.

I know you're all dying to know.

So to make a long story short. Just from what I've read here, and on the Heritage site, of how great and collectible these babies are, especially in this beautiful a condition, I asked how much he wanted? He said $700.00
I made him an extremely low-ball offer based on trying to replace, unobtainable rotted grill foam, and two compression drivers not working.....and he happily accepted, (well not really, happily)after clearing it with his wife who said. "I don't care what he offered, I just want them, GONE!!!"

So what did I just get myself into?
How difficult and expensive is it going to be to restore these to their original glory?
 
Saint Johnny said:
...He said $700.00
I made him an extremely low-ball offer based on trying to replace, unobtainable rotted grill foam, and two compression drivers not working.....and he happily accepted, (well not really, happily)after clearing it with his wife who said. "I don't care what he offered, I just want them, GONE!!!"

So what did I just get myself into?
How difficult and expensive is it going to be to restore these to their original glory?
Click to expand...

I guess he saw you drool over the speakers. His wife is/was right. He has no business keeping them. I hope you offered him $100 tops. Just working on those is gonna take up some real esate - ESPECIALLY during the holidays, which is probably why the wife wants them "GONE!!!" Offer HER $100. $700 is way too much for monster door stops. I do wonder what he tried feeding them to blow a cap or whatever is wrong.
 
VOT said:
I guess he saw you drool over the speakers. His wife is/was right. He has no business keeping them. I hope you offered him $100 tops. Just working on those is gonna take up some real esate - ESPECIALLY during the holidays, which is probably why the wife wants them "GONE!!!" Offer HER $100. $700 is way too much for monster door stops. I do wonder what he tried feeding them to blow a cap or whatever is wrong.
Click to expand...

Are you saying you don't think they are worth $100?
 
The high frequency drivers have replaceable 'diaphrams',not difficult,it would take(from go to whoa)for two:
Twenty minutes.
Even a novice could do it.

The replacement diaphrams are available from this place:

http://www.greatplainsaudio.com/

Here's the list of replacement diaphrams:

http://www.greatplainsaudio.com/PartsList.html

If your treble compression driver is either the '806-8A' or the '806-8B',they both use the same replacement diaphram,model number 34647.

You access the compression driver(which is bolted onto the rear of the horn).
Take the driver out of the cabinet,unscrew the cover on the rear of the compression driver,which gives access to the diaphram.

WARNING !!!!

The magnetic field of the compression driver is INCREDIBLY strong.The screwdriver is almost guaranteed to be pulled into it,thereby ruining the replacement diaphram.
To remedy this,I hold the screwdriver at the top(handle) and down near the blade(with my other hand,between the thumb and index finger)thereby giving control over unwanted magnetic attraction.
Unscrew the old diaphram,screw in new driaphram.
Replace compression driver,and you should be ready to go.:thmbsp:
 
I just noticed on the Great Plains Audio website,that if you click on the 'available downloads' section(on the Left at the top of the Home page),there is in the downloads a section on 'How to replace a diaphram'.
It'll give you step by step instructions(with pictures).:thmbsp:
 
Fiberglass around the horns, and crossover mounted in the corner of the back sounds like 846A to me.

846B will have the input terminals mounted on the crossover chassis and the crossover chassis will clearly say N-800-8K and 846B, white print on a black chassis.

Are the crossovers in square metal cans roughly the size of a 12 oz soda can?

Address the crossovers and their proper function before you install new phragms.
 
When I picked up a set of Valencias, they sounded much like our potential buyer reported. The crossovers had been 'dinked' with and the woofers needed reconing due to sag of the spiders. By dinking, I mean that someone had already tried to update them by gutting the old cans but with underwhelming results - the driver needed remagnetizing once I put a decent set of caps in it and rewired it to the original circuit arrangement.

I decided that they were better off with someone else as I had too many projects at the time - UREIs being the main ones. They would have been a nice project but they went quickly to a good home.

From the sound of these, I'd suggest they'll need some investment to bring back to full glory - well worth the time and money, IMHO.

Cheers,

David

Wish I still had 'em.
 
bowtie427ss said:
Fiberglass around the horns, and crossover mounted in the corner of the back sounds like 846A to me.

846B will have the input terminals mounted on the crossover chassis and the crossover chassis will clearly say N-800-8K and 846B, white print on a black chassis.
Click to expand...
As I surmised, these must be fairly early 846B's, as they have some left over characteristics of the A's. Probably using up left over 846A parts, until they were gone or until B parts came online.

Yes 'black' fiberglass all around the horns, not foam. The backs 'appear' to be made of MDF(I couldn't tell for sure.), they are glued in, not screwed in, so the x-over mounts from the inside, against a beveled edge, recessed cut-out in the back panel, in the rear upper left hand corner.

The terminals are black and red, spring loaded clips, mounted to the x-over plate. The nomenclature is, white print on black chassis . It clearly states on the x-over plate, 'Model 846B Valencia'. But the network designation is not as you've written it, bowtie. It literally reads 'N800-K', with only one hyphen.

Are the crossovers in square metal cans roughly the size of a 12 oz soda can?

Address the crossovers and their proper function before you install new phragms.
Click to expand...

As I haven't opened the cabinets yet, I can't be sure what the x-over looks like internally. But my guess is, it would most likely be the open variety.

I haven't picked them up yet. I left a deposit and will pick them up tomorrow morning. They would not have fit in my Integra. :D
 
Uh Oh....

Saint Johnny said:
I haven't picked them up yet. I left a deposit and will pick them up tomorrow morning. They would not have fit in my Integra. :D
Click to expand...

I hate reading ending lines like that. I would have at least taken a woofer or something to make sure that they just didn't give you your deposit back and say some one else offered me XXX hundred more....I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you.....:yes:
 
Saint Johnny said:
Nothing from the horns at all, pardon the pun but, zilch, nada, nothing!! And even though they do work, the woofers seem strangely subdued with extremely boomy, muddy bass.
Click to expand...
O.K., so we've got cabinets with no grilles and 811B horns.

Pending a determination of what the drivers actually are, both HF and LF, I think I know what I'd do.... :yes:
 
Zilch said:
O.K., so we've got cabinets with no grilles and 811B horns.

Pending a determination of what the drivers actually are, both HF and LF, I think I know what I'd do.... :yes:
Click to expand...

OK, I'm on the edge of my seat....


BTW, I just got through reading all 58 pages of the Valencia thread on the Heritage site.
Very nice work Zilch. :thmbsp:
Although, a lot of it went way over my head. I did understand the basics of most of it.!
Zilch: I saw in that LH thread a fair bit of comparison of the Vals vs. the M19. Have you ever done a comparison of the Vals vs. M14? Just curious.
 
Saint Johnny said:
Zilch: I saw in that LH thread a fair bit of comparison of the Vals vs. the M19. Have you ever done a comparison of the Vals vs. M14? Just curious.
Click to expand...
Only conceptually. I've looked at the M14 crossovers theoretically, and as you saw, the M19 cabinet is overly large for its woofer. I believe we've determined that it will play better in Valencia, actually, unless I have the woofer models confused (again).

Though I've never seen or heard one, the vertically asymmetric MantaRay horn in M14 is, well, interesting. I occasionally try to score a pair of them on eBay, but no success yet. If I was doing M14 without those, they'd have PT waveguides and BMS drivers in them without a second thought, and JBL LE14H-1 or H-3 woofers, probably.... :yes:
 
Zilch said:
Only conceptually. I've looked at the M14 crossovers theoretically, and as you saw, the M19 cabinet is overly large for its woofer. Though I've never seen or heard one, the asymmetric MantaRay horn in M14 is, well, interesting. I occasionally try to score a pair of them on eBay, but no success yet. If I was doing M14 without those, they'd have PT waveguides and BMS drivers in them without a second thought, and JBL LE14H-1 or H-3 woofers, probably.... :yes:
Click to expand...

I had a opputunity at a local pair of M14 for the same price that I eventually got the above mentioned Vals for. But...the Vals were within a quarter mile of home and M14's were about 10 miles away. I'm beginning to wonder if, I may have made the wrong decision, by going for the Vals instead of the M14's.
 
Zilch said:
Only conceptually. I've looked at the M14 crossovers theoretically, and as you saw, the M19 cabinet is overly large for its woofer. Though I've never seen or heard one, the asymmetric MantaRay horn in M14 is, well, interesting. I occasionally try to score a pair of them on eBay, but no success yet. If I was doing M14 without those, they'd have PT waveguides and BMS drivers in them without a second thought, and JBL LE14H-1 or H-3 woofers, probably.... :yes:
Click to expand...

Is that you'd do with the Vals, as well? You never did say.:scratch2:
 
Saint Johnny said:
Is that you'd do with the Vals, as well? You never did say.:scratch2:
Click to expand...
Before I invested anything in restoring Vals, they'd be getting BMS HF and JBL 2235H LF. You saw the curves in the LHF thread for both.

That requires taking a hit in LF efficiency to get extended bass. No big deal; if you MUST use tubes, biamp using them on the HF, and give the bass some SS juice.... :thmbsp:
 
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