Refoaming Walsh Ohm F's - Tough to do?
- Thread starter canuckaudiog
- Start date
W9TR
Super Member
Ohm F's have found a new home
I really love the way the F's light up a room. I've now had my refurbished pair running for 100 very enjoyable hours. The efficiency improvement inherent in Bill Legall's rebuild is significant enough I can run them with an MC 275 to very satisfying levels. Last weekend, I moved them to our lake house, powered by a McIntosh C2300 and MC275V. They sound great, even though the positioning is not ideal.
I really love the way the F's light up a room. I've now had my refurbished pair running for 100 very enjoyable hours. The efficiency improvement inherent in Bill Legall's rebuild is significant enough I can run them with an MC 275 to very satisfying levels. Last weekend, I moved them to our lake house, powered by a McIntosh C2300 and MC275V. They sound great, even though the positioning is not ideal.
I have also refurbished a few set of F.s As long as the foam on the tempered aluminum has not been touched and the clay is still intact in the Titanium section the F's can be rebuilt to a very good sounding speaker not as new but the sound will still be very special.
I really am sick of hearing that one person can rebuild these or there is no way to ever have it rebuilt unless you spend gobbs of money to have them updated to a non Walsh driver system.
That being said if I were to spend the money I would go with the drivers from HHR as you are getting a real Walsh replacement PERIOD!!!
I was harsh with an email from HHR when I had an F driver on E-bay questioning the quality of my rebuild with original clay and foam. My point was I was offering a rebuilt driver that performed excellent. It may have not been up to a new drivers standard but it may have not been far off. It is what you want to spend on the speaker to keep it alive and well if it meets your ears requirements.
I had spoke with Dale, he is really the only person building an actual replacement if you can spend the money for them. The Ohm F is one of the finest speakers out there.
PS: If you are going to do the rebuild yourself the spider replacement is a must.
I really am sick of hearing that one person can rebuild these or there is no way to ever have it rebuilt unless you spend gobbs of money to have them updated to a non Walsh driver system.
That being said if I were to spend the money I would go with the drivers from HHR as you are getting a real Walsh replacement PERIOD!!!
I was harsh with an email from HHR when I had an F driver on E-bay questioning the quality of my rebuild with original clay and foam. My point was I was offering a rebuilt driver that performed excellent. It may have not been up to a new drivers standard but it may have not been far off. It is what you want to spend on the speaker to keep it alive and well if it meets your ears requirements.
I had spoke with Dale, he is really the only person building an actual replacement if you can spend the money for them. The Ohm F is one of the finest speakers out there.
PS: If you are going to do the rebuild yourself the spider replacement is a must.
Last edited:
W9TR
Super Member
I think that the pair of F's Bill Legall rebuilt for me sound every bit as good as my original pair. He did extensive work, including removing internal foam and replacing it with a different material. Of course 35 years have passed by since I owned my first pair, so it's hardly a fair comparison! The next time I'm in Cleveland, I'll arrange to listen to the HHR TLS speakers. The price puts them in league with a lot of other great loudspeakers, the competition at that price point is pretty stiff.
Tom
Tom
Coytee
Super Member
After reading these threads, I'm almost glad I never bought a pair. I liked them when I first saw them, thought they sounded nice.... I was going to buy them and have no memory as to why I didn't.
After reading various refurbish threads over time... I just think 'whew', I dodged a bullet.
No offense to F owners as I still have a high appreciation for them. I had no idea they could be such a pain to maintain/fix.
After reading various refurbish threads over time... I just think 'whew', I dodged a bullet.
No offense to F owners as I still have a high appreciation for them. I had no idea they could be such a pain to maintain/fix.
ricohman
Adventure Rider
I think opposite to you. Maybe if I happen to stumble upon a pair it wouldnt be a bad thing. The more people that can service these the better.
I also believe that there are people out there with the skills to rebuild these.
Coytee
Super Member
Perhaps so but, I already owned a pair of LaScalas at the time I debated these. I bought the LaScalas in 1979. (I also have a pair of Electrovoice Interface D's that I bought in 1978)
The EV's have had their stupid foam replaced twice and are in need of it again....very hard to get.
The LaScalas.... using a cloth surround, are still going strong on original woofers from 1979.
When I think about the LaScalas being almost maintainence free (replaced crossover after 25 years) verses the gymnastics I have to go through to refoam the EV's or the gymnastics that (seem) to be needed for the Ohm's.... I can't help but to get a sense of relief that I never bought them. I'll still admit, I have a soft spot for them.
I guess it's like a higher maintainence woman.... some definate pro's about them but one has to weigh the pro's against the con's as well. I guess I'm gymnastically, lazy.
The EV's have had their stupid foam replaced twice and are in need of it again....very hard to get.
The LaScalas.... using a cloth surround, are still going strong on original woofers from 1979.
When I think about the LaScalas being almost maintainence free (replaced crossover after 25 years) verses the gymnastics I have to go through to refoam the EV's or the gymnastics that (seem) to be needed for the Ohm's.... I can't help but to get a sense of relief that I never bought them. I'll still admit, I have a soft spot for them.
I guess it's like a higher maintainence woman.... some definate pro's about them but one has to weigh the pro's against the con's as well. I guess I'm gymnastically, lazy.
W9TR
Super Member
Coytee,
These bad boys are not for everyone for sure, but as they say:
"Though the road may be long and very hard, the reward is very sweet indeed"
There are a lot of options for Ohm F refurbishment, from the Speaker Exchange, to Millersound, to HHR exotics, all worthwhile, depending on your needs and pocketbook.
For me, this was a journey of rediscovery of the first high end product I ever owned. No regrets, I'm glad I made the trip. I met a lot of great people along the way. Highly recommended.
Tom
These bad boys are not for everyone for sure, but as they say:
"Though the road may be long and very hard, the reward is very sweet indeed"
There are a lot of options for Ohm F refurbishment, from the Speaker Exchange, to Millersound, to HHR exotics, all worthwhile, depending on your needs and pocketbook.
For me, this was a journey of rediscovery of the first high end product I ever owned. No regrets, I'm glad I made the trip. I met a lot of great people along the way. Highly recommended.
Tom
phaelon56
New Member
I first heard Ohm F's at a Tech HiFi store in Syracuse New York, in 1973, when I was 16. The salesman in the store was very kind and allowed my stoned friends and I to stand in the high end equipment room at the back of the store and listen to Dark Side of the Moon, provided that we didn't touch anything and we let him go provide sales service to customers with money to spend. I had recently purchased my first stereo, which consisted of a used Lenco L75 turntable, Shure M95ED cartridge, original series Bose 501 speakers, and an Onkyo A6 integrated amp (60 solid clean watts per channel with low distortion.) Considering that I was 16, and bought the system with money I had made from part time jobs the time I was 12 years old, my system sounded pretty good, especially for near field listing in my very small bedroom. That being said, I was blown away by the Ohm F's presentation and hoped that one day I would have a pair. Several years later, one of the kids were I went to college at a similar Ohm F system in his very tiny dorm room. The single rooms and that old dormitory-which was built around 1900- or so small that we had to gather between the speakers in order to listen. Still sounded incredible the matter where used in the room.
Fast forward to 2012. Events such as becoming a parent at age 25, and then having an... ahem... "lifestyle problem" which I did not resolve until age 32, me out of the audio only entirely. Beginning then, which was in 1988, I didn't have the money or a good system and just limped along with mid-fi components for years. Eventually, with my daughter's college education done and paid for, the number of job promotions and much higher income levels, I finally decided to plunge back into the hobby. I begin looking for a restored pair of Ohm F speakers, and it took about two years before I found the ones I wanted. They had been advertised on Craigslist in Philadelphia for at least six months, but the seller was not willing to ship, and was also not willing to accept low-ball offers. He and I communicated by email and struck a deal for $200 less than his asking price of $1400. I made the five hour drive. to the suburbs of Philadelphia, and auditioned them - with great satisfaction. He had a background in rock band sound reinforcement and had started to experiment with Altec VOT stacks, supplemented by super tweeters, and powered by a little SET tube amp. In his townhouse for these, so they had to go.
He mentioned in passing that the person he purchased them from had the restoration done by a local guy named Bill LeGall. I made a mental note of that, but because they sounded great and looked good on the inside, I really didn't follow up on who Bill was until much later. I didn't buy them based on the premise that Bill had done the restoration, but when I look at the details, including the felt that was applied the inside of the support frame for the driver, I'm confident that he really is the person who did this work. They sound absolutely fantastic, but it took me several evolutions of swapping out amplifiers until I got sound that I really expected and wanted.
I started with an Adcom power amp that was rated at 125 W or 150 W per channel and they sounded "okay" but I could tell that much was still not revealed. That unit was traded in on an early 1980s HK Citation 22, which was rated at 200 W per channel. There was a very notable improvement but I felt like it still wasn't there. After doing much research, in order to stay in my budget I settled on a used Yamaha M-85. It has a switch that allows selection of 4 or 8 Ohm output, and is rated at 330 W per channel into a 4 Ohm load. They sounded really really good, but perhaps in part because of my listening environment, I still felt like the bass response was a bit boomy and a trifle flabby at times. The local vintage shop where I had purchased a McIntosh MX-110 tube preamp/tuner the previous year, had a a McIntosh MC-2205 amp that had just come in on trade. Priced at $1600, and in near mint condition, I just took the plunge. They said it had bench tested at 235 "McWatts" per channel, and offered to let me bring it back if it didn't meet my needs after a few days of testing my system. Plugged it in and finally - bingo! There is a clarity in the high frequencies and offered midrange that had been ever so slightly masked by the previous amplifiers, and even on the most punishing bass notes on the tracks that I used to audition any amplifier for bass - like with great clarity. It seems to play, for all practical purposes, just as loudly as the Yamaha amplifier did, but the sound is distinctly superior. I don't know whether it is because of the Autoformer technology in the MC2205, or if it is just attributable to a superior circuit design, but even my wife, who doesn't pay careful attention to these things really noticed the difference.
At this point, after five years in our previous house, and a year in storage when we moved to Raleigh North Carolina in 2017, the system has finally been installed in our new house, which we moved into as of July 2018. The volume of the room is nearly double that of our all living room, and there is also a wide open archway adjacent to the right speaker. I've been able to compensate for that by putting a bit more gain on the right channel and shifting the balance wheel to favor it, but I still feel like the amp has to work a bit harder to fill this room. I'm contemplating selling this, and acquiring a used MC352, which is rated at 350 watts per channel.
Regardless of whether I do that or not, that my the sound is everything that I hoped it would be, and although I have distinct limitations of the upper and lower end of the frequency spectrum due to hearing damage, I still enjoy holographic imaging as much as I did when I first heard them. They definitely are the right speakers for someone who wants a very flat frequency response, wants to play music really loud rock, or offers the precise pinpoint imaging that is provided by certain types of high end speakers. That being said, I think they were of fantastic bargain at $1200 and I don't intend to ever sell them. The great bonus was that when I was about to leave, and already had the speakers packed in my car, the seller said "By the way - these came with some speaker stands that I stored out in my garden shed. Do you want them to?" I was fully expecting sort of rudimentary stands,, perhaps ones that the previous owner had built himself. Instead, I got what appeared to be factory built OEM risers that exactly match the construction style and veneer on the original cabinets, but elevate them about 14 inches off the floor. I have done extensive listening both with and without, and always prefer to listen to them with the risers. I took a series of photos, made some diagrams with exact measurements, and put together a PDF those individuals who might wish to build a pair themselves or have someone build a set. If anyone's interested please send me a private message here and I will be glad to forward that document.
Fast forward to 2012. Events such as becoming a parent at age 25, and then having an... ahem... "lifestyle problem" which I did not resolve until age 32, me out of the audio only entirely. Beginning then, which was in 1988, I didn't have the money or a good system and just limped along with mid-fi components for years. Eventually, with my daughter's college education done and paid for, the number of job promotions and much higher income levels, I finally decided to plunge back into the hobby. I begin looking for a restored pair of Ohm F speakers, and it took about two years before I found the ones I wanted. They had been advertised on Craigslist in Philadelphia for at least six months, but the seller was not willing to ship, and was also not willing to accept low-ball offers. He and I communicated by email and struck a deal for $200 less than his asking price of $1400. I made the five hour drive. to the suburbs of Philadelphia, and auditioned them - with great satisfaction. He had a background in rock band sound reinforcement and had started to experiment with Altec VOT stacks, supplemented by super tweeters, and powered by a little SET tube amp. In his townhouse for these, so they had to go.
He mentioned in passing that the person he purchased them from had the restoration done by a local guy named Bill LeGall. I made a mental note of that, but because they sounded great and looked good on the inside, I really didn't follow up on who Bill was until much later. I didn't buy them based on the premise that Bill had done the restoration, but when I look at the details, including the felt that was applied the inside of the support frame for the driver, I'm confident that he really is the person who did this work. They sound absolutely fantastic, but it took me several evolutions of swapping out amplifiers until I got sound that I really expected and wanted.
I started with an Adcom power amp that was rated at 125 W or 150 W per channel and they sounded "okay" but I could tell that much was still not revealed. That unit was traded in on an early 1980s HK Citation 22, which was rated at 200 W per channel. There was a very notable improvement but I felt like it still wasn't there. After doing much research, in order to stay in my budget I settled on a used Yamaha M-85. It has a switch that allows selection of 4 or 8 Ohm output, and is rated at 330 W per channel into a 4 Ohm load. They sounded really really good, but perhaps in part because of my listening environment, I still felt like the bass response was a bit boomy and a trifle flabby at times. The local vintage shop where I had purchased a McIntosh MX-110 tube preamp/tuner the previous year, had a a McIntosh MC-2205 amp that had just come in on trade. Priced at $1600, and in near mint condition, I just took the plunge. They said it had bench tested at 235 "McWatts" per channel, and offered to let me bring it back if it didn't meet my needs after a few days of testing my system. Plugged it in and finally - bingo! There is a clarity in the high frequencies and offered midrange that had been ever so slightly masked by the previous amplifiers, and even on the most punishing bass notes on the tracks that I used to audition any amplifier for bass - like with great clarity. It seems to play, for all practical purposes, just as loudly as the Yamaha amplifier did, but the sound is distinctly superior. I don't know whether it is because of the Autoformer technology in the MC2205, or if it is just attributable to a superior circuit design, but even my wife, who doesn't pay careful attention to these things really noticed the difference.
At this point, after five years in our previous house, and a year in storage when we moved to Raleigh North Carolina in 2017, the system has finally been installed in our new house, which we moved into as of July 2018. The volume of the room is nearly double that of our all living room, and there is also a wide open archway adjacent to the right speaker. I've been able to compensate for that by putting a bit more gain on the right channel and shifting the balance wheel to favor it, but I still feel like the amp has to work a bit harder to fill this room. I'm contemplating selling this, and acquiring a used MC352, which is rated at 350 watts per channel.
Regardless of whether I do that or not, that my the sound is everything that I hoped it would be, and although I have distinct limitations of the upper and lower end of the frequency spectrum due to hearing damage, I still enjoy holographic imaging as much as I did when I first heard them. They definitely are the right speakers for someone who wants a very flat frequency response, wants to play music really loud rock, or offers the precise pinpoint imaging that is provided by certain types of high end speakers. That being said, I think they were of fantastic bargain at $1200 and I don't intend to ever sell them. The great bonus was that when I was about to leave, and already had the speakers packed in my car, the seller said "By the way - these came with some speaker stands that I stored out in my garden shed. Do you want them to?" I was fully expecting sort of rudimentary stands,, perhaps ones that the previous owner had built himself. Instead, I got what appeared to be factory built OEM risers that exactly match the construction style and veneer on the original cabinets, but elevate them about 14 inches off the floor. I have done extensive listening both with and without, and always prefer to listen to them with the risers. I took a series of photos, made some diagrams with exact measurements, and put together a PDF those individuals who might wish to build a pair themselves or have someone build a set. If anyone's interested please send me a private message here and I will be glad to forward that document.
