ryanward84
Well-Known Member
Anybody know anything about Sonab OA 14 speakers? Are they any good?
Made in Sweden I gathered.
Made in Sweden I gathered.
Sonab OA 14
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check this out. http://www.carlssonplanet.com/history.php
I have 1 OA-12 speaker that I found and looks very good for what it is design wise,
you need to remember that these are omni directional speakers so to speak and are a
different beast to your more conventional speaker design.
I had a pair of Schilling speakers, similar design and found them to be very revealing
yet excellent speakers.
Alas they were let down by the fact a lot of music were poorly mastered and these speakers kept on reminding me of that fact.
As always its best to audition speakers with music your familiar with.
Where are you located?
Anyway good luck
I have 1 OA-12 speaker that I found and looks very good for what it is design wise,
you need to remember that these are omni directional speakers so to speak and are a
different beast to your more conventional speaker design.
I had a pair of Schilling speakers, similar design and found them to be very revealing
yet excellent speakers.
Alas they were let down by the fact a lot of music were poorly mastered and these speakers kept on reminding me of that fact.
As always its best to audition speakers with music your familiar with.
Where are you located?
Anyway good luck
mhardy6647
Lunatic Member
Stig Carlsson.
http://www.carlssonplanet.com/
The better/best Sonabs/Carlsson speakers were/are pretty darned good. The littlest ones are somewhat less impressive, but they're all nice. Very good quality Scandinavian (at least mostly) drivers and an imaginative if Bose-esque design philosophy.
The OA-14 looks to have been one of the better ones.
http://www.carlssonplanet.com/
The better/best Sonabs/Carlsson speakers were/are pretty darned good. The littlest ones are somewhat less impressive, but they're all nice. Very good quality Scandinavian (at least mostly) drivers and an imaginative if Bose-esque design philosophy.
The OA-14 looks to have been one of the better ones.
stickman
Super Member
Sonab speakers in good condition are collectible and seem to be increasing in value over time. The woofer foams all go bad eventually and many owners have swapped the stock woofers out over the years which is a big no-no, so make sure they still have the original woofers. The stock Peerless cone tweeters sound excellent so make sure they are all working and undamaged. They must be the original alnico magnet, black basket tweeters.
If I could pick up a solid pair at a reasonable price, I'd go for it!
If I could pick up a solid pair at a reasonable price, I'd go for it!
TimF
Super Member
The Sonabs are fun speakers, especially if they are original drivers that have been kept in good working order, as stickman above notes, hard to find these days.
I have been enjoying a pair of Larsen Model 4 speakers for the last couple years-
http://www.larsenhifi.com/en/larsen4.htm
These are the modern variant on Stigs design work with Sonab/Carlsson along with John Larsen. My model resembles more the Carlsson OA-58, but I feel more improved.
I have been enjoying a pair of Larsen Model 4 speakers for the last couple years-
http://www.larsenhifi.com/en/larsen4.htm
These are the modern variant on Stigs design work with Sonab/Carlsson along with John Larsen. My model resembles more the Carlsson OA-58, but I feel more improved.
I had a chance to buy a pair back in the day, but didn't as they sounded so different to what I was used too, the soundstage and detail was awesome but I was addicted to thumping bass back then. Wished I had bought them at the time, and still kick myself that I passed them up. They are highly sought after.
burneyreid
AK Member
Man!
I had a pair of these years ago from a thrift buy ,working,but gave them to the daughter along with Akai component set-up which she donated years later due to lack of use.
I hadn't got back into audio or found AK at that time ,so, didn't know what I had but they sounded nice even though they probably could have used some loving work on 'em.
Dang:sigh:
I had a pair of these years ago from a thrift buy ,working,but gave them to the daughter along with Akai component set-up which she donated years later due to lack of use.
I hadn't got back into audio or found AK at that time ,so, didn't know what I had but they sounded nice even though they probably could have used some loving work on 'em.
Dang:sigh:
I had a set of OA 116's... very nice speakers with the drivers used from their era.
Room placement take some time to find "the correct" sound.
Room placement take some time to find "the correct" sound.
TR6man98
Well-Known Member
I own a pair with original drivers. Surrounds on bass drivers needed replacement due to the age which is typical; other than that you might want to check all the tweeters so they are working...
Those could be difficult to find.
Good luck with those and please report back.
Those could be difficult to find.
Good luck with those and please report back.
Sprague
Active Member
oops, so replacing them with these would be a bad idea?
http://www.hifikit.se/hogtalarelement/hifi/reservdelselement/b65oa-ii-8-ohm
I was given a pair of OA14's recently. The owner had ceased using them back in the 90's and had stored them in various sheds and garages due to home re-locations over the past 30 years. They were in very poor condition full of spider webs and dust and moisture ingress had rusted the tweeter frames and caused the chipboard cabinet joins to open up. The woofers were missing - but I had an original pair stored away which just needed new foam surrounds. I was able to remove one side and one end of the worst box virtually intact, despite the use of Resorcinol glue to fit the panels to the moulded thermo-plastic internal frames. Measurements were taken, checked and re-checked before submitting a drawing to a CNC routing company who manufactured new panels from 12mm MR MDF. My measurements were fairly accurate and the internal frames fitted into the routed grooves perfectly. Anyway, I am posting a couple of pics to show the current state of progress in restoring these old speakers.
