Wharfedale W60 woofers

[Moonwatcher]

Hello, all. I'm very pleased with early two-way ported Wharfedale W60s powered by a modified Magnavox 9303 tube amp, but I go back and forth with a pair of Smaller Advents for the sake of fuller bass. I wish I could add them to the 4 ohm taps on the Edcor OPTs (which have 4, 8 and 16-ohm taps), but some here have warned against that. So I've been wondering: although the 12-inch original Alnico woofers have their advantages in the mid and upper bass, would the Wharfedale magic be lost if I replaced them with something like Klipsch Heresy woofers of the same size? Or maybe another efficient brand? Also, I wonder if stuffing the box would help with the bass, though that seems meant more for sealed cabinets.

Thanks for your thoughts on the matter.

 

[Stereodiver]

Crossovers are designed for the drivers. Change a driver to a different brand,,,, you’ll need to change the crossover.
Sure, the speaker will work but it is no longer the speaker the designer meant it to be.
Will you like it? Maybe, but prolly not.
I don’t know these speakers. Are they on stands? If so, maybe shorter stands and tilt them back so the tweeters are aimed at your ear.
Is the port on the back of the speaker or front? If on the back, get em further off the back wall. If on the front, try em closer to the wall.
Who told you not to use the 4 ohm tap and why?

Good Luck! Mark

 

[CJ Payne]

Just get a sub for the same money you’d get the woofers for. The W60’s are more of a bookshelf speaker. Getting them pressed against the wall will give you a bass boost.

 

[CopperWizard]

You need multiple systems now. The early w60 are the ****. Keep them as is. More bass, hook up other system. DONT CHANGE the w60. You will regret.

 

[drbiggles]

Those early W60s are build like beautiful tanks. But their cabinet size strangles the woofers ability to dig down further. They need 5 cubic feet to open up. That said, it wasn’t the lack of lower bass notes that caused me to sell them pronto. It was the midrange hole and the midrange driver masquerading as a tweeter. That’s a woofer in the early W60s, not a full range driver. What I’d like to do is pop in Wharfedale Super 12s with Super 3s. That’s be the way to do it.

Biggles

 

[Moonwatcher]

So grateful to everyone for weighing in on this: you saved me from making a terrible mistake! I do love the sound of these W60s and would REALLY hate to ruin them. They are great for most of what I listen to--FM jazz and the like--so I'll look into the Super 12/Super 3 suggestion. Thanks!

 

[Moonwatcher]

Crossovers are designed for the drivers. Change a driver to a different brand,,,, you’ll need to change the crossover.
Sure, the speaker will work but it is no longer the speaker the designer meant it to be.
Will you like it? Maybe, but prolly not.
I don’t know these speakers. Are they on stands? If so, maybe shorter stands and tilt them back so the tweeters are aimed at your ear.
Is the port on the back of the speaker or front? If on the back, get em further off the back wall. If on the front, try em closer to the wall.
Who told you not to use the 4 ohm tap and why?

Good Luck! Mark

Thanks, Mark. Several people chimed in that the Edcor was not designed for using more than one tap (including the Edcor company tech), but at lease one other AKer messaged me privately that he ran original and Smaller Advents from both taps from the same OPT and was pleased.

The W60s are indeed on stands, at least 12 inches off the floor of a fairly small room, and the tweeters are close to ear level. I actually don't have that much of a problem with the sound of the tweeters, but I have a pair of paper-in-oil caps (huge!) that Gang-Twanger recommended. I just haven't gotten around to installing them--partly because they are so big. By the way, he talked me into driving over to Florida to grab these for a little bit of nothing, and I really miss his voice around here.

 

[Moonwatcher]

Just get a sub for the same money you’d get the woofers for. The W60’s are more of a bookshelf speaker. Getting them pressed against the wall will give you a bass boost.

Thanks--I never heard of pressing them against the wall and will try that.

 

[Moonwatcher]

You need multiple systems now. The early w60 are the ****. Keep them as is. More bass, hook up other system. DONT CHANGE the w60. You will regret.

Thanks for this advice. Since my Xiang Sheng 728a preamp has two outputs I could in fact send the other signal to my Marantz SS amp and the Smaller Advents. Interesting thought!

 

[CJ Payne]

The bass boost from speakers being against the wall has to do with how low frequencies emit from the cabinet. Placing any speaker against a wall has this affect. With big speakers this is usually undesirable, and can cause a bit of muddiness to the sound, however this is also a reason the smaller speakers were called "Bookshelves", when the speaker is placed on a shelf against a wall, the wall reflections will compensate some for the loss of bass that comes with the smaller cabinet.

It's ironic because a lot of modern bookshelves are meant to be away from the wall on stands as they have a rear facing air port, however it's usually assumed today you will supplement with a sub-woofer. With the W60 having a front facing air port there should be no problem there.

And if they just don't dig low enough but you like the sound, get a sub, and set the crossover low so that it's not getting up into where the W60 shines. Or trade them in for W70D's

 

[Moonwatcher]

Thanks for that explanation. I would sorta like to avoid subwoofers, because I like keeping things period-correct; to wit, I would love to find a pair of W70's or W70D's! But looking forward to trying these backed up to the wall. My back is usually to the wall over something or other, so why not my speakers?

 

[drbiggles]

Gang Twanger and I spent more than a few evenings blabbing about Wharfedales. I too tried vintage paper in oil caps. I’ve still got a good handful laying around somewhere. I have 2 issues with them. One of which is that they’re old. Capacitors age, and not in a good way. They do not all age in a linear fashion. Exact pairs could measure different values and ESR. I heard it in tweeter performance, it’s lopsided. All they do is add uneven second order harmonics. So, to pretend you’re using vintage PIO caps, through a sheet over one speaker. Throw two sheets over the other one. Yes, Iam being overly dramatic. Those old caps just ruin audio signals. And in the case of the early W60s, it makes a dark tweeter even duller.

Biggles

 

[Moonwatcher]

I'm not sure how old they are. Might be new Russian (I can't recall--it's been so long since I ordered them). But they are like the size of a Coke can and heavy as lead, which would only make these heavy speakers heavier!