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Yamaha Tweeter ID - Beryllium?

GabeD

GabeD

Active Member
To all of the sleuths out there I present to you the Yamaha JA0577A 8 ohm tweeter. Anyone know what these would have come out of? Are they the beryllium dome type?

There is a guy in Great Brittan who is selling a pair on fleabay. He says they came out of an organ speaker and can be used for hifi. Any thoughts on that?

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Thanks for your help!
 
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This does not look like a genuine Be Driver, maybe some other metal diaphragm. The mounting plate is plastic.
 
Dr. Ear said:
The mounting plate is plastic.
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Yes, the outer plate is plastic. The structure around the dome is metal. It sure looks like a Yamaha Be tweeter in the center at least. The location of the mounting point and style of the terminals match a Yamaha Be tweeter.

I wonder if this was an "industrial" version that could have been used in an organ speaker as the guy on ebay stated.
 
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I don't believe those are Be domes, the color is not right. Be domes are an iredescent blue, purple, green and silver. My guess is that these are titanium carbide. Yamaha used this material in a lot of tweeters and midrange drivers in the 80's.
JMS
 
Still digging on this one. Searching for JA0577 yielded an ebay auction in Australia. It looks to be very similar except for a coat of silver paint and a grill. Unfortunately the auction does not mention what they came out of.

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I got a close look at some Yamaha Be tweeters recently, I would have to agree with a previous poster, the color is off, greenish Blue copper is what I noticed in the ones I saw, could be from exposure over the years. Now that doesn't mean they are not. if they where not exposed to light and elements it could effect the color. Interesting worth researching.
 
The color of the Be domes comes from the process used to make them. I sold about 8 pair of NS-1000 and NS-1000m speakers back in the late 70's and all of those had the same coloration when new. No two tweeters had the exact same color pattern but the overall look is the same. Currently I have a pair of NS-200ma speakers from 1986 which have titanium carbide tweets and these are the same color as yours. Titanium carbide is a great tweeter material to use and pretty close to Be in sound. Most likely Yamaha went to this to save material and processing cost. Be is also dangerous to be around if it shatters.
JMS
 
JMS said:
The color of the Be domes comes from the process used to make them. I sold about 8 pair of NS-1000 and NS-1000m speakers back in the late 70's and all of those had the same coloration when new. No two tweeters had the exact same color pattern but the overall look is the same. Currently I have a pair of NS-200ma speakers from 1986 which have titanium carbide tweets and these are the same color as yours. Titanium carbide is a great tweeter material to use and pretty close to Be in sound. Most likely Yamaha went to this to save material and processing cost. Be is also dangerous to be around if it shatters.
JMS
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Yes that's what I heard they can be dangerous to work on. I have seen a sent at an acquaintance house NS 1000m's I believe, he had them apart for service, mids and tweeters, so I got a look at them.He had sent them out somewhere? He was having problems finding a qualified tech to work on them. I guess not to many people can fix them correctly? I don't own any myself.
 
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JMS said:
Currently I have a pair of NS-200ma speakers from 1986 which have titanium carbide tweets and these are the same color as yours.
Click to expand...

I did some quick googling and the images that come up for the NS-200ma have a different looking frame from the ones I have. They look like the Be frames. Did they use the same setup for Ti and Be?

I started another thread asking what model Yamaha speakers have Ti tweeters in them here:

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index...rus-what-models-had-titanium-tweeters.935696/
 
The frames for most of the Be and Titanium carbide tweets look identical in the ones I am familiar with. They do vary some in frame size between speaker models. I do know that you cannot substitute a NS-200m for a NS-200ma tweeter due to difference in size. From a distance the tweets from NS-1000,NS-500m and NS-200ma look alike except for the color of the domes.
JMS
 
What a mystery to be sure, the closest I could find is the tweeter on the Yamaha NS-5X. It has the same goldish tone center, but a different front plate design. Good luck figuring out this mystery.

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Got to say that I can't see the point of using beryllium tweeters in organ speakers - production of sound is somewhat different than reproduction of sound (often much louder since in larger rooms and less emphasis on perfect linearity), and the expense and fragility of the beryllium drivers seems to argue against their use in that field.
 
Ok, I found a parts site that listed the Yamaha NS-30X as having tweeter JA0577 (image below). The only other idea that I had was that certain speakers from the professional side of the business might have been sold as a package with organs, and might have also had this tweeter. I found the Oak Series III professional speakers had 2" titanium compression drivers mounted to a horn structure, but I cannot find out part numbers (S115III-OAK, S112III-OAK, S110III-OAK, SM12III-OAK, and SM10III-OAK).

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Yamahalic said:
Ok, I found a parts site that listed the Yamaha NS-30X as having tweeter JA0577 (image below). The only other idea that I had was that certain speakers from the professional side of the business might have been sold as a package with organs, and might have also had this tweeter.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your help in researching this!

So looking at the NS-30X - is the driver I have a midrange, not a tweeter? It certainly looks like the driver that is in the middle in that picture. Looking at the frame and the angle of the curved corners it appears to be a match. The terminal locations, screws for the magnet and the triple ribbed sections are the same as well.
 
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