Owencat
Member
Looking for someone in the Baltimore MD area to upgrade my pair of Altec Lansing 1966 A7 VOTT speakers.
That's exactly what I'd do.I'm not sure, but you may have to bite the bullet and send the drivers to Great Plains Audio.
Jim
Nope. Tom Brennan tried it. Made no difference. The vanes, as far as I can tell, mainly served to brace the horn bells. Take a look at modern JBL horns, or the TAD TH4003 that inspired them and you'll see the bells are nice and solid for minimal vibration. Altec later went to screwed-in struts on the 329 horn to brace the bells. I did cut the vanes and put caulking between them, though. Then I filled the bells with polyurethane and coated the entire horn body to reduce vibration and radiation. Lastly, they are firmly mounted in a box, with a gasket behind the flange to damp that. Then for the coup de grace, I put those TAD TD2002 drivers on them. If there's an Altec hell, I'm going there!Didja ever devane an unsuspecting 811B or 511B, @fpitas ? You're among friends here.
The reviews are...mixed:You might reach out to Just Audio up in White Marsh. Their website shows a specialty in vintage and repairs.
One thing to watch out for, is not many people design the 511 crossover for 500Hz anymore. There are solid technical reasons for that, but for a restoration you probably want the original crossover point.So, which drivers and horn(s) do you have? If it's an A7, I am guessing the horn is an 811B, but it could be a 511B or something else. The 811B and 511B look similar, but the latter is noticeably larger.
You could always source a pair of vintage Altec crossovers from eBAY or otherwise, or build (or commission the build of) any of a number of "improved" XO designs. One doesn't even really know how to solder* to cobble up a crossover -- one may use terminal strips or even wire nuts.
^^^ Here's a not quite cogent (but very close) Altec two-way XO example from hifi fellow traveler Joseph Esmilla
source: https://hifihaven.org/index.php?threads/altec-2-way-build-ala-jelabs-802-32-414.3452/page-23
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* not a difficult skill to develop -- heck, I can do it!
Also true of the 800 Hz point for the 811B (i.e., for best results).One thing to watch out for, is not many people design the 511 crossover for 500Hz anymore. There are solid technical reasons for that, but for a restoration you probably want the original crossover point.
Yes, I got that idea from things Greg Timbers said, too. He was asked about old Altecs and very tactfully said the main issues were the crossovers.Also true of the 800 Hz point for the 811B (i.e., for best results).
It is funny (not the ha-ha kind of funny... the other kind) that Altec's weakness seemed to be in their own crossover networks. Seems to be too easy to make Altec drivers sound better than they do using Altec's purpose-built XOs.