Renovation of Celestion 66 Studio Monitors

[rodthebod]

The 66's, I have, had strips of foam in the rebates either side of the baffle but only in lengths of about 3" to act as padding against the grille cloth stretched against the back of the steel fabricated cover. It didn't look like old adhesive that would have been affixed to the hook part of the velcro - could be wrong it was in a pretty nasty condition but flakes of old foam were there.

The foam on the padded strips was all but eroded and thinned with age but they looked an original fitting. If tolerances are that tight then using a padding strip might be a better solution as the material on the grille covers is pretty thick anyway, you have me wondering about my rebuilt cabs now, still unassembled, I'll have to check on the gaps I have made.

I've seen quite a few pictures of the later 'woodies' with no velcro or pads shown.

[karma67]

ah,then perhaps what im seeing in photo's is in fact foam strips then and not velcro,you can imagine with 6 strips of velcro holding them they are a bugger to get off!

[Qwin]

Agree with Walpurgis - The foam padded Velcro strips were standard and there in my opinion to stop any rattle of the grill frames. The grills are quite long and otherwise only held in place at the top and bottom edges.

[karma67]

cheers fellas

[rodthebod]

I can't comment any more on this one until I have re-glued the grille covers (washed them, or rather my lovely wife has they have come up really well - as new almost) then I can measure the gaps, but it does make sense what Walpurgis and Ken are saying, it is nearly a metre in height and you would need some kind of extra support other than the two metal clamps fixings either side, under the top lip, and the single screw fixing from under the bottom lip to properly secure the rather heavy grille cover.

It's quite an over the top cover being square perforated sheet steel and thick grille cloth - certainly it's not something that would be considered by todays designs.

It would be good to see the finished refurb

[rodthebod]

Well it's taken some time but I finally got the new cabinets together, using external crossovers for now for ease of access, but have placed T nuts at the base of the back to allow easy mounting later. For now until I have a good listen, I've kept as original components but with the hf caps (brown one's) thinned down to be closer to what they should read collectively, these suffered the worst in being out of spec a 1.5uf reading as 3.5-4.5uf. The mid range electrolytic (bright red large can) was within spec on both channels weirdly. The black/red elcaps did fair a little worse the 72uf bass/mid caps reading closer to 95uf. I'm using the crossovers with these values for now wanting to get a feel for what they sound like.

On first hearing they sound very nice indeed, a few hours later and I am very impressed. If this is what the original crossovers sound then I'm looking forward to hearing more improvements.

[walpurgis]

Very good. You'll be giving Paul over at RFC competition!

[karma67]

they are looking really good mate

[rodthebod]

IMG_1758.jpg

Thanks Geoff and Jamie

Haven't applied any finish to the cabs yet, just want to listen to them as it's taken months to get them sorted with one delay after another. I'm going for a natural clear wax finish to keep the lightness of the grain and to be honest the grain of the main panels doesn't look like you typical american walnut but I had to go for what was available - still they look much more 'modern' than their original cabs in teak (which as darkened to a very rich reddy brown colour) Bottom fell out of this one!!!

It's been quite emotional listening to the 66's as I didn't get a chance to hear them before, as they fell apart on moving them from where they were stored by the previous owner.

I get nostalgic memories of how my old Gale 401's sounded when I was in my 20's............... brilliant they moved air..... and so do these speakers

Being critical........ as you do, considering these are original 45 year old crossover capacitors, the midrange seems rolled off in the higher bass and the bass could be tighter, there's room for improvement in the top end definition too, but they do sound is really good, musically balanced with a sense of scale and these speakers have good integrity (control and power). I always think if a speaker can paint an aural picture where the cabinets seem to disappear things are working properly. Not being biased in any way as these have been built by yours truly! (Built to more or less exactly the same specs as the original cabs) The material I've used seems far harder chipboard than the original cabs and far stiffer and heavier but this could be down to age and the humidity which has broken the original cabs down to something resembling soft sponge in places. Modern processes will have an effect on the chipboard material of course but if you try to lift the cabs I've built then the original one's, there is a difference - the new one's seems much denser (is that a word...) and the original lighter.

Anyway they sound good so I'm pleased.....

I'll report back when I get a chance to chance some crossover parts.

[Qwin]

Just got my notifications working again and caught up on this.

Nice work