[Vintage-Audio] small speakers

Wed Nov 21 17:42:58 EST 2007

Hey Michael,

Can you recall anything about the 1979 discussion with the James B. Lansing 
Century L-100 Vs ? If so, I am certainly interested.

I am not familiar with the L-40S. Please fill me in Michael.

I have only owned two sets of speakers since I got my first stereo in 
January of 1965. Truth!

As you know, I was totally blinded when shot by a stranger on the eve of my 
eighteenth birthday in October of 1964. That Christmas my family did not 
know what to buy a blind man as a gift, so most just gave me cash. As I 
recall, I had a few cents under two hundred dollars.

One of my cousins, apparently did not know that I did not own a record 
player, let alone a stereo. He gave me my first stereo album, (Which I still 
have and it is even playable!), Al Hirt's first RCA Nashville Studio B 
recording "Honey In The Horn".

Another cousin, a SERIOUS music devotee - Classical and Opera - with a H.H. 
Scott LK-48 amplifier, LT-110 FM stereo tuner, turntable and pair of 
Electrovoice three-way high end speakers,  was a mechanical engineer for 
General Motors Tech Center in Warren, MI. He went to Pecar Electronics near 
Detroit and bought me an EICO integrated stereo amplifier in kit form. I do 
not recall the model, but it had no cabinet and put out 15 watts RMS per 
channel. He also got me a Giarrard AT-50 changer and a pair of eight inch 
James B. Lansing "full range" speakers. They had a five pound PM, not bad 
for an eight inch speaker! No cabinets or changer base. My cousin built the 
amp and my late Father, a Carpenter, built me bass reflex cabinets out of 
White Birch, per the plans that came with my speakers. He also built me a 
base for the turntable.

It cost me $171.50 for the stereo components and speakers from Pecar 
Electronics and about $30 for materials for my two speaker cabinets. The 
total cost was within a dollar of the money I had!

I used that pair of speakers, which my Father ceiling mounted in my bedroom, 
and later in my house after I got married, until August of 1974. Then I fell 
in love with a pair of James B. Lansing Century L-100's at an electronics 
store in Flint called Teletronics. I took a J.D. Sumner vinyl album, (The 
lowest Bass singer in the world who was singing with a southern Baptist 
gospel quartet known as the Blackwood Brothers then) along to test the new 
speakers. If they could handle J.D. when he hit a 32 Hz note, without 
blowing the voice coil and cone apart, coming unglued, distorting or causing 
the speaker enclosure to fall apart, then they had to be GOOD!

Unless you ever had the thrill of hearing, more like feeling, J.D. hit some 
of his patented low notes you can not begin to image this mans incredible 
voice! While several Bass singers "claim" to be lower, but are both below 
the bottom of the human hearing range so who cares!, J.D. could do what 
absolutely NOBODY else could. He could actually sing at 32 Hz, not just make 
a growling noise! Yes, he was, maybe still is, in the Ginnis Book of world 
records. As I recall, he hit 32 Hz on the song "Blessed Assurance" on a 
vinyl album. But you had to hear this man live to know what "low" really is!

I bought the pair of Century L-100's for $600 in August of 1974 and they are 
still my main speakers thirty-three years later! Unfortunately, I had a 
moment of pure unadulterated maximum stupidity and sold the eight inch full 
range to a friend. There was nothing wrong with them, not even after ten 
years of being played several thousand hours per year! I would kiss 
Frogzilla to have them back!

I did add a pair of B&W model 630 three-way speakers with tuneable rear 
ports in 1997 as monitor speakers. I can run them as monitors alone or phase 
them in with the Century L-100's. The L-100's are mounted at the ceiling and 
are fourteen feet apart. My custom built White Birch stereo console is 72 
inches long and is centered on the wall the Century L-100's are mounted on. 
They flank the console on both ends. Hence, the channel seperation is 
excellent and with all four cabinets operating the sound is beyond words.

I did bi-wire, not bi-amp!, the Titanium tweeters on the B&W model 630's. It 
was claimed, and it is true, that doing so will give you better high 
frequency performance. With the incredibly clean and dynamic Bass the 
Century L-100 woofer puts out, as the Wolf Man Bob will affirm, the sound is 
almost as thrilling as the smell of smoking slicks and burned Methanol + 
Nitromethane as you trip the photo light sensor at the end of the drag strip 
quarter mile marker!

Come on up Michael and let's blow some dust bunnies into low Earth orbit! 
Maybe even trip some neighbor's motion sensors!

Duane Fischer, W8DBF/WPE8CXO
dfischer at usol.com
HHI: Halligan's Hallicrafters International
http://www.w9wze.net
HHRP: Historic Halligan Radio Project
hhrp.w9wze.net

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Salmons, Michael" <SalmonsM at missouri.edu>
To: "Vintage home and professional audio equipment from 1975 back" 
<vintage-audio at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Wednesday, November 21, 2007 4:11 PM
Subject: RE: [Vintage-Audio] small speakers

>Michael, I wonder if you have done any lab spec checks to compare accurate
>frequency response, dispersion angles, strong - normal - weak frequency
>response areas, distortion etc? It would be most interesting to compare the
>data between your larger and smaller speaker systems.

Never have taken done that, no.   I've read about the properties of acoustic 
suspension designs but have not measured the EPIs or the ARs. I can't 
exactly confirm flat response from what I've heard, but I can confirm there 
are no obvious bumps in the curve and the bass response in both models is 
both uncolored and very extended for such small speakers.

I've not had the pleasure of auditioning any classic JBLs since 1979, when I 
compared the L100 to some other speakers at an audio salon. That is, until a 
pair of L40s showed up at a local repair shop a few months ago. I liked them 
very much indeed, and might just have to get pair if I can find some that at 
the same time that I can afford some!

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