Western Electric 15 a- your opinions

[slowmotion]

I tend to enjoy music in this room despite flaws, I also enjoyed the 22a system, and soon will see what the 15a can deliver.



Yes forgot, perfection does not exist so learn to live with flaws.

Looks good to me. A room for listening to music...

[Schmitz]

That room is strange, no mirrors, ok.
Nowadays people tend to think that WE eqipment allone is for fantastic sound but the setup of a system is as important.
Too much is going wrong in the 22A System, the 16A is much better.
Dont use Onken, to low bass quality for 22A in conjunction with Altec. If you could not afford high quality bass than it corrupts the high quality sound of 22A.

[Bohun]

Hi Schmitz: what does your setup looks like then?  What are your suggestions on good quality bass setup (do they parallel Tim's)?


P

[J-ROB]

What a worse listening environment for this equipment

Environment would be even worse if it didn't have all of the cool equipment in it.

[soundlistening]

The 22a system I previoulsy used ended up with OB as commented in this thread.
Think that the WE555's are somewhat under used on mid horn likes the 22a but in most cases size/living style and WAF will be the leading factors on how far one can go.
The 22a setup with OB bass 15" FC Jensens is for my ears somewhat better, smoother and offering better transition from mid to bass, albeit less low bass than the Onken.
But whatever you do matching any decent horn that sccops down to 300hz"ish" (let alone 100hz...) will be a challenge unless one can afford a lot of space.
Now if one is looking for the "audiophile" flat response WE systems are not for that, in fact far from it.
Aldo for example used the 16a with no bass and that is how I had the 16a setup to start. Room size at Aldo's place (been there...) is smaller and the sound he got with a mono 16a, one tweeter and no bass was beautiful.
The room I enjoy is larger but still the 16a with no bass makes it happen for me.
The previous photo in the above post is with no bass at all.

Moved on and "managed" to get an OB behind the 16a, this is about 3mtrs x 1.50mrs hosting two WE4181 fc bass units.



This solution does increase the soundstage etc & etc...but does not add any magic to the sound, just scale. I tend to listen to chamber music, lyric and opera, classical jazz.
I would like a bigger baffle and move it further from the wall behind but that would turn my living space into an audiotirium; my wife and I enjoy music and the space we live in.
But any of these setups require top notch front ends etc....this is what I call my machine room:



More projects ahead : 15a and 12a maybe 13a...but at this time this WE49 (one of a pair) that I am restoring along with self made PS for it:




Oh yes...for the critical eyes those are VT-24 not WE264c tubes...the VT24 are for testing and 264c's are kept safe during that stage!

All fun...
Tim

[tuyen]

Love your room Tim.   Hope I can come visit you one day.

Maybe on my honeymoon!    

Is an open baffle bass solution generally seen as the 'best' way of integrating coherantly/seemlessly with midhorns (ie. ~200-300hz) ?    How about the the old altec style units like what GIP Labs also use?



or this front loaded horn design?


Or it is really room/personal preference dependant and they all have their pros and cons?

Still wondering if it is worth endevouring to play with other bass cabinet designs instead of my onkens (which took a lot of cost/work to make).

Cheers!

[Johannes LeBong]

Hi Tim

I find your floor plan with the We-setup very well done when I look at the pictures.
Everything, the big room itself, the gear and the fürniture seem to integrate wonderfully together resulting in a beautiful interior design which allows you to live well. This is outstanding. So beautiful I saw it not often. I know WE installations in rooms that are uncomfortable and unpleasant for my eye from visits. But this is of course a matter of life-style. For me (and my wife) the sound alone is not everything.

[J-ROB]

Is an open baffle bass solution generally seen as the 'best' way of integrating coherantly/seemlessly with midhorns (ie. ~200-300hz) ?    How about the the old altec style units like what GIP Labs also use?

Not ALTEC. These are actually Mirrophonic-era Western baffle designs, referred to as "W" cabs. They are open backed.

Check out the TA-7396 and 7401: here http://www.moviemice.com/we/speakerBaffles/index.php

This will provide the most powerful and glorious LF you can dream of.

The front horn WE baffles are also insane. Maybe the most impressive bass experience of my life was Stevie Ray Vaughan played on a front horn 15"--pictured here 5th and 6th pics from top:

http://silbatone.com/koreatrip.html (The WE wood horns are fakes. Bass baffle is real. All WE drivers.)

That SRV LP really clicked with my being in a perfect moment of audio bliss.

If you have space and resources for this front horn 15" baffle. i would waste no time--DO IT.

Here's a pr of the "horn modules" for sale listed with good pics (TA-7395 is for the 18")

http://www.vintageaudio123.com/item16/index.html

Trust me, this is a good place to be if you can get there.

I used an Onken/416 for many years. It will definitely integrate well with 300-500hz midrange horns. However, the flavor will be very different from open backed field coils. The Onken (or any bass reflex) stores some energy and doesn't want to shut off. These WE baffles are lightning fast on/off...whack whack whack! Super fast and punchy. Serious weight and gravitas.

But when I had my Onkens, I was quite satisfied with their enjoyable and luxurious character. Not a perfect bassist but who is?

If anybody is saying there is only ONE way to do things, then you are dealing with a priest not an audio enthusiast.

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good!

[tuyen]

Cheers Joe!

I'll look at trying a pair of those front loaded cabs.

I agree with your experience with the onken/416 combo. I ran the same combo for a while. Wasnt really a fan. Didn't blend well with the horns I am usin.  Too slow and muddy in comparison.   Even though changing to the Goto unit bass drivers improved the speed and snap incredibly, I still wanting bit more nowadays.

[J-ROB]

Best thing to do with an Onken is make sure it is tuned right. The original plan proved to be way underdamped for my 416s.  I enjoyed mine with a wide variety of HF setups with crossover adjustments. I am fairly sure a pleasant mix with 22As can be engineered. It is still a ported box though and will not sound like open baffle field coils.

The TA-7331 cabinet for 15"s is also interesting. Very punchy and alive to 50hz. The rear chamber is resistively loaded with a fiber barrier (not shown on plans) and on the rear wall strips of cloth are positioned to catch the backwave. Front chamber is a rectangular box, which doesn't make sense to me (yet). I never saw one with the front removed so I do know if there is any treatment inside the front chamber.

The 7331 was a bass cab that was used with 555 systems, for those dreaming of the Real Western Sound of myth and legend.

It is large but not stupid impossible huge. Not much bigger than an Onken on its side.

Of course, the stupid impossible huge solutions are superior performers.

[audioanthology]

Hey Joe

nice pics there at the Silbatone trip. nice title too: going east to see Western

Love all that WE stuff but too messy for me...and definitively i have never liked too much the big WE horns in big rooms. I have always found a more satifying sound in smaller rooms, at moderate sound level, with less acoustic problems...and definitively with a more intimistic sound.
that's my opinion of course...but big horns for me doesn't mean big listening room

this is my set up . sorry not that cool place...and my listening room is not very appealing...
it's the basement where i work and live. the 15a system is used to fine tune also the amps and preamps that i make.
for myself i don't care that much about the look.I work continously on the electronics and i just need them to work fine and to be easily modified and tweaked.
 
Actually i listen in very subdued light, almost in the dark so the room looks better than in pics !
I like to  don't see the speaker that much...the dark 15a mouth in the shadow... just the music coming out and spreading from that almost dark area.
I think this is important. To be focused on music , not visually on the speaker. I think that to enjoy too much visually the speakers is a bad hi end habit ! WE needs a totally new way of thinking to audio in my opinion



Mono , original 15a with original felt-flannel.

the listening distance is just 3 meters.  the right wall is angled, not parallel : it is enough to have no standing waves and great , clean sound

after owning many original WE amps and other stuff ( ta4181, Jensen m10 etc)  i ended up with a quite simple and relatively cheap set up. the sound i have now is the best i have ever had . just bass could be better ( with a jensen M10 for example) , but as you know , i don't care that much about bass.

For those who are somewhat scared by a 15a system complexity and costs... i would suggest to go for a system like mine, but stereo. 15As placed side by side in a small room work great in my opinion

here is the list of what i use:
-555 with Ale replacement diaphragm ( i like this diaphragm more than some original WE: 555w and early 555 diaphragms sound respectively too thin and a little harsh. i like instead the red dot later diaphragm : warm sound and can stand 10W in respect to the 5W of earlier types. I prefer anyway the clean , airy sound of the ALE)
-Ogawa 597a ( more extension than GIP and Kanno , but these are good too. i still don't know if the LM597a is as good as these, possibly yes)
-altec 803a ( not that bad at the end...a field coil M10 is better of course. WE4181 instead was too slow on this baffle. eltus 4181 or jensen 18 are faster than WE4181 that has an heavier cone) even if not visible in the picture , the back of the woofer is loosely enclosed in heavy drapes to dampen the back wave

-Garrard 301 grease bearing on soft wood plinth+ortofon RS212+Vintage Ortofon SPU
-my phono preamp with we310a tubes and premium vintage parts. no transformers except the MC step up, which is vintage too
-Motiograph amp modified to PP300B ( heavily modified, just the case used) . interstage phase splitting transformer but no expensive WE transformers.
-Tungar psu in WE cage ( just the cage is WE , otherwise all new parts , 220v transformers , but the capacitor is the great sounding WE ATA 4115)
-speaker cables are Supra ply 2.0 . modern tinned copper

no crossover on 15a+555 . 1 mF WE paper cap on tweeter . 18mH air coil on woofer


I hope these infos will be helpful to someone who is willing to go for a 15a or similar system on a reduced or reasonable budget. Expensive premium WE parts are not necessarily a must at the end, but some things are mandatory anyway

I think one day i'll also replace my original we15a with one of my replicas ...but too busy...really no time to make one for me...

[moosemp]

Hi Joe!
Do you know any other plans resources for mirrophonic enclosures? I don;t know if these from Moviemice are possible to be encrypted

cheers-maciej

[moosemp]

I was encouraged to buy WE  horns in Aldo's place.
Sound is really amazing, but I would care about bass much more than Aldo.
You ought to visit Italy, defiitely closer than Seoul

[Bohun]

Thanks for advice Joe.  I will definitely experiment with onkens while I think for Jensen M10 or other driver in open baffle (7395 looks like it might work in domestic setting )

Great setups Tim and Aldo! 
P

[J-ROB]

Aldo, I totally agree that big horns can work in a small room.

Having worked in many small rooms, i share your distrust of massive bass. All I personally need is "enough" bass to float the musical ideas. Not so much as to cause problems in a given room.

My favorite 15A sound was two close 15As with no woofer and no tweeter with 46Cs (rebuilt with exact NOS parts). Room was a small space in the old Silbatone factory, close listening.

Top pic here: http://www.silbatoneacoustics.com/labsystems.html

Those blue 15As were repainted and cut for the Munich show.

But for a medium-large room, which you and I and most people don't have, the large WE bass baffles are quite amazing and take the experience to an entirely different level, an enormous scale unlike any other equipment.

Smaller woofers are more punchy and lively in the midbass...I call it jukebox bass, which I love. The 18"s have a more weighty smooth sound and require some work to set up. They will not perform to their ultimate promise bolted on to an undersized piece of plywood.

15A is actually a small scale WE system...isn't that funny? Same for 16A...even more miniaturized.

For a large scale setup in a really large hall, the woody character of the 15A translates into a soft indistinct sound. 12/13 seems so far to excel in large rooms as do some of the 594 horns.

That woody 15A sound works well to bring music to life in small rooms. Very cool feature of the economy version thin plywood 15A horn.

The important thing is to adjust for your room, your taste, your life.

That Korea trip photo was taken in a marble wall rooftop listening room on top of a 30 story office tower and it is the private playground of a chairman of a very large company. You probably own something with parts he made, no matter where you live.

Few can compete with that kind of resource availability... but he took that great front horn baffle down and replaced it with something else, so maybe he didn't deserve it to begin with.

I caution people to forget about "THE REAL WESTERN ELECTRIC SOUND" because it is only a dream. The real sound is old movie optical source heard in theaters. The "real" sound might not be what you actually prefer.

Aldo and PPG are doing lots of things that have nothing to do with original WE parts and configurations, but they found good ways to modify and adjust for real world conditions. 

Same with Silbatone, we have lots of stuff set up in complete factory-spec systems, fully restored electronics, all factory xovers, etc. but Silbatone gear often sounds better than the WE factory reference, so we use it.

BTW: the factory used a 2uF cap to the 597A from a 15A.

Truth be told, I love the WE PM speakers 755A and 757A for small rooms and I could be eternally happy with either, but nothing else will do what a Wide Range horn does.

My advice is that if it is possible to move in the direction of a 555 system, it is a potentially life-enhancing move that is worth the commitment. It's a major journey and can't be done all at once. One lifetime is not enough.

Beyond certain basics, all details are arguable and subject to creative engineering.