Can anyone identify these speakers?

[gyro_gearloose]

Hi

 

I was given two of these a while ago :

 

http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t41/gyro_gearloose/th_P1010007.jpg

 

They are 31.5" tall, 18.5" wide, and 18.75" deep. They are made from thick chipboard, and appear to be well made. They have 15" drivers and no crossover.

 

http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t41/gyro_gearloose/th_P1010008.jpg

 

The speaker basket is cast metal, and the little circle says '100W 8ohms'

 

The cabs are of a W-Bin construction with the drivers facing towards the rear. I tried Google but W-Bin is also ebay shorthand for With Buy It Now, so that didn't really get me very far.

 

The components its made from (metal corner pieces, recessed jack sockets, white piping) make it look to me like some sort of guitar cab. Also, 100 watts would be about right for a guitar valve amp wouldn't it? Does anyone recognise them and know any more about them?

 

Thanks

 

Moderation: Thumbnailed images

 

Edit : Sorry about that! Click on the pics for full-sized versions

[Brian]

The boxes are nothing special - a generic cabinet. The drive unit itself bears a passing resemblance to early HH units.

[rob.d]

The components its made from (metal corner pieces, recessed jack sockets, white piping) make it look to me like some sort of guitar cab. Also, 100 watts would be about right for a guitar valve amp wouldn't it? Does anyone recognise them and know any more about them?

 

The power handling is about appropriate (as a pair in one cab, and it might be useful to see if theyre series or parallel wired) but ive never seen a horn loaded guitar cab- front loaded is the absolute norm, but some bass guitar cabs have a bass reflex manifold to chuck the sound a bit, but full on horn loading would be a little odd- im not sure why one would require to "throw" a guitar or bass sound so much as that. I can only speculate, but the white piping strikes me as being abit 70's... it might be an early WEM festival type pa cab or similar?

 

HTH

rob :D

[Pete McCrea]

Two 15" drivers in a folded horn, with no crossover? Sounds like a sub/low mid enclosure to me...

[paulears]

Tons of these around in the late 70's when people discovered bass cabs for the first time - as Brian says, a fairly generic design that pretty well all the people at the time had. They look a little like some Carlsbro ones I had, but the handles are not the same (from memory). 100W drivers were considered pretty loud and powerful at that time.

[gyro_gearloose]

Thanks everyone. To be honest I'm not that fussed what they are or what they are supposed to be for, I was just curious. I'm using them in my garages sound system along with another 'rescued-from-the-bin' piece of kit, a Westar W400 amp (one side is dead, but the other is more than capable of driving both cabs :D Mono is good enough for me). They sound alright for background music while I'm working, although they could do with a tweeter of some type.

 

I appears that I haven't made myself that clear in my previous post. I have TWO cabs, each has ONE 15" driver. Not sure why people thought I meant each cab has two drivers, they aren't big enough for two to fit...

 

They look a little like some Carlsbro ones I had,

 

They may even be the ones you used to have, seeing as we are in the same part of the world! Also, whoever supplied the PA for the Lings (local car/bike dealership, for those not in Lowestoft) open day a week or two back had a pair of these speakers along with separate mid/top boxes. Didn't get to see them myself as I was working all weekend :D

[Brian]

although they could do with a tweeter of some type.

The usual retrofit is to stuff a couple of piezo tweeters into the central piece of chipboard at the front of the units, wired off the back of the cone driver.

[MarkPAman]

I tried Google but W-Bin is also ebay shorthand for With Buy It Now, so that didn't really get me very far.

 

:P Tip

Use advanced search and put "ebay" in the "without the words" box.

[Peter Chivers]

If my memory serves me right, they were originally a copy of an early Electrovoice 'Eliminator' cab, in many cases manufactured by a cabinet company called Leech, I think, and marketed by many music shops under their own 'brand names' for example Blackpool Sond Centre sold them under the 'EEZEE' Brand.

I may be wrong - after all I'm stretching my memory back to late 70's or very early 80's!

 

Peter

[Pete Alcock]

Gyro,

 

The drivers I would say are certainly HH (I used to have a pair in the first disco I built in 1977). The boxes are, as everyone says, a standard 70's design that usually sounded pretty bad to be honest. Orange (the musical instrument amp manufacturer) used to do boxes exactly like this.

 

Just for interest, in the late seventies, the Radio One Roadshow used to use two each side of the stage as main FOH PA Outdoors! Imagine that nowadays for a crowd of 3,000 folks!

 

Prolly best kept as a garage system (your garage, not raving).

[paulears]

That would be these, then

http://www.kipstar.co.uk/image/ministakr.gif

 

I seem to remember the DJ being Emporor Rosco who played Judge Dread rather a lot?

[p.k.roberts]

I also seem to remember these under various brands in the late seventies; Roger Squire and Saxon spring to mind.

Pete, you're half right - the picture I have of the mighty Radio One Roadshow only has ONE on each side! Pardon?

Paul, yes, the Emporor had, I think, some kind of deal with Orange. I have a picture captioned 'One of the Great Outdoor Discos of Our Time - 6000 Watts of Orange Power'. It's the man himself on stage in what looks like a footy stadium with a very motley collection of cabs.

And on that wave of warm nostalgia, I think I'll have a Horlicks and an early night.

[paulears]

While we're off on a small nostalgia run, I really don't remember the sound of things in those days being bad. Not hi-fi, certainly, but not bad. I remember Slade arriving at the venue with a pile of WEM 4 x12" columns, powered by 100W WEM amps that lived in beer crates, one for each column, so a mighty 400W - All that went through it were the vocals and Jim Lea's violin of course.

[bruce]

While we're in nostalgia mood, go and have a look at http://www.wemwatkins.co.uk/

 

Yes, it's an accordion shop.

 

But it's run by Charlie Watkins (WEM: Watkins Electronic Music) - the guy who invened the Copicat, those 4x12 columns, the "slave amp" and loads of other gubbins.

 

On the front page, there's a "Watkins and WEM History" link. Read that page.... it's got loads of interesting stuff....

 

...like this picture of Fleetwood Mac playing with a massive 1000W of amplification. Charlie wasn't there - as the sound engineer, he got arrested for disturbing the peace...

http://www.wemwatkins.co.uk/ballfest.gif