Malcolm

General definitions...perhaps more than you asked for... A power amplifier is a device which simply amplifies a signal. Output is proportional to input. A preamplifier is a device that accepts inputs from various sources (like turntable, CD player, tape, etc.), allows you to switch between inputs, provides some minimal amplification and equalization for low level inputs like phono cartridge and tape head to bring it up to the level of the other inputs, provides volume and tone controls, and feeds a power amplifier. An integrated amplifier combines the preamplifier and power amplifier in a single unit. A receiver is an integrated amplifier with AM and/or FM tuner built in. An A/V receiver is a receiver with Dolby and/or DTS decoding built into it, and the ability to switch video signals as well as audio. There are also high end processors that provide all the features of an A/V receiver except the power amplifier. If you go with the appropriate high end components, all you will need are the processor and the power amplifier, plus whatever signal sources you want. You might want to look at the offerings at www.mcintoshlabs.com for an example of high end separates. Any receiver with preouts, like the 4802 and 5803, can be used with external power amplifiers. I doubt you will hear a difference between the 4802 and the 5803 preamp sections. Why would you not want to use the power amplifiers built into the 4802 or 5803?

Sure looks like 60's Heresy components, complete with EV woofer and Type C network, to me. Don't know if Klipsch every offered a kit like this, or the components as a kit. The cabinet looks to me like it may have been commercially manufactured. But its hard to tell from the pictures. Wonder why someone would want to pay $600 for these when two pairs of real Heresys of similar vintage recently went for $350 and $374? Maybe they know something we don't?

Well, in some parts of the world, if you knew where one was, and hard the "right" contacts, maybe $50. Of course, in some parts of the world, that could wind up costing you a hand or worse. Considering how new the 5803 is, supply and demand, I think you will pay close to list price to an authorized dealer to actually get one in the near future. If you can wait, of course, the price will come down.

I cannot imagine why anyone would want to measure speaker impedance unless they are a speaker engineer or just have too much time on their hands. But for anyone who does, the link below explains speaker impedance and gives a rudimentary way to measure it: http://www.epanorama.net/documents/audio/speaker_impedance.html

Sounds like Tangent 30. See the description on this site under products->home audio->classic series.

Assuming Klipsch used the correct size box for the Heresy in the first place, I think you will want to use a smaller one for the woofer. You need to reduce the size of the original box by the volume displaced by the tweeter, squawker and possible crossover network to arrive at the same effective volume. I have a K-22-EF I might be persuaded to part with. The rest of the components of the Heresy it came out of, along with two CTS 10" woofers, are going into a custom center channel speaker. Email me if you are interested.

If you check the archives, you will find info/opinions on the pros and cons of various types of capacitors for crossover networks. Klipsch used metallized film capacitors in the later Heresys. I replace paper in oil caps in Heresys with Solen metallized polypropelene caps and like the results. You can get them from places like www.partsexpress.com and www.madisound.com.

Very interesting thread. I was going to just lurk, but I'll add my two cents in no particular order. Economic boycotts don't work. The grape boycott didn't work for Chavez. Oil boycott didn't work against Iraq. Change has to come from within. Developing countries may, indeed, have problems with pollution, human rights, etc. So did, and does, the United States. Developing countries need to fix their problems. We need to fix ours. And we need to work together for our common good. "Slave labor" in China means making convicts in prison manufacture products. Frankly, I don't have a problem with that. Its just part of the way they pay their debt to their society and support themselves. We pay convicts in the U.S. pennies an hour to do similar work, although it is voluntary on the part of the prisoner. Prisoners in at least one Texas jail have to pay for the food they eat. "Living wage" is relative. I live in a house in the U.S. worth perhaps $300,000. The crew who installed my carpets were all from Mexico. The foreman is building a house bigger than mine, at least as nice as mine, with much more land, for $50,000 in Mexico. A living wage in Mexico is much less than a living wage in the U.S. An "oppressive, authoritarian government" is not considered a bad thing by all people in the world. In fact, some of the highest standards of living are found in countries with such governments, like Saudi Arabia and Singapore. Most people value prosperity much more than freedom. Many Russians would rather have the relative prosperity they had under communism than the poverty they have now. Mexico was in trouble long before the maquilladora system. There were far too many peasants for an agrarian society to support. Land reform failed. The government and unions were corrupt. Unemployment and inflation were rampant. Interest rates were soaring. The peson was greatly devalued. The maquilladora system, in fact, gives jobs to Mexicans who would otherwise have none. The people really raping Mexico are their own politicians, unions and businesses. THe worst air and water pollution in the world is in Mexico city, almost all caused by Mexicans. Mexico's problems are going to have to be solved by Mexicans. Lets hope Fox is successful in his attempt to change the system. Exploitation of cheap labor in a developing country by developped countires can actually be good for the developing country. Japan, South Korea, Taiwan were all in that boat after WWII. Look at them now. There is really no such thing as a large publicly traded American owned, or German owned, company. People all over the world own stock in them. In many, the board members, officers and employees come from all over the world. Many have factories all over the world. The only thing American, or German, about them is where they are incorporated and where they pay taxes (and in some cases not even where they pay taxes.) The Chinese takeover of Tibet may not have been such a bad thing for the people there. There were basically three classes: land owners, monks, and peasants. The peasants were pretty much slaves. Being a U.S. citizen, I prefer to buy American when quality and price are competitive, e.g. Porter Cable power tools instead of Japanese or Chinese. I buy American made hand tools if I am going to use them much. Otherwise, I buy the quality I need at the best price. The U.S. television industry was killed by three things, neither of which had much to do with wages. The first was American companies were still trying to sell "service" when the Japanese started selling "reliability." American companies touted the skill of their service people and how fast they responded. The Japanese showed up with products that did not need service. The second was the Japanese bought the U.S. television market by giving kickbacks to large retailers like Sears. The third was dumping. The Japanese companies sold product at less than cost to gain market. FWIW My "American" Daimler Chrysler Dodge Ram was built outside of Mexico city. I had no choice in that, but I am glad it was. The build is better than the ones built in the U.S. I have seen. Apparently Mexican workers value their jobs more than UAW members.

What you see are Model H700, not Model H, speakers. I have a pair two years older than these. Same tweeter and squawker as all the Heresys up through the early 80s. Woofer is a late cast frame variant of the Electrovoice SP12B. Can't see the network model in the pictures but I assume it is a type C because my 1965 and 1972 Heresys have type C. Although the woofer looks cooler that later woofers used in Heresys, IMHO it sounds just like the CTS and other woofers used in the later models. For a look at the same woofer in plain clothes, do a search on eBay for "Electro Voice SP12B." You should find some reddish brown cast aluminum or stamped steel frame woofers. They are the same thing. If any of the Heresys have better bass than the others, I think it would be the last ones. Now if the H700 had the SP12, which had a much bigger magnet than the SP12B, there might be a difference. But that is not the case. Are they rare? Not really. They show up from time to time on eBay. The original Heresy, the Model H (not the H700s you are considering), appears to be much rarer. It has a University tweeter and squawker driver, and less bass output than the H700 or later Heresys. But, I have seen a couple of these on eBay, too. Are they a good find? I always consider Heresys a good find at the right price. I bought my 1965 set on eBay for $185. If you looking for a set with Type C networks to Heresys you already have with Type C networks for a HT system, and the price is right, I would consider this a good find. If you are trying to match later Heresys with Type E or E2 networks, I would pass. FWIW one potential downside of purchasing speakers this old is that depending on the environment they have lived in the woofers may need to be reconed. New cones are no longer available for the SP12B from ElectroVoice. So, if it comes down to a recone, it will have to be with a generic cone.

Center channel is extremely important in HT. It has to be a good timbre match for the front left and right. IMHO your only good choices are going to be members of the Klipsch Heritage line speakers: Belle, LaScala, Cornwall, Heresy, etc. Assuming similar vintages, they all have the same tweeter and squawker driver. Differences are limited to crossover to woofer and relative efficiency. The closer you are to matching your Klipschorns, the better. But a Heresy can do a good job with a good subwoofer. Or you can just use phantom mode and forget the center channel if the Klipschorns are reasonably close together. IMHO your JBL monitor will not be a good match. If you are at all a critical listener, the difference in timbre between the Klipschorns and the JBL monitor may be very annoying. BTW you will need a good subwoofer for your HT, if you don't have one already.

Class A, B, G, etc. refer to the design of the output stage of the amplifier. Here is some info snipped from I forget where: CLASS OF OUTPUT.Class A amplifiers produce extremely linear replicas of the input signal, are inefficient, capable of extremely low distortion, run hot, are large and bulky and tend to be fairly low powered at a given price level. Class B Amplifiers employ output transistors that alternately turn on and off to amplify the positive and negative cycles of the total waveform. They are very efficient, run cool, but unless the output devices are very well-matched, can introduce a discontinuity called "switching distortion" to the output signal. Class AB amplifiers combine the advantages of both class A and B amps with none of the liabilities of either; they avoid switching distortions while achieving almost the same efficiency as a Class B amplifier. By far the most popular design, Class AB amps are often called by different proprietary names - "Dynamic Super Class A", "Hyperbolic Conversion Amplification", "Non - Switching" , "X-Balanced" and so forth. In Class D amplifiers, high frequency pulses carry the audio information. In Class G amplifier, low -power transistors handle the amplification most of the time, with high-power transistors switching only during peak signal demand. In Class H amplifier, two different supply voltages are switched in as required, depending on the size of the signal being amplified (Carver and Soundcraftsmen). A variation of Class H , Class "H+", is used by Technics in its line of receivers.

I use both because of my mix of equipment. I cannot tell the difference between toslink and coax with my equipment. I think the pros and cons of both have been covered in other posts recently. You might want to check the archives.

The degaussing circuit operates only for a few seconds after turning on the TV. You will see any improvement in that much time. I would not blame the TV if the shadow mask is magnetized. All color direct view sets have the same potential problem because of the steel shadow mask in the picture tube. Get a strong enough magnetic field close enough to the mask and you will have the problem. The degaussing circuits in the sets aren't really design to undo this kind of damage. So, you may need something more powerful. There is another potential problem. It is possible for stray magnetic field from the speaker to affect the picture even if it is not strong enough to magnetize the shadow mask. If this happens, the problem will go away, or change, when you move the speaker. Is it possible that the problem existed before you put the speaker on top of the set and just didn't notice it before? If so, there is another possible cause for this kind of distortion. Your set may just need alignment. If you have had the set for a long time, it is possible component values have drifted. In addition to that, sets are aligned at the factory based on a nominal magnetic field for the area in which they are to be sold. Unfortunately, almost nobody lives in this nominal magnetic field. Most get by OK. The farther your environment is from nominal, the worse the picture. Those who live near magnetic anomalies may have the worst pictures. The fix is to align the set where it is going to be watched. In the early days of color TV, when a service technician actually installed the set, this was part of the setup procedure.

Current trend seems to be to use standard full-range speakers matched to your fronts for the rears, not bipolar/dipolar speakers specifically designed for surround. In your case that would mean KSF 10.5s insetad of KSF-S5s. Don't know which would be easier to find on the used market. eBay is a good source for used Klipsch speakers, though. The pros and cons of the different types of speakers for the rear have been covered in other posts here. You can find them in the archives. IMHO you will be better off finding the appropriate KSFs than trying to use something out of the current lineup. That way you are guaranteed a good timbre match. Maybe someone who has gone on the same quest as you will chime in here with an acceptable alternative. FWIW I have 5 nearly identical speakers and a sub in my system and am quite pleased.

http://starkelectronic.com/gc9317.htm

The easiest way to degauss a picture tube is with the built in degaussing coil in the set. I think just about all sets nowadays have them. It gets powered up for a short time when you turn the set on. If that doesn't do the job, something more powerful is needed. A bulk tape eraser moved quickly back and forth across the screen can sometimes do the job. Otherwise, you may need to use a degaussing coil purpose built for the job. They are not much more than a coil of wire plugged into the wall outlet. Used to be a standard tool of the trade among color TV techs. Don't know how common it is today. Don't know where you can get one. You could roll your own, but I don't have the specs. There is one other way to degauss a picture tube. But I don't think anyone would want to use it. Hit it real hard. Anything that has been magnetized can be demagnetized by hitting it hard enough.

I didn't see any tweeters in what you were bidding on. Do you have them already?

Sounds to me like you may have magnetized part of the shadow mask on your picture tube. Perhaps one of the woofer magnets came close to that spot when you were placing the speaker on top of the set. As TheEAR points out, they are very well shielded. But the shielding is not absolute. And, it doesn't take much of a magnetic field in the right place to cause a problem. I have seen a child do this by trying to stick a small refrigerator magnet on the screen. Your TV's degaussing circuit may take care of it over time. Or you may need to degauss the tube. BTW aluminum foil won't help you with magnetic fields.

Gee, I really don't want to defend the Russians, but... The 40 or so 5' x 5' sheets of Russian baltic birch I've used over the last year were just fine. In fact, it is great stuff. I ran into no voids. All core plys appear to have been plugged per specification. There was no filling on the edges. Face veneer generally greatly exceeded minimum specification for grade. IMHO baltic birch plywood, whether from Russia, or any of the other baltic countries that make it, is great stuff for building speakers, furniture, cabinets, etc. It is an excellent substrate for veneer. All plies are birch, making it much denser than American "birch" plywood which has a core of other wood. Also, core plys are plugged, making it much more consistent. Except for a few other types of plywood, like "Appleply", most plywood has voids and core plys that are not the same as the face veneer. MDF is a bit better sonically, but not so good structurally. Does anyone know for a fact that Klipsch used baltic birch in any of their speakers? It doesn't seem so to me, at least for Heresys. All 8 of mine appear to be made out of American plywood. The plys are thicker and fewer for the same panel thickness than all the baltic birch I have seen. FWIW American 1/2" plywood is not 1/2" thick, not is American 3/4" plywood 3/4" thick. More like 15/32" and 23/32", nomimally. And it varies a bit on either side of that for various reasons, as does metric plywood.

Sequential serial numbers are meaningless except for pairs built with matching veneer. It is quite common to find a set without sequential serial numbers. I have four pairs of Heresys. Two of them have sequential serial numbers. But the one set I bought new, and the dealer had to order from Klipsch, does not. What is important is that the tweeters, squawker drivers and woofers match. And with Cornwalls, you want to pay attention to the orientation of the squawker and tweeter. Some were horizontal, some vertical.

There is only one part to replace. The diaphragm, the voice coil, and the wires that connect to the terminals are one piece. There is paper spacer/washer that you will need to re-use. So make sure you remove it from the old diaphragm if it sticks. That is about all there is to it. Good luck!

ProLogic II decoders do have significant advantages over ProLogic. The biggest one is full range stereo rear channel sound instead of 7 kHz wide mono when playing back ProLogic encoded signals. ProLogic encoded analog TV programs with significant surround sound, like action movies, will sound better. ProLogic II also gives you more control over what you hear when playing back stereo recordings through your surround system. The idea here is that they were never mastered for playback through a surround system, so you might have to tweak the signal to make it sound good. But then, you can always listen to the recording in stereo mode and hear what was intended by the recording engineer. So, it all really depends on what you are listening to. ProLogic II is not a big deal for me. We are in a digital age. DVD, satellite TV, OTA DTV sound is digital. Audio is going digital with DVD-A and SACD. The price difference would make it a no-brainer for me. But that is based on my listening habits. If ProLogic encoded analog TV is a big part of your listening, I would suggest that you listen to both receivers in your listening environment before making the choice, if you can.

Solen is a good source for capacitors and inductors. There are in Canada I believe.

Assuming you can solder, you should be able to replace a diaphragm fairly easily. It is pretty much self aligning. Main thing to keep in mind is to be very careful with the diaphragm when handling and inserting in the magnet assembly. The voice coil is very fragile and easily damaged. If it is bent, it will rub or jam in the gap, and you will be right back where you started. Same diaphragm goes in T35, T35A, T350, K77 and K77-M. K77 and K77-M are just Klipsch branded T35As.

http://www.simplyspeakers.com/12diaphragms.htm