Correct ReCone kits for EV15WK woofers (16 ohm impedance/DC resistance 3.5 ohm)

[Restoman]

Has anyone else had any luck with trying to find the correct cone kits for EV15WK woofers. I am restoring a pair of Georgian speakers and even though the 15WK's are still working they are really showing the age of 50 yrs.

I figure that if I am going through all the trouble of resealing and painting the K-horn bass bins and rebuilding the cross overs I may as well do it right and recone the 15WK units for a complete rebuild.

[LarryC]

How are they showing their age? Do they perform OK?

I looked into reconing 15WK's several years ago because one of a pair I bought on Ebay had a small tear in the cone. Unfortunately, EV recone kits had long been unavailable. I found someone who had generic non-original kits in 4-ohm and 16-ohm incarnations. The 4-ohm was called "horn only," which would have been for K-horn bass horn use.

However, the original 15WK is a powerful, well-built unit with a super-quality cone, and the unit with the tear sounded identical to the other one (I didn't install in a horn baffle to test it). The person I sold them to probably used a mending dope rather than re-cone.

I'd say this: if cosmetics are the only issue and they sound really good, I would just keep them as is. My 15WK's sounded extraordinary after 50 years. They and their cones are too special to mess with IMO.

[Restoman]

The edge surround which is corrugated shaped paper has some mildew on it and coakroaches or silver fish kind of ate some of the top layer of paper off of some parts of the edge. One of the 15WK's had a very small tear on the edge which I was able to fix and is hardly noticeable. I may be able to get away with just coating the edge with some flexible edge damping compound or cloth surround flex coating just to help them hold together better until I can figure out whether to replace them or find the correct recone parts.

When I carefully push on the cone it moves up and down without any clearance issues on the voice coil. I measured the DC resistance of both units and it measures out at 3.5 - 3.6 ohms so that is correct for 15WK's.

EV currently has a recone kit for the 15W (not 15WK) 16 ohm but I do not think it is the voice coil that has 3.5 ohm DC resistance. I could very carefully just use the paper cone and retain the original voice coils but that would be a very delicate operation to separate the original cones from the voice coils as they are glued with red epoxy.

I used to recone JBL and EV woofers for a local pro-sound company back in my younger day so I can recone them myself as long as I can get the correct components. I used to work for Bose repairing their 301, 901 speakers too.

[Don Richard]

A friend got a pair that had rodent damage reconed at Orange County Loudspeakers two yeard ago. They sound great in an EV Georgian (later EV design) cabinet with Klipsch tops and Type A crossover.

[Restoman]

Thanks for your reply---I'll ask them if they have the right cone kits. For everyone else out there looking for EV15WK recone I have some research info that may help.

EV has a cone kit PN 8516XX , however they do not answer my question concerning the voice coil. The EV 8516XX is supposed to be for a EV15W woofer. The cone and voice coil dimensions of the 15W and the 15WK are exactly the same (15 1/8 in cone diam. with 9 in depth and 2 1/2 in diam VC) . The only difference is the VC for a 15W is 11.6 ohm DC resistance versus the 15WK which is 3.2 ohms. They both have impedance of 16 ohms.

The other confusing thing is that over the years EV changed part numbers a lot. My current 15WK woofers have the number 7270 in white printed on the back side of the cones. They do measure 3.5 ohm on my Fluke DVM.

I also found EV PN 79629B for a cone kit and also EV PN 71157B----all of these are supposed to fit the 15WK but I cannot get any detailed specs from them to confirm correct parts.

Considering that they want 90.00 for each cone kit you would want to make sure that you can at least have the correct paper cone and VC diam. Consider this option---I once had to do this for a JBL driver for a friend that had a woofer that was torn all the way around on the paper cone but the VC and spider was otherwise intact. I had to very carefully cut away the cone from the VC and reglue a new paper cone that my friend already had. This worked and the speaker operated like new. This was done out desperation as he did not want to spend any money on a new cone kit because he already had a cone with no VC parts.

[LarryC]

This worked and the speaker operated like new.

While getting wrapped up in voice coil DCR and impedances, I would worry if I were reconing about whether a speaker reconed with some replacement paper really would work as well as new. The 15WK is a case in point -- the midrange on these is incredibly clear and musically natural-sounding. This seems to me to be very important, since 15WK's were crossed over as high as 400 Hz, 600 Hz, or even 1000 HZ in Klipsch applications.

Think about that -- 400 Hz is a full half-octave (a perfect fifth) above middle C on the piano, and 1000 Hz is the soprano's high C, which sounds pretty far up as musical notes go. And remember, these notes are not just fundamentals; these frequencies define notes, timbre, and the instruments themselves in bass and mid-range instruments and voices.

I'd like to know how a reconed unit sounds compared to the original if I could have a choice.