BELLE KLIPSCH INFO WANTED - serial #'s, date & cross-over info, etc.

[Vintage Stereos]

Greetings to all members of this great

forum site. I am a new member. I just acquired a set of

Belle Klipsch speakers. I am totally amazed with the sound

quality, and the effiency is simply unbelieveable. I have had

some great speakers in the past, but these Klipsch are the ultimate. My

previous sets included JBL L150, Dynaco A50, AR58s & Rega's, etc,

etc.

I would really appreciate it if someone could give me some info and any

thoughts on the ones that I have. I have read about

different crossovers & pre 1985 production, etc. Which are

considered the best?

I purchased them from the original owner. They are in MINT

condition - yes, a mint set of Belles!!! He said he bought them

new 17 years ago (estimate). They were bought as a pair for $3600

Canadian. He even had the original boxes until 3 years ago. He

just got tired of storing them & had no intentions at the time of

selling the speakers - but his wife's larger chesterfield won

out!! I told him I would make room for them, even if I had to use

a hammock!! One of the serial # tags is missing, but the other one has

the serial # 8538979. Would I be correct in assuming they are

1985 models? They have the AB x-overs. The cabinets are

oiled walnut.

Thanks in advance

[Gilbert]

Congratulations on your Belles purchase. They are in my opinion the prettiest of the Heritage family. I can't answer for the AB crossovers, because I have no experience with the Belle, but if you want to have them rebuilt or buy some custom jobbers you came to the right place.

Look for BEC, DeanG or Al to help you out in that regard. I believe Popbumper also builds custom crossovers, but I'm not sure if he does any for the Belle.

Anyway, congrat's again, and enjoy your new Belles.

[Mike Lindsey]

Yep... those are 85's...

KLIPSCH S/N FORMATS

DATES<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

DESCRIPTION

EXAMPLE

1946-1947

###

001 (ending #021)

1948-1961

####

0121 (starting #0121)

1962-1983

##letter####

20Y1234

1984-1989(?)

YY WW ####

89281234

1990-1997(?)

DOY Y2Y1 ####

135791234

1998-2000

YY WW ####

00281234

1962-1983 Letter format

A = 1962

F = 1967

K = 1972

R = 1977

X = 1982

B = 1963

G = 1968

L = 1973

S = 1978

Y = 1983

C = 1964

H = 1969

M = 1974

T = 1979

D = 1965

I = 1970

N = 1975

U = 1980

E = 1966

J = 1971

P = 1976

W = 1981

NOTES

1946-1961 dates can only be found in log book (eng. Library)

DOY = day of the year
YY = year (i.e. 99,00)
Y2Y1 = 2nd digit of year, 1st digit of year
WW = week of the year

Date code on drivers (1994) Example - 9429 = 1994, 29th week of the year / YYWW

Klipschorns of this vintage had the s/n hammer stamped into the tailboard, woofer access door or inside the woofer chamber.

Mike

PS.... Welcome to the Forum

Edit: The AB is of the same family as the AL (La Scala) and AK (Klipschorn), and is generally regarded as the red-headed stepchild of all of Klipsch's crossover networks. You can gain major improvements by replacing those with others that are built by a few of our members here. However, get familiar with the stockers so you have a benchmark to compare to.

[WMcD]

Congratulations on the find. I have a pair of Belle's too, but with AA. They are, in my view, the most beautiful of the Heritage.

Here is a schematic of the AB which Trey C. sent me. I was thinking that when the K-Horn got a much more sophisicated X-over maybe the Belle did also. I don't know whether it ever happened.

None the less, there are some interesting things in the AB.

1) The tweeter section is like one of the older redesign of the K-Horn. A third order with a Zobel.

2) The bass is running wide open with no filtering at all. In an interview PWK had mentioned that he ran K-Horn bass units like this and that "it is worth a few dB." Therefore, there is no reason to believe it is a compromise.

3) As you may know, the Belle is using a K-500 midrange horn which is a bit shorter than the K-400 in the K-Horn or LaScala and has a smaller mouth (big end). It has to be because the cabinet is about 18 deep.

The midrange x-over is basically a second order to roll of the lower end. But then we have the inductor in parallel with resistor. It is tough to tell the effect with accuracy without running it on a circuit simulator. It looks to me that the resistor is knocking down the entire band pass by a dB or so except the inductor maintains the lower frequencies,

Best,

Gil

[BEC]

The Belle, LaScala and Khorn all shared the type AA crossover. For a time with the AB crossover the Belle had its own that was not shared. With the advent of the AL-3 (Lascala), AK-3 (Khorn) and AB-2 for the Belle, again the three speakers shared the same design for crossovers with minor differences in woofer cap values.

Bob Crites

AB-2 schematic

[fini]

Can someone provide the dimensions of Belle Klipsch? Was she as short as Miss Valerie?

[JohnA]

Can someone provide the dimensions of Belle Klipsch? Was she as short as Miss Valerie?

Fini,

Even if I knew, I wouldn't tough that one! []

[Al Klappenberger]

Vintage,

The Belle is the best of the heritage series in my book. I own 3 of them! But they can be improved.

The bigest bottleneck is the squawker horn. It should be upgraded to my Trachorns or with Altec 811b horns ASAP. That improvement will be a jaw-dropper!

The other is the crossover. The AB is the least desirable of the crossovers put in the Belle over the years. It is reverse equalized in an attempt to compensate for the squawker horn and it runs the woofer full range. This puts the crossover very high. The only good thing about it is the tweeter filter that is actually extreme-slope. I would replace it with my AP12-500 and ES5800 network sets. The AA would also be an improvement, but not much of one since it's tweeter filter is a poor design.

BTW: Leave the K33 woofer and the K55M squawker drivers alone. They are fine. The last thing to upgrade is the K77M tweeter for something better. The Crites tweeter is Ok, but do that last.

AL K.