What speaker is best for a Leslie 122?

[God's element]

Hello everyone,

I have a modified Leslie 122 hooked up to a Hammond A102(same as B-3). The Leslie has a 250watt sub amp to drive the 15" speaker. There is an EV SRO installed in it now. What JBL speaker would sound best a Leslie.


thanks everyone,

[chad]

Hammond.... Leslie... ((((mmmm)))) ear candy!!! A 15 for the Leslie? I'd recommend the E-140.

[moldyoldy]

I'm guessing an E145 might be a good JBL to try, but I don't know my JBL drivers near as well as most others here. Perhaps if we give them more details, they could make better recomendations.

The 122 Leslie has a LF enclosure volume of approx. 5 cubic feet, which is vented. The 15" must tolerate downfiring. The acoustic load is modified by the placement of a rotating scooped drum (often misconstrued as a horn)below the speaker, in the baffle cutout, which imparts amplitude modulation to the LF. The load is modified further, as the combined output of the drum and vent must exit the cab via narrow slots on the lower front and sides. The low pedal on a Hammond is 32Hz, and the standard XO is 800Hz at 12dB/octave.

Don't forget that the Leslie is an effect, intended to modify the sound of the organ, not merely reproduce it. This means you don't have to follow any rules, other than those of physics. If you want it to have the traditional "Leslie sound" you need to install a Jensen P15LL, and revert to the original tube amp. If you want to create your own sound, experiment to your hearts content. That's the beauty of being a musician, you can pretty well do whatever the heck you want!

[jim campbell]

i believe that there are some brand new e 145's for sale on this forum (no affiliation) and if you go that way probably worth a look

[boputnam]

...The load is modified further, as the combined output of the drum and vent must exit the cab via narrow slots on the lower front and sides. ...Except in the most common case of cabinets having the entire back removed! :applaud:

Great post. Nice to hear from someone knowlegable about Leslies.

FWIW, I've replaced blown / ruined Jensens with K140's and had great results.

[hapy._.face]

Man, I love the Leslie. I've heard it modded so many ways, and the end result is still usually pretty good. I tried to build one in High School and I ignored a few basic principles- THAT one didn't sound too good! I'd say as long as you abide by the basic rules that Moldy outlined in his post- EXPERIMENT! :D

I had the unique fortune of meeting Charlie Hunter last summer, as he is a friend of a friend. Super nice guy, btw. He kicks it my friend's house at least once a year, and they smoke it up and trade licks.:p

Charlie is a diehard Leslie fanatic and I know for a fact he uses a myriad of JBL drivers in some of his setups. I asked him about his Leslie fascination and he says he owns more Leslie cabs than he cares to count (not sure how many that is).... Of course, this is jazz guitar we're talking about. I might be able to find out what model he prefers, if it is of interest to anyone.

K140 sounds like an obvious choice, though. Just curious, would a D130 or E140 work, also?

[moldyoldy]

Except in the most common case of cabinets having the entire back removed! :applaud:

Great post. Nice to hear from someone knowlegable about Leslies.

FWIW, I've replaced blown / ruined Jensens with K140's and had great results.


Backless Leslies are (too) common, which brings up the most important part of a Leslie's sound, how and where it's setup. Placement
has more effect on the sound than anything else you can do. Also, you'll never get one to sound the same at all listening locations. You can tune a backless Leslie by varying the gap between it and the wall, the same way Hammond did with their own tone cabinets (BTW many Hammond TCs are better than a 122 Leslie at kicking out the lows, and they did it with 9 closely-spaced 10" Jensens in a backless cab and crossed actively at 200Hz with tubes). It's amazing how much difference is achieved by moving the speaker to/from the wall as little as 1/4" makes. Most owners either didn't read this in the manual, and no one told them, so those cabinets have had a bad rap for years. My personal favorite Hammond setup is an ensemble configuration with a 122 Leslie and an HR40 Hammond. The bass fills out, you have a reverb option, 40 additional watts, and...well...it finds my personal resonant frequency.

Wait till you try to stereo mic a Leslie.....



I'm sure some of the readers have scratched their heads over the basic nature of the specs I described, realizing that it just won't work the way I described it. Thanks to all for not calling me names, I just described the beast, but didn't design it.....ol' Don Leslie had quite an imagination.


Yes, there's usable response down to the low C, but it's been falling for the last octave...it ain't the Jensens' fault, just the laws of physics and size. You can put a 1000W sub in a Leslie box, and when you go much beyond the LF acoustic output of the original, about all you'll notice is how quickly your cab is falling apart. The solution? Add a standard MI sub in another box to handle the lowest octave. If you're a bass-sadist, insert a subharmonic synthesizer at preamp level....or install the tube equivalent of one with parts from an RT3...don't be surprised to find that after all your efforts you decide that although you can rattle the china, that last octave just ain't very musical.

Whatever driver you use, ensure that the frame gasket is thick enough to keep long excursions from slapping the drum bearing support, and subtract the amount of sag caused by downfiring from the max allowable excursion (a good reason to get the backs on the Leslie...reduce xmax). Most 122s with different 15s I've seen all needed thicker front gaskets (and backs on the cabs) than std., you could hear them slap when the pedal went down....

[God's element]

Awsome info guys!!!

My Lesile amp is configured as follows: Original 40watt amp is dedicated to feed the upper horn driver, a line out from the original amp connects to the 250watt amp, XO is at 800MHZ, installed a seperate volume pot for the lower and upper driver, replace the Jenson horn driver with an Atlas PD-60. Ok, this Leslie is a beast :applaud:. I felt like I wasn't getting enough volume on stage with a stock Leslie. Not anymore. I used to have the Volume up way past the stock configuration, but the lower baffle started to become unglued. I used Gorilla Glue on it and man, that stuff really works! Lately, I use my extra wattage just to achieve the volume I need and nothing more.

The vintage EV SRO sounds great but some people swear by JBL and tell me to give them a try. What is the difference between the E-140 and K-140 and can they handle a 250watt amp?

Thanks everyone. I've learned a lot from this thread so far. :)

joe

[edgewound]

E140, E145. The E140 is probably a better choice from the ease of installation standpoint. It really wakes up a leslie...almost viscerally. Band I played in..in the 1980's...we carried (2) Leslies, one for backup...one had a Gauss with aluminum dustcap the other had an E140...they both ROCKED:applaud:

K140 is alnico, E140 is ceramic. Both can handle 200 watts sinewave, 400 watts pink noise if assembled with E140 cone assembly. If the cone has no backloading(open cabinet) cut the power handling in half.

[toddalin]

I seem to recall that both my Leslie 122RV and 147RV had CTS woofers. If not that, they were Emmenance. I certainly remember the big square magnets.

At one time I had the 15" on my later Leslie (don't remember the model # but Hammond was an H134 as I recall and this one used rotating Jensen 6"x9s" up top) and I used the 15" in conjunction with my sub. When I unplugged the 1/4" phone jack, it reverted to the organ.

BTW, at one time Leslie made speakers for home stereos. I don't know if they had any rotating elements.

[moldyoldy]

(snip)BTW, at one time Leslie made speakers for home stereos. I don't know if they had any rotating elements.

Wow, I'll never have another opportunity to bring THESE up.....
Remember all the different ways there were in the '70s to add synthesized quadrophonic to your old stereo?
I've got a pair of '74 Leslie Quad Plus Two's. They are similar cabs to the few other Leslies Todd mentioned for home stereo use, ~ 6cu/ft, veneered, grillcloth fronts, only these also have 122-style side-slots down low. Any resemblance to a traditional speaker ends there. Inside each cab;
1-60W SS amp
1-800Hz XO
1-Jensen C12N, downfiring into a single-speed rotating foam drum, then out the side slots.
1-Jensen 2x8 exp. horn, mounted vertically in the front baffle.
1-motor-driven "space generator", to introduce regular phase and frequency anomalies to the HF. The Leslie space generator was their attempt to achieve rotary vibrato from a fixed driver.
You're supposed to plug the Leslies into each other, and also into your existing stereo's 'phones jack, while leaving your old speakers active. The Leslies mechanically introduced LF wavering amplitude, and the HF...well...it was funkified too. I think they were only produced the one year, though Leslie continued to keep a model or two of 'regular' home stereo speakers in their yearly lineups.
I've never had the guts or desire to play any recordings through these as they were intended. I rewired them for mono, and substituted a different space generator from a 102 in place of both the original units. The 102 space generator (also mechanical) can give a convincing rotary effect from 2 HF drivers fixed in different cabs, not a true doppler vibrato, more of a ping-pong effect. You oughta here what these lightly-modified freaks do to my Wurly electric piano....bad!to!the!bone!....Ray would have loved it, RIP.

[moldyoldy]

Here's a couple of pics of the Quad Plus Two. The observant will note the Altec 417 in place of the C12N, and that the space generator is not in place. The cabs do have back panels. The 417s were only in there a few days, they now reside in a Marshall cab, and the C12Ns went back in the Leslies.

[God's element]

What a fine pair of twins. I would love to find something like that at a garge sale.

[toddalin]

These are the cabinets I remember. It's interesting that the woofer rotating baffle slopes both ways so sound is emitted from both sides simultaneously. On the organ speakers, the baffle slopes only one way and my Leslies (122 and 147) were of a thin veneer(?) rather than foam. I guess that may have been a bit much for home stereo. Also most people are unaware that the top rotating horn on the 122/147 and their varients is only open on one side that the other side is only there for balance.

With a little modification, Leslie amps could make nice tube amps for stereo. As I recall, they had dual 6550s and I always preferred these to the 6L6GCs.


Here's a couple of pics of the Quad Plus Two. The observant will note the Altec 417 in place of the C12N, and that the space generator is not in place. The cabs do have back panels. The 417s were only in there a few days, they now reside in a Marshall cab, and the C12Ns went back in the Leslies.

[moldyoldy]

Sometime around '70, Leslie made the wise decision to use injected foam rotors, and retired the plywood construction. Even though we all prefer to see that big, wooden cattle chute spinning around, the foam was an improvement in every respect. On some models, including the quads, the rotors have 2 outlets, and are run at half the normal RPM. To me, the AM is more intense with duals, if you place them right you can play the direct sound against the reflected to get what you like.

You can't do that succesfully with the HF though, as you noted, all the HF rotors are single outlet. Don's original intent with the Leslie speaker was mainly to add a vibrato effect (FM) to an organ speaker. With the HF, the single-exit spinning horn rapidly moves the wave source about 20 inches in relation to the listener. At these wavelengths, this motion gives the Doppler effect to the sound, not unlike that of hearing a train's horn increase in pitch as it nears, and decrease as it passes. To do that with the LF, you'd need...well... a train, so we settle for some amplitude modulation of the lows. The inevitable evolution of the concept resulted in the modern version, which still uses a similar mech horn for the HF, but the LF AM is done in the amp, and played through a fixed speaker.

Joe, it sounds like Bo and Edgewound have experience with JBLs in Leslies, so it looks like an E/K 140/145, all of which should handle your amp, assuming you select the right impedance. 'wound raises a good point, regarding ease of mtg. There's little extra room, especially for diameter. If the cone can travel beyond the gasket face, you need to shim the mount to prevent that. If theres any difference in size in the suggedted models, I'd go with the one that fits best.

[God's element]

Thanks for the info everyone. I'm going to get an E140 and try it out. It will be nice to A/B the ev SRO and evm 15b against the JBL E140 since all three are concidered the best 15" speakers ever made.


thanks everyone,

joseph

[moldyoldy]

If you find the 122 box tuning unsatisfactory for your new 15, you can cut a new center back panel, and do whatever vent/port suits your fancy out the back. If you do this, you'll want to block off the old vent (the triangular opening in the corner of the 15" baffle). There's a "leak" at the motor shaft penetration that might be worthy of sealing too, you might find a shaft seal of the right dims if lucky.


Since your Atlas HF driver is a sealed unit, it can coexist in the same compartment with a powerful 15. For the benefit of others that might read this thread, if you upgrade to a more powerful 15, but want to keep the old Jensen V20 or V21 HF driver in place, you'll need to devise a way to seal it off from the rest of the LF box. The voice coil gap in the V20 and V21 goes clear to the back, and is merely sealed against debris with a thin felt ring glued in from the back. Any LF that seeps through that felt ring will play hell with that NLA phenolic diaphragm. I built a small wood box to enclose both of mine, even though I use the stock amp and drivers.


The V21s open gap can be a blessing too, removing the felt simplifies gap cleaning, and when replacing a diaphragm, you can insert shims from the back to center it, instead of buzzing it in. The VC on the only available replacement diaphragm is actually placed on the former a tiny bit too deep, which can be corrected by using the proper-thickness gasket under the 'phragm. Measuring the former depth from the backside will let you know when it's right. Reglue the felt ring in when you're done.


Sorry everyone, I know that very little I posted in this thread has to do with Lansing Heritage, I merely thought it might be of help and interest. I'll understand if it gets deleted in the interest of storage.

[hapy._.face]

Sorry everyone, I know that very little I posted in this thread has to do with Lansing Heritage, I merely thought it might be of help and interest. I'll understand if it gets deleted in the interest of storage.

Are you kidding!? I'm glad you posted it.

[God's element]

Thanks moldyoldy :applaud:

[Zilch]

http://cgi.ebay.com/RARE-Leslie-DVX-570-home-speakers-jbl-macintosh-NR_W0QQitemZ9704284149QQcategoryZ50597QQrdZ1QQcmdZ ViewItem

[Fluxbuba]

I just want to point out with respect to the open back modification to a Leslie cabinet, that usually the lower back (and upper back on a Leslie with a HF horn) are removed and the Leslie is turned back-side-front. This is done to improve projection on stage. The center back panel is kept in place. If you remove the center back, besides drastically altering backloading, you also negate or at least reduce the Leslie effect from the LF driver.

[whizzer]

Except in the most common case of cabinets having the entire back removed! :applaud:

Great post. Nice to hear from someone knowlegable about Leslies.

FWIW, I've replaced blown / ruined Jensens with K140's and had great results.
I, too, have replaced blown Jensen's with K-140's with results the keyboard wizards themselves have found quite satisfying. The only thing is, the rotating drum will sometimes "ripple" during powerful passages in a manner reminiscent of a drag slick under torque. The actual sound, however, does not seem degraded by this behavior, but I sometimes wondered if mechanical failure might be a possibility.

[bigstereo]

Guys, I am fascinated by all of this. I have to tell a story to get to my question........

Back in 1977 as a US Marine, we were deployed on ships in the Western Pacific. We tied up in Subic Bay, Phillippines for about a month, and the main street in town was wall to wall nightclubs. (some of you may know of this place and some may have been there also, nuff said) Almost every one of them had a band.
In this particular club I hung out in nightly, (the Sierra Club) the band had a box up on the stage that appeared to be a speaker of which I had never seen anything like it before. It had a double horn in the top of the cabinet that rotated at variable speeds it seems. I was fascinated by it and never forgot about it.
Could this have been a Leslie?

RJ

[bigstereo]

http://cgi.ebay.com/Leslie-Speaker-Model-740-Vintage-in-Cabinet-No-Reserve_W0QQitemZ7414593536QQcategoryZ64430QQssPag eNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Sorry I screwed the last one up. Tried to post a link. Deleted. I think I just answered my own question.

[Earl K]

YES,

- That's a Leslie . They made quite a few models / & I'm far from an expert on them / though I spent many years lifting them into and out of clubs .
- Great device / made the Hammond ( organ ) come alive.

<> :)

ps ; I saw the Sabres kick Montreals butt back at Easter ( in Montreal , at the Bell Centre / "comped" tickets ). They certainly had the look of a championship team that Sat. evening. I could easily see the Stanley Cup going to Buffalo . :D

[toddalin]

YES,

- That's a Leslie . They made quite a few models / & I'm far from an expert on them / though I spent many years lifting them into and out of clubs .
- Great device / made the Hammond ( organ ) come alive.

<> :)

ps ; I saw the Sabres kick Montreals butt back at Easter ( in Montreal , at the Bell Centre / "comped" tickets ). They certainly had the look of a championship team that Sat. evening. I could easily see the Stanley Cup going to Buffalo . :D

The most popular, and probably valuable models now are the Leslie 122 and 147. Slightly smaller versions were offered (I think 120 and 145) that only reduced the size of the woofer chamber, reducing deep bass output. They all used Jensen horn drivers and either CTS or Eminance 15" woofers. The amps were 40 watts and used two 6550s in a push-pull design. I think they were crossed over at 800 Hz.

The 122s were the favored version for the B3, C3, M3, etc. Hammonds that only had a single channel. Some of the later Hammonds (e.g., H) that typically had internal speakers, used multi-channel models with other stationary speakers, typically 6x9 Jensens. These were typically more for specific models and most didn't have the rotating Jensen horn, but did rotate a couple Jensen 6x9s. Some of these didn't use a rotating baffle for the woofer.

The 147 is like the 122 but has a slightly different preamp front end. The 147s were often used with the combo foot switch that would allow for any common 1/4" jack source, such as a guitar or portable organ. The foot switches were offered with two or fout input channels, each with its own volume control.

I had a modified Hammond D (originally looked like a C) that had been cut down by Valley Sound in Burbank with percussion added. I had a Leslie 122RV (a 122 with an additional 16 watt tube amp and a Jensen 6x9 for reverb). Before the Hammond was modified, I picked up a 147RV with the two channel combo foot switch. I removed the 122 amp and 147 amp and using the 147 as a guide, made the necessary changes to the 122 amp to drive it off the foot switch also. Most of this was actually removing parts from the amp with some wiring changes. I also had to make up a relay box as the foot switch could not carry enough current to run all of the amps and motor drives. Leslie also offers a relay box for this. This allowed Valley Sound to "gut" the Hammond of all its elecronics retaining only the tone wheel mechanism thererby reducing weight. The tone wheels are simple gears with varing numbers of teeth that are spun infront of a coil that can be adjusted relative to the gear. When Vally Sound was done, two people could move the organ.;)

Hammond invented the synchronous clock that locked onto the 60 cycle phasing to keep accurate time. This technology was then applied to his organs. That's why real Hammonds have "start" and "run" switches.:D

http://www.jimlaabs.com/auctions/organs/organ-hammondc3-7.jpg

[Earl K]

Neat info Todd ! ( somewhere around here I have cut-sheets on the 122 & the 147 ).

BTW ; Thanks for the invite to your place / I've always loved trains / I grew up behind a railway track / was quite saddened ( even as a young gaffer ) when the CPR stopped using steam locomotives .

:)

[SKOOTUR]

wow i was happy to run across this thread. i was originally just going to ask the same question about replacement drivers,but you guys got me fired up now lol. btw i like trains too. i have recently been trying to learn about the organs and leslie's myself. we have an xk2 & 122 i think. the one speaker don't cut it. after all the reading to this point i decided i might want to custom build a leslie like speaker so JBL came to mind. this is all new on the drawing board today lol. i'm thinking about doing a cabinet with dual hf tremolo stacked one on another. i know the hf is around 6k ish for the organs. havn't decided if one tremolo horn would be for hf and the other for mf or both just hf. then the lf will be a 15 or 18". each driver will have it's own compartment of course. i would like to keep the backs on so probably just open the ventings more. i was thinking maybe an extra port tube for the lows,but didn't know if it would make it sound good or bad lol. i want this thing to be an attention getter. i will probably run 2 amps,one bridged for low unless i go duel lows. and one dual channel for both hf's. i figure 300-500 watts for lf and around 100-150 ish on the hf's. does anyone have any suggestions for what kind of compression drivers to use for hf and appropriate woofer. i could build the cabinet to match the lf for whatever volume it would be. then i was wanting to keep the tube system in,but adapt it by possibly changing tubes to lower wattage and maybe some form of di system. if anyone has any suggestions or can point me in the right direction would be awesome. i thoroughly enjoyed reading everyone's comments to this point. thanks in advance and have a great day!!! :bouncy:

[toddalin]

As you say, high frequency for an organ isn't all that high, and if you put an old Hammond through a high fidelity system, the "key click" from keying on a transient will drive you crazy (or you may love that click sound characteric).

If you want to produce some real volume you could use a 375 driver and that would probably give enough high frequency for the old Hammond sound. (Maybe your model doesn't use a tone wheel and does the highs without the click?)

But it may be easier to rotate the horn by finding a rotating horn from an existing Leslie. In which case, the original used a Jensen driver. I remember home-made Leslies in the late 60s that used Leslie parts.

I think that the JBL LE175 would actually be the best driver for this application. It has the same efficiency as the LE85 with a little less high end and it comes at a better price and availability in a smaller package. The originals were crossed over at 800 Hz. and that should be OK with any of these JBLs too.

Slap it under one of these horns common on e-pay, and you have a Leslie.

http://i16.ebayimg.com/03/i/08/29/69/f9_1.JPG

A D140/K140 would do well for the bass. Like the horns, the drums and motors are readily available on evil-bay.

Or, why not try to find a Leslie 900 or 825 or such? Some of these actually came with JBLs and were rated at 100+ watts (as opposed to the Leslie's 40 watts) but may have been solid state.

Hot rodded Leslies are also on e-pay.

[SKOOTUR]

thanks for the input toddalin. right now the organ is a hammond xk2 which is newer electronic technology. i don't play myself,but i run the sound for church. eventually they will probably get an xk3 which is a little nicer. i know the minister of music would rather have the hammond b3 though,maybe one day. that's why i'm trying to educate myself on these things.i feel i have the ability to repair these things when they break if i learn about them. i'm currently visiting here on the westcoast so don't have access the the model leslie,but i think it's a 122. since i don't play organ this is a project/learning experience i'm taking on myself seperate of the church. i plan to find broken leslies for parts and on the internet/local like you suggested to build what i want. if i get it to work then i will donate it and possibly make a matching 2nd one for each side of the building. i don't think the 2 models you mentioned will do what i want. the hotrodded ones i ran across don't sound like they will have the oomph i want which is leading me to want to build one. i want to keep the original tube amp as a preamp to help keep some of the tube sound then will be adapted to solidstate amps. so the tube amp will have to be detuned or make a way to absorb excess power before going into any effects or highpower amps. i would imagine when i'm done the cabinet will probably double to hold everything and match the Lf . i want the speaker to generate as much natural organ sound with minimal distortion as possible and fill the room without having to send as much through the house system. i have to run more organ through the mixing board more than i like because it gets drowned out. the db's generally are in the mid to high 90's and many times run over 100db near the back part of building. there's pros and cons i guess no matter what one does,but looks like this is what i have to do to get the results i want. the current leslie speaker sounds good,but distorts way too easy on bass notes. when the organ hits bass notes i want you to feel it and sound good outside of normal distortion. so this thing will be a heavy duty powerhouse if i can make it work out. thanks. :D

[SKOOTUR]

i forgot to add in last post that since i won't be using the tube amp as a final output which i believe uses 16 ohm loads. i intend to use the original tube amp as a preamp just to change the sound before it goes into the solidstate amps. some recommendations may not be correct if one was to think i needed or wanted original like driver application. the final stage output will be high power electronic solidstate which could run 4 to 8 ohms depending on how it gets set up. i havn't decided yet if i will run dual Lf drivers or one. i'm just in the idea research stage right now. thanks all.
:bouncy:

[toddalin]

If you want to "feel" the sound, maybe try a W15GTI for the bass. And to really "plumb the depths," maybe put the signal through a dBX subharmonic synthesizer.

The W15GTI goes lower, louder than any of the other JBL 15's and is rated at 700 wrms (5,000 wpeak). I use this combination (pushed by a dBX/Crown PSA-2xh) for my home theater sub and it rocks. Also, the W15GTI can be used in a smaller cabinet than the other 15's.

[Bob Womack]

A point to be made is that part of the natural sound of a B-3& Leslie in pop music and in much of its use elsewhere, comes from creative use of distortion in the tube preamp and power amp. I discovered that clean sound through a Leslie speaker doesn't sound like the classic Hammond/Leslie or guitar/Leslie sound at all. You actually need the distortion produced by the under-powered amps to get the "grit" that keyboardists typically want.

Typically, if your amplification needs exceed those of the Leslie, you'll want to mic it and put it in the P.A. or build mics into the cabinet as Goff Professional (http://www.goffprof.com/) does. These guys are about the most recognized of the long-time B-3/Leslie specialists. Their client list is kind of a who's-who of B-3.

Bob

[toddalin]

A point to be made is that part of the natural sound of a B-3& Leslie in pop music and in much of its use elsewhere, comes from creative use of distortion in the tube preamp and power amp. I discovered that clean sound through a Leslie speaker doesn't sound like the classic Hammond/Leslie or guitar/Leslie sound at all. You actually need the distortion produced by the under-powered amps to get the "grit" that keyboardists typically want.

Typically, if your amplification needs exceed those of the Leslie, you'll want to mic it and put it in the P.A. or build mics into the cabinet as Goff Professional (http://www.goffprof.com/) does. These guys are about the most recognized of the long-time B-3/Leslie specialists. Their client list is kind of a who's-who of B-3.

Bob

Totally agreed! Of course Skootur is looking to a church setting so the "grunge" may not be necessary. Couldn't play "rock" organ without it or key click. Even Keith Emerson used lots of Leslies.

[Bob Womack]

Yeah, Goff does Keith's B-3s and Leslies for him. I've just found that many of even the sweet B-3 sounds count on the Leslie's limited headroom to smooth out the keyclicks. A lot of the B-3 sounds used in Contemporary Christian and P&W are the same growly organ sounds used for the Allman Brothers. For instance, I was listening to FFH's nice female solo song, "Your Love is Life to Me" from Found a Place, and they've got gorgeous growly, milky B-3 in the last verse and choruses.

Just a thought.

Bob

[edgewound]

If you want to complete that Leslie with a 15"...use an E140.

[Rex Everything]

I have a leslie cab(not sure the model) It is a tolex covered model w/ a solid state amp that is disconnected. The reverb pan has been disconnected and removed as well. My point here is when I bought this old cab about 10 years ago it had what appeared to be a JBL D-130 w/ an orange back.

A few years ago I decided I would pull the 130 out since I had not been using the cab. When I pulled it out and took a look at it, it was not marked d-130 but just had a 15L on it if I remember correctly.

Does any one know anything about this speaker? I thought it would be a factory speaker w/ the "L" notation.

The cab is on loan at a friends house right now but I will try to get him to pull the back and take a pic and write down the model.

Any info on this speaker would be appreciated.

[audition]

Some background on Leslie conversions here, (as well as any Hammond product) Many companies over the years tried to imitate the Works of "Bill Beer" Bill owned Keyboard Products located in Los Angeles CA. Even Leslie tried to work out a deal with Bill to Produce his Products..... Bill was very protective of his circuits so no one could copy his work, many studio rental companies tried but were so inferior at it there was NO competition!
Bill was factory trained at Hammond and later taught classes for Hammond to "create Hammond techs" Pretty much any hit song you can think of was done from the 60's 70's 80's etc was done on either a "Bill Beer, Keyboard Products" Hammond B-3 and Leslie. Bills work was so good it was the only stuff bands wanted to tour with.... (nothing like being in austrailia or some far away place on tour and having your hammond go "down" on you) even the "expression pedals were redesigned to be fully roadworthy" Bill even made an expensive "Box" so you coult take the Hammond and leslie to any part of the world and it would be in tune.... it would take any voltage any Hz and put out 120v 60Hz (as you know a Hammond from UK was run with 50 HZ motors on the tone wheel) and if you tried to use a UK Hammond over here it was out of tune as the tone wheels are basicly a guitar pick-up with a wheel with so many notches in the wheel to create a certian frequency all run by a motor with many sized notched wheels on the same shaft... Now more background, My cousin Mike worked for Bill for almost thirty years (till his back went out - Hammonds are heavy! even on an organ dolly) Bill was like family to us and I worked there also off and on. Bill worked on anything and everything in the shop from mastering boards, amps, synthesizers- you name it. "Keyboard products" was a JBL authorized dealer as well as Fender Rhodes. most of the time that I worked there was when they got backed up and needed help getting the jobs out... when we made a Hammond portable, we gutted the Hammond completely and made the portable from the ground up from the marine grade plywood, vinyl, legs, etc. only retaining the tone generator, manuals, drawbars, etc. (even in its flight case a Portable Hammond is heavy) we completely tore down the tone generator and rebuilt it, new buss-bars if needed. nothing went untouched. Bills Leslies were famous everyone in the who's-who used them, Pink Floyd, fleetwood mac,Prince and on and on.... at one time I had the serial number list of all the portables and leslies and who originaly had them made and the list was like a rock and roll history book. In the eighties if you provided the lesslie it was a flat rate of 2,000 to high power it and it was guaranteed to be roadworthy. Most of what I did was Highpower the Leslies (but also did the Hammonds) first thing on the leslies was to remove everything - then rebuild the fast/slow motors for the upper and lower section, new tires installed and relaxed, next was to drill the patern for the HF driver mounting plate (bill had special plates and throat adapters machined out of aluminum with the proper exponential curve) the mounting plates and adapters were costly to have made due to the precision needed so when it was time for more to be ordered a large batch was machined. We used a 2482 driver for the high end, and an E-140-B on the low end. the lower rotor was completely serviced and a brand new custom sewn cloth rotor cover and a brand new "o" ring installed over it (which had to be specialy centered , just as the tires did on the drive motors)as was the upper horn assembly. Next came time to make an amplifier.... same as anything bill designed it was from the ground up.... first came placing the artwork over the coated pc board and exposed it to U.V. for a determined amount of time, then into the acid to etch the board, then to the drill press and drill all the pads - I then stuffed all the boards, soldered them wired them, mounted all parts, connectors, boards, heatsinks, etc. to the chasis then handed it over to bill who put it on the scope and did all the testing and a few things he didnt share.... after the amps were "burnt-in" and considered "ready" (later versions were conservatevly rated at 250w RMS) I would then take an electric eraser.... the type draftsmen use (like a dremel only with an eraser core) and remove all numbers from all IC's transistors etc. and mark the parts with paint pens with a designated color for a designated part.... thus no one in the field could reverse engineer Bills designs. I have a handbuilt Keyboard Products bi-amp (1 of a kind that Bill made for my 4350's) that finally died (the capacitor normalisation circuit that trips the output relay no longer trips the relay):biting: I just googled and found a few links --- and im sure keyboard magazine as well as others have many archived interviews with Bill (there were stacks of them at the shop each with interviews with bill in them - even some with my cousin Mike) here are the few links I found durring a quick search.
the "Mark" in the first link is not me.

http://http://www.zeni.net/pipermail/hammond/2003-October/035100.html

http://http://www.fortunecity.com/business/huntsman/1056/tone_and_tone_cab__svc____keyboard_products____bil l_beer.htm

http://http://www.keysnovello.com/johnsarticle/index.html

http://http://www.keysnovello.com/studio.html

http://http://www.sonsofchamplin.com/sons/pressKeyboard.htm

on that last link you can see a picture of one of the portable Hammond B-3' labled "Bills Chicago Hammond B-3" its not a big pic though.... Mark

[toddalin]

Keyboard Products competition was Valley Sound located on Ventura Blvd near Universal Studios. They also did the Hammond portibility conversions and actually had fiberglass cases made to order, with a nice wooden top made. The top was flat and was easy to stack additional keyboards on.

When my Hammond D (an early version of the C which is a B with solid "church" sides) was involved in a car accident (the van it was in hit the California/Nevada Inspection station), Valley Sound did the conversion (including the full pedal board that they had never done before), added percussion, and refinished the two Leslies in black. The conversion was about $2,000 back in 1973. I was supprised that the insurance covered the conversion rather than totalling out the organ.

Look at the early pics from the band "Angel" to see what the Valley Sound conversions looked like.

[audition]

We re-did MANY valley sound conversions, some were redone in less then a year by their owners. KBP conversions had flat tops and were magneticaly shielded so you could put other synthesizers on top of course the mu metal shielding cost extra.

[audition]

You should have seen some oF the leslie conversions that came into the shop for us to re-do... I remember one that had dual non-JBL 18" on a 45 degree wedge above the lower drum... many tried to use stock off the shelf amps with a cross over in leslies.... but there was a reason the equiptment managers as well as the musicians insisted on K.B.P. stuff the "sound" "reliability" and "quality" K.B.P. was not the cheapest.... but they were the best!

[SKOOTUR]

it's cool to come back and see the thread has grown and very informative. thanks for the comments. i'm still in washington state,so not sure when i'll get back to virginia to tinker with this. yes we're in a contemporary worship atmosphere and will go to the gospel type music(i guess you call it gospel) where there is a lot more bass or low end. when the volume is up on the low notes it sounds like the speaker is going to rip apart and sounds real bad. we havn't had any rock sounds yet lol. might be cool if they did once in a while. i have mic'd the cabinet before in a seperate room with awesome sound,but they decided they wanted it in the sanctuary and use it for a monitor so to speak.the minister of music won't let me take a signal off the digital output to supplement the sound.somedays the fader is like a roller coaster ride lol. when i turn up the organ the player turns the pedal down and so on. so it's a constant fight some days to maintain a good mix of the organ.we have seperate monitors with headphones,speakers and wireless monitors,but the player insists on the speaker.since she hears the speaker at a different level than i do because of location we have a battle lol. well some days it's not funny,but i just take into account she doesn't understand. i placed the speaker further away so she would have to turn it up to hear which helped,but the speaker has crept closer to player. the current organ used is the electronic xk-2. they eventually want to get a b-3. i guess we'll get it straight one day. we currently have to setup and teardown weekly since we're renting a sanctuary in a christian school. i'm not an expert at the sound reinforcement and mixing,but do pretty good.i don't notice any clicking sounds except from the relays which i eventually plan to change to solidstate switching. you don't hear any noises except when i mic the cabinet,plus it's an xk-2 organ. i would like to keep the sound as close as possible while going all solidstate. that's why i want to keep the tube amps intact and use as preamps,but not sure how i can load them to get the same warm tube sound as well as the natural distortion when necessary.the gti speakers sounds like the ones i need for what i want. i also have an oldschool crown amp. i think it says ps-2 or psa-2 on the front. that thing kicks butt. i love it. in the end i want it all to have updated solidstate ...any controls,the amps and signal processing if any.the cabinet has a coilspring type reverb in it,but probably won't use it. the xk-2 has reverb and overdrive knobs built in if we want rvb.or distortion added. i will eventually experiment with internal mics. i figure the pzm or planar types,but don't know for sure. the sm-57 & sm-58's work fine so far when i use them.well that's enough of my babble for now lol. thanks everyone for the info. very informative for me in addition to reading some stuff on the net. have a great day! btw bob w. ...you must not live too far from me. i saw some of your stuff about the mini and trips. it's like reminiscing reading the different areas you wrote about hampton roads area.laterz

[Bob Womack]

Yup, I'm on the Southside. Tomorrow we are going for a Guiness world record loading the Jamestown/Scotland ferry. :bouncy:

Bob

[kziss]

Hi Audition.
I am a Hammond / Leslie enthusiast from Melbourne , Australia.
I have learned how to work on and modify Hammonds through the work that I have done on my 1962 C3 organ such as replacing the aged wax capacitors of the Tone Wheel Generator ( TG ) with new correct micro farad spec capacitors , recalibrating the whole TG to produce a louder and warmer sounding TG output curve and repairs and modifications to the AO28 preamp. I play my Hammond organ through a Leslie 122 that I have done some modifications to , including adding a JBL 2482 treble horn driver and I may put in a JBL-E140 8 ohms bass speaker.

I am currently repairing the gooey black foam related damage done to the manual resistance wires of my newly purchased 1965 C3.

I am quite interested in learning about the modifications that Bill Beer did to Hammonds and Leslies in order to get his customized fat sound.
Information about the Bill Beer organs and Leslies seems very hard to find and some stock Hammond/ aLeslie purists dont like the Bill Beer sound , but from examples that I have heard , I quite like the fat sound of the Bill Beer organs and the Bill Beer Leslies.

I have read that Bill Beer used to recalibrate the TG to produce a fatter sound than the Hammond factory stock TG calibration .

Do you know anything about the output levels specs of the Bill Beer TG recalibration ?

Where there particular areas of the TG frequency ranges that Bill Beer boosted or attenuated in order to get his particular sound ?

Bill Beer was quoted as having measured the TG output levels of six ''hot bitchin'' B3 organs and that he then used these as the basis of his TG recalibration specs and he said that he could recalibrate the TG to make it sound ''fat and ballsy''.

I know that the Hammond factory used to calibrate the TG's to have stronger outputs in the bass and the lower midrange region until 1956 when the factory TG output curve was changed to have slightly lessened bass and lower midrange levels and that this new TG output curve remained until the end of Hammond TG organ production in 1975.

Do you know anything about thes six ''hot bitchin'' B3's that Bill Beer used as the basis of his TG output curves , and what production years these B3's were from ?

As well as recalibrating the TG and replacing the aged wax capacitors of the TG notes 49 to 91 of the pre 1964 organs , do you know if Bill Beer also modified the TG note filters to produce a more pure sine wave quality and less background rumble or hum ?

Do you know anything about how the frequency response of the solid state Bill Beer organ preamps differed from that of a stock AO28 preamp ?

I have been told that the Bill Beer biamped solid state high power Leslie amplifiers had a three position tonality switch , and that this switch selected:
1) the straight flat response
2 ) boosted bass ( for organ)
3 ) boosted bass and treble ( for guitar ).

Do you know what the frequency range and the decibel level of the bass boost for organ was and what the frequency range for the boosted bass and treble for the guitar was ?

Although Bill Beer used the JBL E-140 or the K-140 bass speaker and the JBL 2482 treble driver , do you know if there are better JBL or other brand bass speakers that are more efficient and that produce a deeper bass response than the JBL E-140 or the JBL K-140 bass speakers ?

I have searched the JBL website for a frequency response curve chart but all that I could find was a brochure that described the E-140 series and the K-140 series speakers together with some other speakers , but there were no frequency response curve charts on that brochure.

Do you have a frequency response curve chart for the JBL E-10 or the K-140 speakers ?

I have been told that Gregg Rollie from the early Santana years used a Bill Beer modified organ or a Bill Beer Leslie on the early Santana albums but no one has yet verified this .
I know that Tom Coster and other subsequent Santana organists used a Bill Beer organ.

Apparently Dick Sims used a Bill Beer organ and Leslie on Eric Clapton's early 70' albums.

I have been told that Steve Walsh used a Bill Beer organ and Bill Beer Leslie on the 1976 album "Leftoverture". Do you know if this is correct ?

Are you able to say who the other big name organists / bands that used Bill Beer organs and Bill Beer Leslies were ?

Dop you know what year the modified Bill Beer organs and Leslies first started appearing ?

I am a big fan of the mid - late 60's / 70's era Rock music.

I am quite interested in finding out what I can about these things and Bill Beer's legacy in improving the tonality of the Hammonds and Leslies.

Thank you very much in advance for a reply and for your patience with my many questions.

All the best.
Kon