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View Full Version : LE15A LE85 and LX5 What do I do?????



Chris UK
02-24-2006, 08:38 AM
I bought some LE15A, LE85 and LX5 's at a garage sale.

They look like they are in perfect condition but I have no idea what I should do about testing them and boxing them to get them up and running.

The boxes I have seen on the net have been enormous, though I have read that about 8 cubic feet is best for the bins.

I need really simple advice about what to do as I gather that these are vintage speekers and I dont want to make a mess of them.

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Zilch
02-24-2006, 12:13 PM
Those are the core of the S7 system, recently a topic of discussion in other threads here.

JBL made a variety of systems using those components. Look in the site Library for more information: C50, C51, C50SM, 4320, many others, plus later derivatives like L200(B) and L300.

8 cuft. would be atypically large. Olympus, for example, is 6 cuft., and the monitors smaller.

To test them, begin by measuring the DC resistance at the input terminals.

After verifying that, you might hook the system together correctly using the LX5 crossover to see if they all play.

Then, consider how to package them, including horn (and lens, with vintage exponentials, if you didn't get those, as well,) plus a UHF driver to render them listenable.

There are other, perhaps better, options, if you don't want to restrict yourself to vintage "correct."

Chris UK
02-27-2006, 05:43 AM
Thats a great help!

Mr. Widget
02-27-2006, 10:39 AM
I bought some LE15A, LE85 and LX5 's at a garage sale.

They look like they are in perfect condition but...In addition to Zilch's advice look at the surrounds on the LE15As. Older units had a yellow foam that stiffens with age. Newer ones had a standard gray foam that rots and crumbles. The the surrounds are not intact and very pliable then they will not perform properly. If everything else is good, they are quite repairable. The same is true for the LE85s. If they have been driven hard they may need to have their diaphragms replaced. JBL still supports both of these models and if there is a problem they may be repaired... though not inexpensively.

As for the LX5 network... it is a 500Hz network. I don't know which horn you have with your LE85s, but virtually none of them will really work well down to 500Hz. Back in the 60's when the system was designed they seemed to think differently.

Widget