L100 grills - reproduction!!??

[Rusnzha]

The L100 grilles were the coolest ever even if they disintigrated. Anyone out there know where they can be fabricated?

[boputnam]

OK, in all (quasi...) seriousness, my grab is those original waffle-foam grill covers were made on a router. The material was just stiuff enough to have enabled that.

The ONLY guy I know who could recreate that is The Widget, with his handy-dandy computerized router.

If you can source that rigid open foam, pm Widget and see if he'd make a stab at this. Could be a nice waffle-and-butter (sorry... ) business, for him.

No, back to sourcing that dang JBL blue...

[Don McRitchie]

Last October, a member of our old forum posted that he was taking advance orders for exact replacements of L100 grills and replacements for all other JBL/Altec speakers that used foam grills. Never heard from him after that. If you want to try and get a hold of him, his email address was:

sonofagun@netonecom.net

[Mr. Widget]

I am not sure if it is the same fellow that posted a similar line on eBay several times. The fellow on eBay had not actually made the waffle pattern yet, but sounded confident that he could.

I am not sure if it really can be done without special tooling.

Here are a pair of Blue Grills. They come with extra speakers.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...&category=3276

[Rusnzha]

Thanks -- will give it a try

Russ

[RickL166]

Hey Bo,

Byte Me!!

L100s are OK!! In Fact, they're cool!!!

[Tom Loizeaux]

I don't think I'd put slabs of foam over my drivers...especially the high frequency units.
I think JBL did this out of convience and as a marketing gimick, not out of a solid engineering concept.
Some people suggest that even semi-transparant mesh degrades the performance!

Tom

[Mr. Widget]

Hey Tom,

You are right. One of the speaker reviewers that I read from time to time likes to include a measurement comparing the performance of the speaker with and without grills. The grills of the systems that he has compared have ranged from very sheer fabric to foam. In every one of the tests that I have read the speaker's performance is compromised with the grill in place.

As far as the L-100 grill, it works for me. I especially like it in that screaming orange color. My favorite is the L-88 Plus which is a flat slab of foam with a dished out disc hinting at the woofer's location. It is a very clean pure modernist design statement.

[Rusnzha]

I'm sure that you are right about this, but there is no problem with the L100s that can't be fixed with a tweak on the bass or treble controls.

[boputnam]

Originally posted by Rusnzha
...there is no problem with the L100s that can't be fixed with a tweak on the bass or treble controls.

(don't fret L100 fans, I'll delete this post too. I just can't WAIT for you to discover, say, the 4313B...)

[scott fitlin]

Originally posted by Rusnzha
I'm sure that you are right about this, but there is no problem with the L100s that can't be fixed with a tweak on the bass or treble controls.

Quite wrong indeed!

[Rusnzha]

Talk to me

[Mr. Widget]

It's a personal preference thing. If you like the sound of L-100s, and many people do, enjoy them!

The main criticism of L-100s is that they have a pronounced midrange peak to emulate the sound of the Altec 604 and they don't have an extended or detailed top end.

If you are seeking an extremely neutral playback system try some Meyer Sound HD-1s.

http://www.meyersound.com/products/s...hd-1/index.htm

[boputnam]

Originally posted by Rusnzha
Talk to me

I hereby admit to, during the mid 1970's, having had a brief affair with the L100's. It might have been the orange waffles, it more likely was there was finally something very acoustically superior to the (crummy, IMHO ) overly popular Advents of the day, which were a drag to look at (with their shoddy baffle fronts) and even worse to listen to.

Then I found a pair of recycled 4312's L/R at a used audio shop in Boulder. I summoned all the $20's I had, and never looked back. Even then, I moved beyond these to the 4313B's - a very superior quality three-way. That LE10H 10-in simply smokes the 123A and 2213H 12'ers, respectively. But, in the meanwhile, I also, on the advice of Giskard, swapped 128H's into the 4312's, and found THAT a remarkable improvement.

Then, came the 4345's and I grew up. Now it's just good clean fun to bash the long-lived popularity of the L100's, when they really are one of JBL's lowest-ranking products...

[Ian Mackenzie]

Bo,

True Even on paper the 4313 is smoother by design, and that must translate into the listening experience

But at the time the concept of the L100/4310/4311 was on reading on fulfilled.

Subtle tailoring of the attenuators while playing later day State of Art Class A amplification makes you appreciate the intention of this vintage system.

I recall saying my God, these capture eveything after I pulling my E bay L100's specials out of the tea chests and wiring them up the the Aleph 2.

Ian