Hello Havenites!
Been a while, but at the urging of my buddy @BassKulcha and @hifitown , I thought I would post about my once-in-a-lifetime speaker find last month.
I cannot share too many details- but suffice it to say I have a good friend who was able to recover this for me before it was dumpstered!
What we have here is a 1938 Jensen Imperial Reproducer Model C (or C-1300 depending on the literature). This was installed in a radio station that was the site of a Western Electric Doherty transmitter. It was installed by Western Electric to accompany their speech input rack as a monitor speaker for both live radio and recorded program material that was going to be broadcast. Since Western had just been forced out of the speaker business by the consent decree earlier that year, they contracted with Jensen to install what was at the the time probably the top of the line widest range speaker available. Contrary to popular belief, the Model C is a permanent magnet 2-way system- they were never offered in a field coil variety unless custom ordered by the station. I have seen a field coil version that was custom made for a Detroit radio station (seen on Facebook- this particular trio of Model C's had a different set of switch controls as well as one had a custom installed Western Electric 94 power amplifier) - but I am unsure why they chose FC over PM. Jensen's own catalog advertises the Model C as exclusively PM- not needing an external power supply and PM offered "no degradation in quality reproduction." My Model C is the piano black and maple finish- the only example of this finish offering that anyone has ever seen. No dealer friend of mine or any collector has ever seen a real-world example of a piano black Model C, even though there are a few examples of the larger Model D in piano black.
Anyway- my speaker served as the hifi station monitor speaker most likely until the Western Electric transmitter was replaced sometime in the mid 1960's. The fact this this speaker sat in the same spot until I got it (over 80 years) is totally remarkable.
Details: my unit has a Jensen 500 ohm input transformer- most likely to take the 500 ohm output off of the Western 106 amplifier that was installed in the rack (which is a very high output preamp) and make it listenable. The tweeter is a Jensen PM Q tweeter, and the woofer is a Jensen A15PM/PM15 (these model numbers are interchangeable and are the SAME WOOFER!). The crossover is a custom designed Jensen crossover.
After getting the speaker home, I carefully vacuumed the 80 years worth of dead spiders and cobwebs from the back. Eww!! To play it, I decided to use one of my venerable Bogen PX-15 amplifiers from 1948 (since it has a 500 ohm output tap). I guess it is time to let ANOTHER cat out of the bag- the Bogen PX-15 is the best sounding hifi amp that Bogen ever made, second only to the venerable HO-10. The secret magic is that it features a custom wound UTC choke that is a tapped choke that serves as the filter for the roll-off selector. It has another UTC custom choke in the tone circuit- and even when selected on full range the signal passes through both UTC chokes. (This is a Western design). The power supply is fascinating in that it uses another Western design in that the 12V preamp tubes are lit with DC filament!! In 1948! To accomplish this, Bogen takes the cathode voltage off the pair of 6L6 once they are warmed up to feed the 12V filaments. This is a nifty trick from Western that H.H. Scott also copied in their 210A and 210B amplifiers from around the same year. This is how Scott and Bogen were able to achieve whisper quiet hifi amps and almost dead silent phono stages long before Saul Marantz. To top it all off- the power supply is also choke fed! The result of all of this is a rich, detailed, and absolutely beautiful and engaging sounding amplifier that is as good as you can possibly get with a pair of 6L6's.
What does the speaker sound like?
Both my wife and my mother said its the best sounding speaker in my collection that they have ever heard. So does @BassKulcha. The naturalness and detail from it is truly outstanding. It is on par with, maybe better than several full Western systems that I have heard. The PM Q tweeter is every bit as good as a 597 in my opinion and the midrange and midbass and bass is slightly better than a Western 753 that I have heard in person.
Don't ask- its not for sale! Ha ha!
La vie est belle!
Message me if you want a video of it playing...
Been a while, but at the urging of my buddy @BassKulcha and @hifitown , I thought I would post about my once-in-a-lifetime speaker find last month.
I cannot share too many details- but suffice it to say I have a good friend who was able to recover this for me before it was dumpstered!
What we have here is a 1938 Jensen Imperial Reproducer Model C (or C-1300 depending on the literature). This was installed in a radio station that was the site of a Western Electric Doherty transmitter. It was installed by Western Electric to accompany their speech input rack as a monitor speaker for both live radio and recorded program material that was going to be broadcast. Since Western had just been forced out of the speaker business by the consent decree earlier that year, they contracted with Jensen to install what was at the the time probably the top of the line widest range speaker available. Contrary to popular belief, the Model C is a permanent magnet 2-way system- they were never offered in a field coil variety unless custom ordered by the station. I have seen a field coil version that was custom made for a Detroit radio station (seen on Facebook- this particular trio of Model C's had a different set of switch controls as well as one had a custom installed Western Electric 94 power amplifier) - but I am unsure why they chose FC over PM. Jensen's own catalog advertises the Model C as exclusively PM- not needing an external power supply and PM offered "no degradation in quality reproduction." My Model C is the piano black and maple finish- the only example of this finish offering that anyone has ever seen. No dealer friend of mine or any collector has ever seen a real-world example of a piano black Model C, even though there are a few examples of the larger Model D in piano black.
Anyway- my speaker served as the hifi station monitor speaker most likely until the Western Electric transmitter was replaced sometime in the mid 1960's. The fact this this speaker sat in the same spot until I got it (over 80 years) is totally remarkable.
Details: my unit has a Jensen 500 ohm input transformer- most likely to take the 500 ohm output off of the Western 106 amplifier that was installed in the rack (which is a very high output preamp) and make it listenable. The tweeter is a Jensen PM Q tweeter, and the woofer is a Jensen A15PM/PM15 (these model numbers are interchangeable and are the SAME WOOFER!). The crossover is a custom designed Jensen crossover.
After getting the speaker home, I carefully vacuumed the 80 years worth of dead spiders and cobwebs from the back. Eww!! To play it, I decided to use one of my venerable Bogen PX-15 amplifiers from 1948 (since it has a 500 ohm output tap). I guess it is time to let ANOTHER cat out of the bag- the Bogen PX-15 is the best sounding hifi amp that Bogen ever made, second only to the venerable HO-10. The secret magic is that it features a custom wound UTC choke that is a tapped choke that serves as the filter for the roll-off selector. It has another UTC custom choke in the tone circuit- and even when selected on full range the signal passes through both UTC chokes. (This is a Western design). The power supply is fascinating in that it uses another Western design in that the 12V preamp tubes are lit with DC filament!! In 1948! To accomplish this, Bogen takes the cathode voltage off the pair of 6L6 once they are warmed up to feed the 12V filaments. This is a nifty trick from Western that H.H. Scott also copied in their 210A and 210B amplifiers from around the same year. This is how Scott and Bogen were able to achieve whisper quiet hifi amps and almost dead silent phono stages long before Saul Marantz. To top it all off- the power supply is also choke fed! The result of all of this is a rich, detailed, and absolutely beautiful and engaging sounding amplifier that is as good as you can possibly get with a pair of 6L6's.
What does the speaker sound like?
Both my wife and my mother said its the best sounding speaker in my collection that they have ever heard. So does @BassKulcha. The naturalness and detail from it is truly outstanding. It is on par with, maybe better than several full Western systems that I have heard. The PM Q tweeter is every bit as good as a 597 in my opinion and the midrange and midbass and bass is slightly better than a Western 753 that I have heard in person.
Don't ask- its not for sale! Ha ha!
La vie est belle!
Message me if you want a video of it playing...
