Western Electric KS12027

The hole in the speaker enclosure in the photo looks like the hole for the horn in the L300. The WE-728 of the WE-757A is a closed speaker like the AR, but it is not a bass reflex type and I wonder if it is a separate treble tweeter. Simple is The best
 
another WE-728B and pairs of WE-713C required
That would work out very nicely! The question then is whether to build a 757a cabinet or something else. The one time I heard a pair of 757a’s was at the 2011 RMAF. Joe Roberts was acting as DJ and the sound was mighty good indeed. I considered it best of the show. My main complaint was the bass was rather boxy. The bass also didn’t go very deep but I don’t think that would have been a problem for me.
 
KS-12027 is a small horn responsible for 1000-15000 Hz used in WE-757A.
The WE-728B is a full-range 12-inch woofer with poor bass ability, but like the WE-755, it is 4 ohm. So, when I saw that design, I thought the KS-12027 was a virtual coaxial for the main purpose of connecting two 4-ohm woofers in parallel. In general, the lower the ohm, the rougher the sound, so if you can get a 12-inch woofer of the same standard, connect it in series to make an 8-ohm woofer, and make the 1-inch compression driver for KS-12027 in the middle operate up to 20K at 8 ohm. I believe it will work quite well. However, the crossover is newly designed and the recommended compression driver is JBL D220ti. My idea is to keep only KS-12027 without using WE units.
I did not know what to think of these JBL'ish constructs, either.
I do agree they make good use of that special horn.
I call this approach, the "wall of sound" method. Like you mentioned– – there's a lot going on in the wire up – – of all these different components. Bozak (WECO alumni, and no fool) did it back in the 50s and 60s – – to pretty good effect. But you may need a lot more power in a system like this – – which puts you off at a disadvantage to start. Rudy Bozak liked 6dB crossovers, which are still not commonly used.

Low impedance, I feel is typically just a design tweak on the voice coil – – and intended to match up with certain output transformers. This is especially so in the case of the Western Electric 713C and as Joe was pointing out to me (great talk we had couple of years by phone) -- the WE755 and 728 were probably setup as 4ohm'ers to make nice-nice with the WE171C OPT.
In the end, I don't think impedance selection has a great necessary effect on T/S parameters. Low impedance might give an edge in efficiency – – which is what I suspect WE was thinking on the line of "Presence" speakers,,, in the end, I think it's like designing with tubes. Choose your parameters and do your best in your cabinet. A 4 ohm or "low impedance" speaker is just a good starting advantage but not necessarily the best thing for any given scenario.
On any given Sunday, Open Baffle is the cleanest and clearest, always.

I really think the fascination with the Western Electric 757 system in general is a little bit blown out of proportion to what the speakers original intention and overall capability. I suppose the problem is industry wide – – because naturally a lot of people think that the perfect studio monitor would be necessarily the perfect home speaker? Not necessarily I would say.
Despite the size, the 757 Is best considered an intimate point source speaker.
It's not going to make a live room, per say.
The Western Electric 757 could be best described as a much much better sounding (out of this world comparison, I know) Yamaha NS10 (an industry "accident" with it's own story) . It's original intention was very real-world very non-reactive, monitoring.. perhaps with a peak in the mids... which is very handy for mixdowns. It's absolutely a speaker that sounds realistic when you are in front of it but the realism is deep down in that box. And it's never going to lie to you.
One of my longtime friends who I would describe as having probably some of the best ears I know, uses WE757 for just this task, as a tool, for monitoring. He very accurately described the WE757 – – as unforgiving on many recordings. Having owned them several times in memory – – I think that is very fair. I also agree it's definitely not a bass reflex design and it's also not an acoustical suspension. It's much more primitive in execution than I think a lot of folks realize.
Arguably one of the special points of the system is the crossover... I think it's special mostly because it was built with off-the-shelf corporate components from Western Electric. And they took some liberties there. Same deal with the WE728.

The end, the reason the system is going to sound the very best is the 713 C. The special low ohm version ... It's also written up by Western Electric to have added sensitivity. Have had many of them over the years along with the A's and B's – – and I can definitely agree first-hand .. they are much better than the others. It's even better than a Western Electric 555 in every day use I would say. Can't go wrong with a 713C no matter what you do. Unfortunately they are priced as such!

From an hardcore engineer's standpoint – – comparing it to modern speakers – – I guess I could see your criticism that the 728 is "not good at bass".. The last unit I had through here – – measured 59 Hz FS which I would argue is not bad at all for a 12 inch speaker that can play full range, from the 1950s! So it's capabilities for playing bass are well within the normality of the type of cabinet that the 757 is.
It is in general a very high performance speaker. It's able to do a very adequate job on low frequency reproduction. The argument I would make is that it's not a cost-effective solution.
I've been throwing out the idea that you could do something similar with an Altec 412 biflex, for instance. The problem is the other 12 inch woofers are of lower in midrange detail and do not have the presence or resolution that the 728 is able to reproduce. This is somewhat negated by the fact that the speaker is wasted in the 757 cabinet and is also "choked down" by the aggressive crossover. Still these things are all analog.... so the superior low-mids quality of the WE728 slips by.... so that if you use a very good sounding 12 inch speaker like the 728 it's going to come through in effect no matter what.

So in the end... 757 system pulls it off in brute force with the very best sounding active components ever made. (The smooth performance of that 12027 helps as well).

I have at least a couple of customers either actively using the Lycan 12027 ... or planning to – – Not like a 757.... These will be used "set top" Similar to how the 12025 was used in the Westrex L8 build. Still waiting on results. But the pleasing "polite" nature of that horn.... I think can be utilized in other completely different in philosophy...Time will tell.
 
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I largely agree with your opinion.Among them, what I know about WE-757A isDo you agree that the WE-713 compression driver produces a unique sound?I think that sound is a unique combination of the traditional paper cone of the WE-728B full-range 12-inch alnico speaker and the aluminum diaphragm of the WE-713C among the WE-713.I think that the WE-713b produces a different sound because it has a phenolic diaphragm, but I think the unique sound of the WE-757A is the unique sound of the midrange that comes from the 1Khz crossover point. I don't think these speakers produce powerful bass sounds like modern speakers. That's up to you. This would mean the same as saying that it is not an air suspension or bass reflex type enclosure.I sent an email to an American in Chicago asking for the selling price of WE-713c, but there was no response.They said it was an unused product because it was NOS, and it cost about $15,000. At one point, I went crazy over this and tried to buy it, but unfortunately or fortunately, there was no response, so I couldn't buy it. So, as a second option, I used Atlas PD-5VH, which I think is of the same family as WE-722A, and attached it to my WE-12027 as a replacement for WE-713b. Unfortunately, I only have 1 ea of WE-728B, so I used Jensen P12n as a substitute. So, I tried to make a WE-757a clone using this combination, but I couldn't let go of my attachment to the aluminum diaphragm, so I asked the person in charge at Radian Audio, whom I thought was the best cost-effective, if they could make an aluminum diaphragm that could be used instead of the phenolic of the PD-5VH. There are currently no plans, but the response was that they can make it if there is sufficient demand. If you can get the PD-5VH aluminum diaphragm, you can create a similar feeling. However, PD-5VH is a 16 Ohm product, so you need to attach a 5.33 Ohm resistor in parallel to match the impedance. It works
We are trying to solve this problem by connecting a high-quality resistor of approximately 5.1 ohms. Jensen P12 will connect an 8-ohm resistor to make 4 ohms. For reference, the WE-757A's crossover is made by combining two 0.91mH coils and two sets of 28uF capacitors. This is a Butterworth type crossover. I actually purchased and have several Western Electric crossovers used here. Each 4uF capacitor was connected in parallel to make 28uF, but I confirmed that the individual capacitance is less than 4uF. No matter how good the sound is, it is old and not accurate. not capacity
My personal opinion is that the sound produced by the crossover made by connecting these 4uF capacitors in parallel determines the character of the WE-757A.

Personally, I can special order 4uF copper oil containing a small amount of silver, so I plan to make a clone of the WE-757A speaker with these exact values.

If I can get a WE-713C or a broken WE-713c or WE-713B, I would like to reproduce it. I think I have the ability to do so. I have been working hard for the past 5 years to create a JBL Paragon clone.
Since I could not directly measure the external dimensions of the JBL Paragon in the museum, I received basic 3D data from a kind American. With the help of my younger daughter, I entered it in mm units into 3D rhino. Even though there were many difficulties, it was eventually completed.

Because it is Google Translate, I am concerned about whether my suggestions are conveyed accurately.


Thanks to all audiophiles...
 
I listened to the vocals linked through the WE-757A speakers at the Museum of Popular Music in Gyeongju, a city in South Korea, and it sounded very good.



 
"crinkled surfaces are acoustically better"

I have never heard/read what this acoustical material is accomplishing in this application. It looks like typical ceiling acoustical 2x4 material you see in office buildings but I dunno?. It's 30/40 years older than that so it could be full of asbestos.

I was thinking that it is reflecting/dispersing/absorbing/dampening(??) a specific range (I would guess lower mid-range??). More questions than answers.
 
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"주름진 표면이 음향적으로 더 좋습니다"

나는 이 음향 재료가 이 응용 프로그램에서 무엇을 수행하는지 듣거나 읽은 적이 없습니다. 사무실 건물에서 볼 수 있는 전형적인 2x4 음향 자료처럼 보이지만 모르겠습니다. 그것은 그것보다 30/40년 더 오래되었기 때문에 석면으로 가득 차 있을 수 있습니다.

나는 그것이 특정 범위를 반사/분산/흡수/감쇠(??)한다고 생각하고 있었습니다(낮은 중간 범위가 아닐까요??). 답변보다 질문이 더 많습니다.
 
This is only my personal opinion. If you look at the baffle surface of the old WE-757A, it is irregular. Unlike modern speakers, the unit is mounted on the back of the baffle surface. As you mentioned in the previous thread, the treble of the KS-12027 and the WE-728B are different. In order to operate as much as possible as a One Point of Source, the area around the baffle surface of the woofer mounted behind the baffle is made irregular and rough for straight high sounds that pass through a horn of 1K or more, which has straightness at a certain angle, to eliminate sounds spreading to the surroundings and unwanted sounds. I think it improves the characteristics. My recommendation is to use traditional Korean paper on the smooth baffle surface to make it look like the irregular surface of the moon. The tweeters of the LS 3/5A and JBL L100 also have this treatment, but the WE-757A has a full-range tendency. I think this is important because it is a speaker that focuses on the mid-range. If the treble goes straight but the bass spreads out to the side, I think the balance is off.
 
Material for coating baffle surface

Old style manufactured Korean Paper made from Korean Pulp

 
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