advertisement


Vintage Wharfedales

S

smithy

pfm Member
Rash of Wharfedales on EBay recently anyone here bought them ,quite a few SFB3s amongst them.£310 for a single SFB3 needing restoration seems a bit on the steep side.
 
Because some new but retro looking models have been getting good reviews recently?
I also think fashion is swinging away from skinny towers with stacked 5" drivers back to a decent sized woofer in a wide cabinet
 
I sincerely hope you're right, David! Let's hope that skinny floor-standers and teeny squawk-boxes have had their day. WAF has a lot to answer for ;)
 
I picked up an SFB3 a couple of months ago at the last NVCF http://www.nvcf.org.uk/. This one needs serious restoration. But all the basic parts are there. When I saw it it had no price on. So I started by asking the seller what he wanted for it. He said he didn't know what it was worth, so what was I prepared to offer ? Stalemate. Eventually I smiled and said "Well one of us has to go first". "Thirty-five quid" he said. "Done" I said. I could tell from the look on his face that he thought this hadn't gone well ...

VB
 
I've noticed a tendency lately for speakers that have been considered, by consensus, a pile of crap for the last 35+ years to suddenly be fetching unbelievable sums and being described as "wonderful" and "Tannoy beater" and "rediscovered classic"..... Boomy, coloured and with a power handling of 20 Watts more likely!
 
Never heard SFBs but always been curious about them. A radical design for sure and one I see no reason wouldn't work. Certainly shouldn't be boomy, what with no box! I suspect Gilbert Briggs knew what he was doing.
 
Tony L said:
Never heard SFBs but always been curious about them. A radical design for sure and one I see no reason wouldn't work. Certainly shouldn't be boomy, what with no box! I suspect Gilbert Briggs knew what he was doing.
Click to expand...

I wasn't specifically referring to them... Apparently they're not bad at all!

No it was more like Goodmans Magnum's and Magisters and other such things (they are just a couple that sprang to mind) that you couldn't give away for the last 40 years suddenly going for £250. I'll admit I've never heard them but hifi enthusiast friends of greater age than myself have described them as bloody awful.... and that was when they were new!
 
I wonder if the big Goodmans were that bad, Joe Akroyd was involved with them at one time.
They probably roll off a little early at the top due to the cone tweeter, but most of us here could not hear that anymore
 
Arkless Repairs said:
I wasn't specifically referring to them... Apparently they're not bad at all!

No it was more like Goodmans Magnum's and Magisters and other such things (they are just a couple that sprang to mind) that you couldn't give away for the last 40 years suddenly going for £250. I'll admit I've never heard them but hifi enthusiast friends of greater age than myself have described them as bloody awful.... and that was when they were new!
Click to expand...

Partly fashion, fads and trends; a few years ago you'd find Garrard 301/401 decks in a skip, now they are in serious demand.

I had Wharfedale Lintons as a teenager and remember them as being quite good, but recently picked up a pair of their little brother, Dentons, which were well reviewed at the time and they were awful!
 
davidsrsb said:
I wonder if the big Goodmans were that bad, Joe Akroyd was involved with them at one time.
They probably roll off a little early at the top due to the cone tweeter, but most of us here could not hear that anymore
Click to expand...

It would be interesting to hear a set certainly....
 
Gaius said:
Partly fashion, fads and trends; a few years ago you'd find Garrard 301/401 decks in a skip, now they are in serious demand.

I had Wharfedale Lintons as a teenager and remember them as being quite good, but recently picked up a pair of their little brother, Dentons, which were well reviewed at the time and they were awful!
Click to expand...

I once got a Leak Stereo 20 for a fiver before they started to get trendy again!
 
Gaius said:
I had Wharfedale Lintons as a teenager and remember them as being quite good, but recently picked up a pair of their little brother, Dentons, which were well reviewed at the time and they were awful!
Click to expand...
But were they still working properly? There are many things that can go wrong with a speaker over time
Which version. Wharfedale made 2 and 3 way versions with the same model name
 
Valvebloke said:
I picked up an SFB3 a couple of months ago at the last NVCF http://www.nvcf.org.uk/. This one needs serious restoration. But all the basic parts are there. When I saw it it had no price on. So I started by asking the seller what he wanted for it. He said he didn't know what it was worth, so what was I prepared to offer ? Stalemate. Eventually I smiled and said "Well one of us has to go first". "Thirty-five quid" he said. "Done" I said. I could tell from the look on his face that he thought this hadn't gone well ...

VB
Click to expand...

Ah, now when a situation like this arises, the trick is to continue to um and aaah for a minute or two and then reluctantly drag the money out of your pocket and hand it over, thus making the seller think you've done them a huge favour by taking the item off their hands. Heck, in the situation you've outlined, I'd probably have countered with a cheeky offer of £30...

Arkless Repairs said:
I'll admit I've never heard them...
Click to expand...

Decent of you to confess to that. Many who offer sweeping opinions on stuff they've never heard aren't so good as to own up! :D
 
A good friend of mine owned both the magnum and magister and told me he got rid pretty quick cos they were no good... As they have completely disappeared off the radar for so long I'm inclined to think he was probably right. Quality speaks for itself so if they were actually any good I guess they would have been regarded as a classic for many years.... Obviously it would be interesting to hear a set for myself but I'm expecting under-braced and damped large cabinets to be singing their own tune for a start!
 
I think what happened to the Goodmans brand had a lot to do with that. Seeing the word on all sorts of rubbish from Hong Kong did not do resale values any good.

You can get away with lighter cabinets when the drivers are efficient, as many of these old speakers were and at least you don't get the "organ pipe" resonance towers are prone to
 
davidsrsb said:
I think what happened to the Goodmans brand had a lot to do with that. Seeing the word on all sorts of rubbish from Hong Kong did not do resale values any good.

You can get away with lighter cabinets when the drivers are efficient, as many of these old speakers were and at least you don't get the "organ pipe" resonance towers are prone to
Click to expand...

The bad rep of early 70's Goodmans speakers had been around for many years already when the badge engineered rubbish came out of the far east.

There is no correlation that I'm aware of between efficiency of drivers and the need for cabinet bracing etc!
 
Had both Magnum K & SL... Overall the SL were crap, too much cost cutting in evidence.

The Magnum K are a completely different kettle of fish & right up there when it comes to reproduction of the human voice, made me jump numerous times as they tricked me into thinking someone else was in the house with me :D only momentarily of course but that's how good they were/are. Also, I found they must be listened to on axis due to the cone tweeters which can be annoying but as with ESL's you do get used to sitting in "the sweet spot" ...
 
Older lady in the neighborhood got W70C clunkers , she caught the wave and doesn't want to budge from her $100 asking price. Is this US only model or there was a British equivalent of the series ?
PS.
i.e honorably mentioned Leak 20 God knows I tried hard to like it and did completely proper restoration plumbing all the leaks /replacing caps with those nice Vit Q and spensive correct resistors but sadly the merit for fame of this model is beyond my comprehension.
 
Arkless Repairs said:
There is no correlation that I'm aware of between efficiency of drivers and the need for cabinet bracing etc!
Click to expand...
When you have a 80dB/W speaker due to the use of a heavy plastic cone, the motor is generating much greater forces on the cone to move it. This is in turn pushing much harder against the cabinet structure

Remember that Goodmans were a mid price brand, cheaper than equivalent Tannoys, so something had to give
 
davidsrsb said:
When you have a 80dB/W speaker due to the use of a heavy plastic cone, the motor is generating much greater forces on the cone to move it. This is in turn pushing much harder against the cabinet structure

Remember that Goodmans were a mid price brand, cheaper than equivalent Tannoys, so something had to give
Click to expand...

That's highly tenuous David... Newtons third law! The mass of the chassis and magnet is so much greater than that of the cone I doubt it would have a major effect. The sound pressure within the cabinet would be a much larger factor and that is not proportional to the efficiency. My 1971 Hi-Fi year Book doesn't give the efficiency of the Magister but I doubt it would have been much more than 88dB/W
Apparently that 15" cone went up to 800Hz.... £57 a pair...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top