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ROGERS LS5/8

I'd be wary of those one's on eBay. LS5/8s are an active design which used modified Quad amps with the crossover built into the amp (Chord amps on later models). That's what they are designed to use and that's what they should come with. There was no passive version. Minus the amps and with a dubious passive crossover, there's no knowing what they'll sound like ... Not right most likely ... Hence the price I suspect. With the right amps they tend to go for closer the £1k mark. The amps on their own are rarely seen. Whether they are worth £1k is another matter, but if I had a yen for them I'd want the proper rig. A friend of mine has a pair in his studio and I like them.
 
Uncle Ants said:
I'd be wary of those one's on eBay. LS5/8s are an active design which used modified Quad amps with the crossover built into the amp (Chord amps on later models). That's what they are designed to use and that's what they should come with. There was no passive version. Minus the amps and with a dubious passive crossover, there's no knowing what they'll sound like ... Not right most likely ... Hence the price I suspect. With the right amps they tend to go for closer the £1k mark. The amps on their own are rarely seen. Whether they are worth £1k is another matter, but if I had a yen for them I'd want the proper rig. A friend of mine has a pair in his studio and I like them.
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Strictly speaking, you are correct about the non passive LS5/8 but there was a passive version built by Rogers under another model number. Same cabinet, without the handles and same drivers but it had a very complex crossover. There was also yet another passive version made under the Chartwell name with subtle changes.
Versions with Chord power amps tend to sell for well over £2K nowadays but you will be able to get a pair with AM8/16 amps (modified Quad 405) for around £1K. I have a pair with AM8/15 amps (modified Quad 303) that came from BBC some years ago. As Uncle Ants says, the modded 405's rarely come up for sale on their own and they go for high prices when they do as the BBC sold off many LS5/8 without amps a few years ago and their owners are patiently waiting for the correct amps, hence the modded ones you have seen on sale.
 
Please be aware that the horror stories put about by Alan Shaw (Harbeth) about failing adhesives used in the drivers may actually be the case.

LS5/8's did the job for the beeb at the time, but they will have had nigh on thirty years of varying use/abuse and you won't know how good or bad they are until you've bought them. Why have they been de-commissioned in the first place? is it purely because they're surplus or is it because they're regarded as well past their best and in need of replacement? I don't even know if the drivers are servicable if there is a problem, sadly.
 
DSJR said:
Please be aware that the horror stories put about by Alan Shaw (Harbeth) about failing adhesives used in the drivers may actually be the case.

LS5/8's did the job for the beeb at the time, but they will have had nigh on thirty years of varying use/abuse and you won't know how good or bad they are until you've bought them. Why have they been de-commissioned in the first place? is it purely because they're surplus or is it because they're regarded as well past their best and in need of replacement? I don't even know if the drivers are servicable if there is a problem, sadly.
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Alan Shaw's horror stories have a hidden agenda here, not for the first time.....

The Beeb still use them....saw several pair at Maida Vale very recently and I know of other Beeb studios still using them. They get de-commissioned when new studios come into use, eg Pacific Quay in Glasgow, the new Broadcasting House in London etc where they don't fit in with modern designer led studio furniture or, as you suggest, when surplus to requirements.

There was a specialist repairer near Havant (in Hants) who did repair them but I believe he has long since retired. They seem to be virtually bomb proof unless abused..
 
I had a very interesting discussion with Alan Shaw some years ago about the replacement of the Beeb's LS3/5As which he was involved with at the time. I was trying to find out what happened to the many pairs of old speakers (I definitely had a hidden agenda!), and he told me that they had in general been extremely heavily used, and were so far from the correct specifications now that they were unsalvageable. As I recall he said Harbeth hadn't actually been throwing them out, but had them all stacked up on shelves down in Sussex as they were almost all unfit for use.
 
Interesting discussion, I have 2 pairs of passive LS 5/8s (they say LS 5/8 on the Rogers labels). They were originally sold to ITV and have been unused for most of their life. They are truly remarkable speakers! Does anyone here know the best place to Market them? I also have spare LF and HF drivers for them.
 
I thought the passive version of the LS5/8 was called the PM510?
Quite scarce and easy to sell I would have thought, bet they sound great (I had a pair of the domestic versions for a while).
 
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Hello. I have these boxes, Rogers LS5 / 8 passive, which I have finished reviewing but I have a question about the connection of your filter. I can not find any pictures to see their connections. Anyone with the same model to help?
Thanks
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The one on the left looks like a Spendor BC3. The one on the right is an early version with the LF slot and should have a 5 pin XLR on the rear which connects to a Quad AM8/16 amp with built in filter.
 
Sí, la otra caja es spendor bc3.This Roger lo compró para reparar y tenía el cableado roto. El filtro original, que vemos en la foto, es low pass o high pass?
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I’ve fixed the above links so they display correctly (you had some spaces in the bbcode).

I’ve no idea what speakers you have, but they are not 5/8s! Or at least they certainly don’t look like my friends pair, which have the Quad 405-derived active amps. The whole of the bass driver is on view with his and they look to have a very different tweeter too.
 
Translation
Yes, the other box is spendor bc3.This Roger bought it to repair and had broken wiring. The original filter, which we see in the photo, is low pass or high pass?

It's not a filter. It is for tweeter level adjustment. There are no crossovers in LS5/8.
Tony L said:
I’ve fixed the above links so they display correctly (you had some spaces in the bbcode).

I’ve no idea what speakers you have, but they are not 5/8s! Or at least they certainly don’t look like my friends pair, which have the Quad 405-derived active amps. The whole of the bass driver is on view with his and they look to have a very different tweeter too.
Click to expand...

The left speaker is a Spendor bC3, as I suggested and the poster confirms. The other is an LS5/8 but a very early one.
The BBC Research paper shows it with an LF slot to adjust dispersion. This was later dropped.

See this. I had a couple of those and still have one of the baffle somewhere.
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/reports/1979-22.pdf
 
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