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Kef 107

foxwelljsly

foxwelljsly

Me too, I ate one sour too.
Thinking about picking up a pair of 107's or 107.2s. And wondered if there were any users, or former users, here that might be able to offer their observations.

I have no doubt that, in good order, these will be among the best passive domestic loudspeakers ever made, but they are getting long in the tooth and many will be in need of a bit of TLC by now.

Thoughts on positioning? Are the tweeters ferrofluid? Do any of the cone suspensions degrade over time? Is there mileage in recapping thr crossovers? Is the Kube worthwhile or best left alone? Are drop in replacements for the tweeters available?

I plan to use them with some flavour of big Quad power amp (606/707/909/QSP/QMP/Artera Stereo) and they will be firing down a large room with a low ceiling about 50-100cm from the corners.

Any observations from users gratefully received.

Cheers
 
The 107 is one of these speakers that no-one seems to speak much about. I have always wanted a pair.

Immediately upon reading your post now, a slight alarm bell rang when I read the words "low ceiling".
As you may know, the 107s twin bass drivers vent out and upwards at the position of the head. There is a report from the KEF history book (I have forgotten the title) which recalls a customer issue with someone lacking bass from their 107s. This was in a basement installation with a low ceiling. A pair of Quad ESL57 had better bass in this location, impossible though that may seem. I'll dig out the proper reference later. The fact that the room is big might help with this- how big is it?

The 107/2 T33 tweeters definitely have ferrofluid. Unsure about the 107 ones. There ARE t33 substitutes available although of course not exactly the same response. Someone had Raal ribbon tweeters fitted on theirs and said it was fantastic. It's doable.

Bass driver surrounds rot. By now many examples will have been refoamed- check for this in any for sale- sellers tend to mention this as a plus point.

Mid drivers and tweeters usually fine (other than the aforementioned ferrofluid). Midrange is polypropylene.

Crossovers are a good shout- good chance the electrolytic caps have drifted well off spec by now. Again a plus point in examples for sale.

Your positioning sounds about right. Give them more out from the sides than from the rear wall if possible. In any case 50cm from the back wall should be adequate but experiment with more.

Quad 909 should be an excellent choice. The 107 is a purely resistive load by design (I mean flat at 4Ω over the frequency spectrum).

Apologies if you already know a lot of this! Any more thoughts or questions, fire away.
 
Hi, I have a pair of 107/2 , I have done the donuts, foam surrounds and the ferrofluid which probably took about 4 hours in total.
They are the best speakers that I have ever heard.
I run mine with a quad vena ( acting as the pre ) and a quad 909.
 
The Finisher said:
Hi, I have a pair of 107/2 , I have done the donuts, foam surrounds and the ferrofluid which probably took about 4 hours in total.
They are the best speakers that I have ever heard.
I run mine with a quad vena ( acting as the pre ) and a quad 909.
Click to expand...
Cheers. That's reassuring. Much trouble getting the cabs apart? Have you changed the crossover caps?
 
The cabs came apart easily. I I did mark the woofers top and bottom but made the mistake of not marking their position in cabs which turned out to be important because when I put the bottom one back in I had basically turned which meant the wires were too far away from the connectors on the driver .
I’m not going to recap the bottom end. The new capacitors arrived yesterday for the mids and tweeters but I have since read that because Kef couldn’t get caps of precise values they would actually make the induction coils to match the caps ( hence the speakers being reference) , trouble is when Kef was sold the new owners destroyed all the individual value records for each reference speaker so it’s impossible to know what the precise value of the caps were when first fitted .
I intend to recap one head this weekend and compare the 2 speakers and also measure the old caps.
 
I had a pair of original 107 from new. Used to do contract assembly work for Kef, direct from the factory at £600 plus VAT each after Laurie Fincham demonstrated them at the factory.

The one thing that I would never believe is an owner complaining of lack of bass, simply awesome and the best passive speakers I heard in many years. Still regret selling them, after 10 years use.
 
canonman said:
I had a pair of original 107 from new. Used to do contract assembly work for Kef, direct from the factory at £600 plus VAT each after Laurie Fincham demonstrated them at the factory.

The one thing that I would never believe is an owner complaining of lack of bass, simply awesome and the best passive speakers I heard in many years. Still regret selling them, after 10 years use.
Click to expand...

oh yes the bass is great, down to 18,000hz with the Kube .
 
The Finisher said:
oh yes the bass is great, down to 18,000hz with the Kube .
Click to expand...

Hi...i just picked up a pair of Kef 107s and I am currently on the restoration journey:
- I had the bass drivers surrounds refoamed (all went well)
- the caps were also replaced on the cross-overs for the bass drivers (I purchases the original manufactures caps ALCAP from falcon acoustics.co.uk /// btw 2 of the original caps out of the 16 were toast)
- my next step is to replace the ferro fluid in the t33 tweeters and to replace the caps (20) in the tweeter and midrange head assembly
- Kube seems to be working fine.... not sure if I should replace caps?

My question is .... I am looking for info on how to take apart the tweeter/midrange heads so that I can have the caps replaced, and what is the best way to remove the tweeters to have the fluid replaced.

Any help would be much appreciated
Thanks in advance
 
FWIW i picked up a T33 replacement for 102's from Falcon and it's not a 1:1 replacement, the threads are spaced differently and it's more sensitive.
 
Kef 107 restoration complete (no work done to Kube as it is working fine)
- new surrounds and grommets for the drivers
- replaced caps on the crossovers for the driver units and the tweeter/mid heads
- replaced the ferrofluid in the tweeters

I am having trouble creating a link via google photos for pics... will keep trying

If anyone needs help or more info on this restoration let me know.
 
I think I remember seeing them in Laskys in the St James Centre, Edinburgh next to a Quad pre power and an AR Legend with an AT1120 on it. Never had a cartridge any time I passed...
 
rbg said:
Kef 107 restoration complete (no work done to Kube as it is working fine)
- new surrounds and grommets for the drivers
- replaced caps on the crossovers for the driver units and the tweeter/mid heads
- replaced the ferrofluid in the tweeters

I am having trouble creating a link via google photos for pics... will keep trying

If anyone needs help or more info on this restoration let me know.
Click to expand...
Awesome work. My 107 itch has been placed on hold in favour of some landscaping work, but I will get a pair one day.

How do they sound? Have you tried them without the Kube?
 
foxwelljsly said:
Awesome work. My 107 itch has been placed on hold in favour of some landscaping work, but I will get a pair one day.

How do they sound? Have you tried them without the Kube?
Click to expand...



Most of the stuff I read says the speakers were designed with the Kube, as an integrated unit... also it provides "tuning" of the sound to your room/ears/music type as I do not have any treble/bass controls on my amp/preamp....so I did not bother to set up without the Kube.... I will some day if I have to disconnect.

With respect to how they sound.... as with any speaker the sound can vary significantly based on the turntable/cartridge/amp setup...
For my setup I am very impressed (and also had a few friends over for critical listening...we generally agree on)
- the overall clarity is excellent, very very clean
- the range from high to lows is very broad
- the bass is true, comes easy, without effort

After the many hours of the research/restoration (at times I was wondering what I got myself into) it was well worth breathing life back into the 107's. I can now sit back and thoroughly enjoy!
 
My FIL had some from New Years ago. They were in some ways the most impressive speakers I have ever heard. I can still remember the intro of Also Sprach Zarathustra pouring out of them. It was hair raising( I had hair then).
 
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