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Views on the Celestion 15's (dittons?)

Back to Dittons, I bought a pair of Ditton 10s and repaired them.
I was surprised how good they sounded compared with my Harbeth P3s.
They were sold to a happy buyer in Taiwan.

He said they were wonderful.
Told me old English speakers are really liked in his country.
 
Ditton 15's... I've heard them sound surprisingly good and also bloody awful and in just the ways described by others up thread....
Back when I was about 15-16 and dinosaurs roamed the earth a good mate had a set with a JVC JAS11G amp and Technics belt drive TT with EPC-270C cart and they turned in what seemed to me a good performance.

Just a few months back I was doing the sound at a gig in a huge barn and a guy there had set up a system for music after the gig which was a Sony "all in one" "mini system" with an immaculate pair of 15XR's... now bearing in mind the aircraft hanger like size of this barn I thought this would be completely useless but in fact it turned in an amazing performance! I was actually given first refusal on them a few months later at a funeral but I turned them down... They were in such good nick that they would have been worth more as 1970's objet d'art than I would have been willing to pay for them as a mediocre hi fi speaker...

I do have a set actually but they have been painted matt black at some point in their life and the tweeters are missing....
I also have a set of Celestion Hadleigh that I used in the workshop some time ago and a set of Celestion UL6's, which I really rate!
 
Stunsworth said:
Well, not blue LEDs anyhow.

Re UL6s, many years ago Celestion exhibited half a dozen or more, one on top of the other, as a line source. Sadly I can’t remember how they sounded.
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Fashion is non existent to me.... if something looks good it stays looking good and does not cease to because "someone somewhere" decrees it no longer looks good.... FWIW I always found blue LED's naff and never used them myself. I do however really like a blue lit display on a receiver:)

Interesting use for UL6's there! I recall mine sounding very good... as in good enough to rival modern £1000 bookshelf speakers... I re-capped them with film capacitors and converted them to bi-wire operation many years ago and a mate bought them off me in this form but I later got them back in a swap for something long forgotten... not before my mate had decided to paint them black unfortunately! He made a good job of it but they were much better looking in the original very nice veneer.
 
Hoopsontoast said:
hi, anyone heard the Celestion 15 (mabye ditton model) from the late 60's-70's, i might be able to aquire them and are they any good?
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I know that this thread is very old but I'll throw in my $0.02. The Celestion 15 original version are a very well designed and executed speaker system. I suspect that the poor reviews are a factor of low quality amplification and source equipment, poor synergy, tired crossover capacitors, poor placement and/or room acoustics - and in some cases all of these factors combined. I purchased a beautiful original pair for $150 and recapped them with Dayton audio grade capacitors (single cap on each crossover). They are sited on 16" mass loaded stands and dialed in to the millimeter in terms of position in relation to the room boundaries and listening distance (this takes time - weeks to dial in properly). My equipment is not super high end but it is good. Systemdek llX turntable with an outboard DC power supply and a $700 AT cartridge, Jolida JD-9 phono stage with Tung Sol tubes and a completely rebuilt/restored 1964 Heathkit AA-32 tube amplifier (with NOS Mullards) that puts out 8 wpc on a good day. I stream via an iFi Zen DAC and cabling is Unity Audio solid core throughout. Sound quality? Superb! Tight, deep bass, an outstanding midrange and a very real and true to life top end - not tilted and unrealistically emphasized like so many modern (and expensive) speakers of today. The 15's image very well, provide for a very believable sound stage and create a good sense of depth with the tube amplification. I've been through a lot of speakers in my enthusiasm over the past 40 years but these are very high on my list of favorites - and they among some pretty lofty company. With all of the considerations mentioned above attended to, the 15's provide for a very musical offering that sounds correct by just getting out of the way. If you know what that means and you're experiencing this with your audio system, then you've nailed it.
 
Yay...good review. Always liked the Ditton 15s. You should try the Ditton 25s. I have a pair on a Tandbefrg 2075 reciever with an Arcam Alpha 8 cdp and they sound lovely. I always hankered after a pair of Kef Concertos and finally found a pair but they are not as good as the Ditton 25s
 
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