In the “I didn’t expect that” category, I’ve been offered a pair of IPL S5TL speakers. Here, in New Zealand. Cabinets were professionally built 12 years ago, and the ribbon is a Fountek, not the more recent IPL own item.
I have fond memories of the IPL M3TLM speakers I had some years ago. Some folk may have seen/heard them at Scalford in the early days of the HFWw Show. This tells me there are significant gains to be had by spending time and money on the crossovers.
These are kind-of the big brother. Claimed response of 22Hz - 30kHz.
The best bit? The price. A basic S5TL kit (driver units, crossover kits, instructions) listed at over £600 in 2021 when the IPL doors closed. No cabinets, etc. The ones I’m offered work perfectly, are in very good condition, and can be mine for (NZ) $400. That’s about £200.
I’ll need to look at the woofer cone. Doesn’t appear to affect sound, and I could just leave the covers on, but I’ll know it’s not right.
They’re a 10" woofer & given their pictured placement end on to a Chesterfield sofa it’s easy to spot that the Fountek ribbon tweeters (ITL’s own on the later iterations) are more or less at knee level from a seated position.
There’s a build & review thread on the Wam, which I can’t seem to link to which is very positive. Given this & Ivan, the designers known prowess in speaker builds/design I reckon they’ll be well worth giving a go!
To maximise the length of the line within a given cabinet height. The line is in three sections inside, so from the woofer goes down (at the back), up again (in the middle) and down again (at the front). You could take the mid and tweeter off and mount them in a separate box on top if you want. As they are now they will be a bit low for normal seating, so the speakers are often mounted on 4 inch stands - which is also claimed to reduce bass / floor interaction.
Putting mid and tweeter on top might get them a bit too high, but worth a try if you fancy playing with sheetwood. They should sound nice either way.
(If anyone in the UK wants a pair then I have some older ones (different drivers) cluttering the lounge…)
I managed to sneak them into the house! Actually quite easy… Mrs was away for a few days…
Bit of a rush job to set them up which involved using a SMSL SA98E amp, and an old NuForce Icon Mobile DAC connected to a laptop.
They’re really quite good. Bass? Definitely, but that was expected. What was more of a pleasant surprise is the mids, treble and overall precision. Bass is a bit woolly at the moment but setup is a very long way from ideal.
Nice to listen to at low volume with good, tight bass (it seems tighter at lower volume); that’s something that I have often found missing even from some very expensive systems.
No idea how loud they could go - much louder than I want, that’s for sure.
They really don’t look like much, but I’m sure Mrs will be happy to dress them up a bit.
Yep.
Definitely good sounding speakers. Older build so checking components is a good idea.
Unsurprisingly Mrs is less than thrilled with the appearance.
Ivan used to offer veneer kits for the speakers so I can look into that as a way of hiding the plain, unfinished MDF. Or they could be painted - if they were manufactured similarly to Ocellias, the paint used might be important. Can’t see it being as relevant with 22mm (I think) MDF
Grilles… They’re very lightweight, which is fine. But (apparently ) black cloth isn’t aesthetically pleasing. “Could we use lightweight canvas, and I’ll paint it?” was a question, and I’m reasonably confident that’s a “No.”
However, I’m hoping differently-coloured acoustically-transparent material might be available. Anyone know of anything suitable?
) black cloth isn’t aesthetically pleasing. “Could we use lightweight canvas, and I’ll paint it?” was a question, and I’m reasonably confident that’s a “No.”