Leslie 60 speakers

[Alan Lenhoff]

I'm intrigued by seeing a couple of Leslie 60 speaker systems for sale in my area. I understand they were designed to be used with a Rhodes or Wurli, to provide a kind of stereo vibrato.

Anyone familiar with them?  Are they really cool -- or has newer amp/stompbox technology left them sounding lame?  I don't gig, so high volume isn't required.

[tomnardozza]

buy em!!!  they're awesome, but MAKE SURE the control box is with them....if not, they're useless

[latenite]

Leslie 60's have a pretty unique sound - not left behind by newer effects.  The effect is created by the Leslie "space generator" which my friend who got mine up and running says is created by motors rotating some plates to change the capacitance or something like that.  The sound is somewhere between a suitcase vibrato and a rotating speaker, leaning more to former than the later.  They're not terribly loud, but when I put a tube-pre in front of it, it sounds great and gives sufficient volume.  Mine has some noise (I think it's from the space generator), but not enough to be distracting unless you were playing a quiet solo gig.

$400-600 is a reasonable price for a functioning set, but don't buy one that's missing the control box.

[Seanfir]

Just landed a pair.
I'm likely going to restore and rebuild them right away before they stop functioning, as there are no shortage of non-working/incomplete examples...

There's a lot to them, so they're not for the faint of heart, or for anyone that doesn't have their own dedicated Tech! That's my strong suit, as I am the technician for probably half of the Midwest it seems lol!

Leslie was owned by CBS at this point but it doesn't mean they weren't still Leslie! They were cranking out new stuff and this is no exception in that it's what the previous poster said; something that has not been superseded by effects boxes as of yet, because the effect gotten is gotten by rather decadent and extremely complicated analog means... something along the lines of a Univibe, but instead of LDR's, (or light dependent resistors, phasing) they use an actual motor to turn a variable capacitor that creates both a pleasing vibrato/phasing effect and amplitude-based trem effect.

The space generator was probably one of the first truly close approximations of what a Leslie does, and was actually made by the company of the same name, originally to ad the said effect to the reverb units on their full sized Leslies ( which let's face it, is silly!)... though the univibe was also a special and similar product. These both offer the sound and attitude of an effect that typically can only be gotten in the physical realm, electronically, and in doing so can enhance things that would not be enhanceable in the real physical world!

That's where the magic really comes in. By literally phasing the sound against itself to create the pseudo Leslie effect, they go a little bit further than the Leslie ever could, giving you a nice swirly phase sound as well as the amplitude/volume effect of tremolo.

I'm also going to check out the speakers in this and see if they can be improved upon in any way, although I've never noticed them lacking; it would be nice to see if they have any more potential.

[Seanfir]

buy em!!!  they're awesome, but MAKE SURE the control box is with them....if not, they're useless

The control modules aren't that big of a deal. I've made them before.  There are a couple different varieties, one with a app amp preamplifier in it which is a little more complex but still pretty easy, and the passive version which is just basically a guitar plug and two potentiometers hooked up to the multi-pin cable which is I believe a standard 6 pin Molex connector. So basically two wires for the audio and then three wires a piece for the potentiometers but they all share the same ground so that equals 6.

[Seanfir]

Leslie 60's have a pretty unique sound - not left behind by newer effects.  The effect is created by the Leslie "space generator" which my friend who got mine up and running says is created by motors rotating some plates to change the capacitance or something like that.  The sound is somewhere between a suitcase vibrato and a rotating speaker, leaning more to former than the later.  They're not terribly loud, but when I put a tube-pre in front of it, it sounds great and gives sufficient volume.  Mine has some noise (I think it's from the space generator), but not enough to be distracting unless you were playing a quiet solo gig.

$400-600 is a reasonable price for a functioning set, but don't buy one that's missing the control box.

I'm curious if anyone knows if the hiss in these can be controlled in some way. I replaced the op amp in mine but I'm considering even removing it to see if that makes the noise specs better or not. I can get a preamp of some sort that will be quiet, I just like the sound of these and I'm trying to get them to be a little bit quieter.