Bose 601 series 2 rebuild questions

onwardjames said:

What you call "botches" most of us call "Thank god that's done!"

When you apply the badges, I'll consider you having crossed the finish line.
And while everyone is trying to convince you to keep them, as they are a fine speaker + the love you've invested, I understand.

Priorities are priorities. And the taxman cometh, as I seem to recall. :scratch2:

Click to expand...

Yeah, the badges will be quite a milestone, eh? Will still need the foam for around the horn. And I realized the other day I still need to paint the exposed white filler on one side. Remember the missing corner and peeled veneer? I bought the dark brown paint a while back. That'll take about 4.6 minutes.



We've come a long way baby.

Biggles

Well, they're DONE!

(still gotta rig up a foot on one of them)

Its apparent the speakers set near a wall getting sun...tweeters on right side are a little sun faded.

I soldered the wires together that had previously held the bulb/fuses. May do something about that later, probably not.

Pics include the 4 new resistors from Digikey. They're 20 watt, 1 ohm, otherwise identical. Old ones were 15 watt, 1 ohm.

All caps had pulled loose, I hot glued them back down. New resistors glued down and soldered to posts.


They've still got much dust, and some cosmetics to clean up.

I have them on a Yamah M60 power amp, with a 6 disc pioneer run directly into the amp. No pre. It's just an old rental house on my property where I store junk, all my good gear is in the house.

The sound.....

Well, it's different. I can definitely see jazz sounding nice on these. I played Tears For Fears The Seeds of Love thru them, and was pleasantly surprised. Bass very tight, expect woofers to loosen up a bit after the refoam.

As many have stated, these are great for background music. Don't know if I could deal with that imaging, tho.

I'm trying not to like them, as they were bought strictly to flip.
However, I suck at flipping.

May audition them tmw, as we have a helluva cold front moving in, and I'm off.

Here's some pics of my sloppy work. And my feets.

Grills to be washed and reinstalled tmw.

Conclusions....

Okay, grill guides and grills back on.

Lost foot problem solved with wine cork and screw. Works fabulously. Its one of those artificial corks, will hold up just fine. Screw head countersunk to prevent scratching.

Initial listening in kitchen (acoustically good listening spot) with Sony 7065 and laptop/hard drive reveals the magic....

I get it. These are enveloping for lack of a better word.

Highs a little on the sibilant side (no fuses causing this??) but not terrible.

The more I listen, the more I want to keep.

DAMMIT.

Its all good. Thank you to everyone who has been of help in this thread. This has been one of my more challenging speaker rebuilds. I didn't cut corners (fuse issue aside) and finally feel like I've got refoams under my belt.

Now, I must live up to my word, and put these on the chopping block. I promised the wife I would, and she's a good woman, so off they go.

Thanks, everyone. :thmbsp:

I forgot final pics...

You're awesome, they look absolutely fabulous. I'm really jealous, would love to get my hands and ears on a pair. Take some good shots and get them up on BT and CL today. Bam, done.

xo, Biggles

drbiggles said:

You're awesome, they look absolutely fabulous. I'm really jealous, would love to get my hands and ears on a pair. Take some good shots and get them up on BT and CL today. Bam, done.

xo, Biggles

Click to expand...

Ditto.

I couldn't believe the way the Infinity's (early shot) dwarfed the 601. What were those Infinity speakers? 15" woofer? Gads.

Based on your review I'm thinking I'll like them. Maybe some day some will pop up nearby.

Nice work!

drbiggles said:

You're awesome, they look absolutely fabulous. I'm really jealous, would love to get my hands and ears on a pair. Take some good shots and get them up on BT and CL today. Bam, done.

xo, Biggles

Click to expand...

I been looking for a reason to re-subscribe. Time to do just that.

Copa1934 said:

Ditto.

I couldn't believe the way the Infinity's (early shot) dwarfed the 601. What were those Infinity speakers? 15" woofer? Gads.

Based on your review I'm thinking I'll like them. Maybe some day some will pop up nearby.

Nice work!

Click to expand...

Thanks very much. I been listening all afternoon, and I just keep trying not to like them, and failing.

Last night I spun Amy Winehouse "Our Day Will Come" and those little Pioneer SP-B22-LR speakers were just uhh-maaayyy-zing. Could really retire the hunt with only those. I jest not.

But today, listening to these 601's, it reminds me of that thread where Brent was considering tossing it all due to bad ears. My ears are horrible, and while I think perhaps once I cross the 10 watt threshold I'm missing those fuse lamps (anyone know when those would start to dial back the highs?) I am really GROOVING to these. The highs are high, the lows are low, and sound is everywhere. No such thing as the sweet spot. The entire room is the sweet spot.

They're FUN! Forget analytical, forget imaging. They're just a hoot.

A tad too much sibilance, but really engaging, and isn't the music what it's really about? Or is that the hokey-pokey?

Those Infinity's are the much-maligned SM152's. 15'' woofer. Parents bought me those, so I cannot ever part with them. Already regret selling my Stratocaster they bought me (and 50 watt Marshall stack) so they stay. With work, they're not as bad as everyone makes out.

I think the reason it is so fun to bash those speakers is that Infinity should have known better. Corners cut everywhere.

Anyhow, gonna hurt a little to see the Bose go.

onwardjames said:

But today, listening to these 601's, it reminds me of that thread where Brent was considering tossing it all due to bad ears. My ears are horrible, and while I think perhaps once I cross the 10 watt threshold I'm missing those fuse lamps (anyone know when those would start to dial back the highs?) I am really GROOVING to these. The highs are high, the lows are low, and sound is everywhere. No such thing as the sweet spot. The entire room is the sweet spot.

Click to expand...

I don't believe I'm wrong here when I say, fuses blow when you crank up your amp and overdrive your speakers. They don't do anything to the sound. They blow, not your tweeters. That's all there is to that.

Biggles

drbiggles said:

I don't believe I'm wrong here when I say, fuses blow when you crank up your amp and overdrive your speakers. They don't do anything to the sound. They blow, not your tweeters. That's all there is to that.

Biggles

Click to expand...

Well, cool, then.

At around 10 watts or so, they're honking plenty for me.

All I can say to anyone who finds these, they're kinda like the Wreckedilinears, in that the design isn't supposed to work, yet does so wonderfully.

onwardjames said:

Well, cool, then.

At around 10 watts or so, they're honking plenty for me.

All I can say to anyone who finds these, they're kinda like the Wreckedilinears, in that the design isn't supposed to work, yet does so wonderfully.

Click to expand...

Hooboy, the Altecs at 10 to 20 hurt me physically. The Wreckedilinears are beauties from 1 to a solid 110 watts without breaking a sweat. Effortless. I'm sure those 601s can swallow quite a bit as well.

Biggles

Oh the late night Friday night...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSSvzCNBvlQ

I rebuilt a set of those approx. 20 years ago, bought all new drivers from Bose and they gave me some those ceramic resistors . Yea the ones that break off. I have had those as my fronts in my surround system since and have been very happy with them. Last Saturday I brought home a set of JSE speakers and unhooked the 601`s. The next day, I hooked the 601`s up to my SAE 2401 amp, SAE 2100 preamp and a classic 5.5 I pod. OMG! I forgot how good those 601`s can sound! I agree that these are the best sounding speakers that Bose made and yes, I had a set of 901`s with "major juice" running thru them. Sounded great, but way different.
I have found that the 601` sound the best set up in the corners of a room. (IMO) Play around with the distance from the walls, mine are around 24" form the walls.
Once you get those "all tweeked in" they will hard to let go. LOL! I just realized that this thread is 2 years old ! GEEZ

Welcome, thermoluddys!

I swore to sell these 601's....but here they sit.

In another thread, I see you sold your 601 ii. How long ago? Did you ever have to replace/recone the tweeters? Old thread, so sorry for resurrecting the dead.

SuperDaveOz said:

In another thread, I see you sold your 601 ii. How long ago? Did you ever have to replace/recone the tweeters? Old thread, so sorry for resurrecting the dead.

Click to expand...

Hey there!! I sold these i believe in late '16 or early 2017, I forget. I never replaced nor reconed the tweeters. Did replace those crummy resistors, as the leads broke, and left the stock poly caps.

While I tripled my investment, I made the guy promise if he ever sold, I'd get first dibs.

So many speakers, so little time.