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Realistic Optimus-2B Near Mint

plazmaplanna

plazmaplanna

Active Member
Boy did your dollar go further back in these days....can't believe the MSRP on these things...anyways got these at GW for $7 :D...deals are getting harder to find there so that made me happy. Woofers/Tweeters are perfect and the cabinets exterior is very good not great....some water stains (On top) and a few nicks. The grills are I would say 8/10 definitely not bad at all. Eventually I'll tear into them to look at the crossover...but I like to listen to em as is before I do that. Anyways...enough rambling here they are.
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They are 8 ohms but I do not know the wattage. I would guess they can handle 40w? Not sure...I'm sure someone knows as their bigger brothers are popular.
 
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Worked for RS in HS and college. Sold about 11 of them. They were just average then.

Tear into them and make sure the speakers themselves are ok (cones, spiders, suspensions). Then yank the XO and rebuild them.

You can also gut them and sand and poly the finish, and replace that old grill cloth.

Those old screws can be replace by decent binding posts too.
 
Bad crossover then you say KKnight? I'll have to take a look soon..very soon. I like the grill cloth for now. The binding posts are a bit of a pain ha....how many watts are they rated for do ya think?
 
While it's not listed as new, it first appears in 75

http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/html/1975/h024.html

Appears 76 was the last year for this model. It also appears that RS didn't start stating power handling till around 77. This might have been due to RMS not being formalized till 74 and adopted by the rest of the industry. I remember those days all too well, RMS vs IPPS (which was Instant Peak).
 
Had a set of those for years, swapped all the drivers before I knew anything about efficiencies and crossovers points, etc... finally put them to the curb after they got wet and the cabinets swelled...
 
Broke into them today, knight is correct the crossover is a little lack luster but could maybe be kept intact and improved...eventually. I took some pictures of the inside and the woofer and tweeter. You wouldn't believe how much insulation was inside there, 8 squares of it in 1 speaker and the same in the other...so took a picture of that. I replaced it with some higher quality stuff and a little bit of the same. I also put a little more filler in the tweeter seals. Overall I think the sound improved quite a bit from these little steps I took.
All of the following pictures are with the original insulation/filler.

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Only half of the total insulation from the two speakers...
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Ah...so. My first "real" audio speakers after plastic all-in-ones and such. Bought them for $79 for the pair plus tax (on sale, of course) during the year off between high school and college.

Worked well for my bedroom living with parents but failed miserably when I moved out to the Frat house. Much too "small" in punch and dynamics. I was using a mid-sixties tube integrated which didn't help much. Amazed that they held up despite the abuse. As with many speakers of the era they were great for background listening.
 
As said they use same drivers as the Nova 6's which were rated for 60 watts. Your 40 is probably a safe bet
 
I was curious...if anyone had some good ideas for drivers....I like the low bass these produce but they plateau after so much wattage. I'd like to replace them with something more modern, the same for the tweeter as well. Also...if anyone has time- ideas on cap/resistor replacement ideas on the crossover...though that would be after I establish what replacement speakers. Would like the speakers to be rated at 8 ohms so the crossover doesn't have to be re-designed completely and is more of strait swap. Also comparable 40hz or lower is preferable at decent DB but 45 would do maybe...tweeter is less a concern as loud treble can hurt my ears pretty easily.
 
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