I used to pester the hell out of H Alexander Dumble at his little shop on E Cliff dr. in Santa Cruz. I was horsing around with a little solid state practice amp (the first pignose had just come out) trying to make something sellable. It died on the vine.
Anyway, Howard built me an amp based on a Fender Rhodes piano amp (4- 6L6s). He did put his OD circuit in there. Anyway it had a 2 ohm output tranny and I used a single 8 ohm Altec 417-C 12" speaker. It was by far the best amplifier I've ever had. But I sold it years ago to pay rent or some such triviality. Since those days I've mostly waisted my life with a career. Now I'm semi retired.
6 Saturdays a week. I'm going to build up the Hybrid Amp rev A. With EL-34s. It needs to be absolutely tiny. I live on a boat. Some suggest that when you turn the Hybrid A down the tone is still there. That wasn't true of that very early one I had. '74? If it's too loud on the boat I'll make some sort of dummy load to run with it. Many more questions about that subject later.
Now, the 417-C was the cat's whiskers in those days. I understand now that some EV, Celestion, and Eminence (sp?) are the hot ticket. The Altec was very bright, having as much to do with the impedence mismatch to the 2 ohm secondary as anything else. Hadn't an amp ought to be voiced to the speaker anyway?
Are any of you using this classic speaker in any amp?
That, anyway, stands for an introduction to me. This is one heck of a great bunch of people. Maybe the last of them for all we know.
Dan Hall
Sausalito is my home. The Alaska Pipeline is my temporary (called out of retirement) work assignment. Inspection Services.