1960's Vox LS-40 PA speakers +ac 50

newnostalgia · 12th August 2011

Hi, I just bought a set of 2 Vox LS-40 Pa speakers, to go with the 1967 vox ac-50.

I bought these speakers hoping that they were grenadiers collumns hoping to get a badass sound out of my Ac-50. As i have little to no knowledge of these Ls-40s except that they are 4x10 inch speakers and that they were designed to be PA speakers. as my ac-50 is getting worked on in the shop i have no idea how they sound together yet.

Are these speakers good for guitar play aswell, or are they strictly vocal focused speakers?

Any extra info on these speakers is welcome and much appreciated as there is very, very little information about them on the net. voxshowroom.com has a tiny article on them, for the rest i havent seen anything.

also the speakers are 16 Ohm a piece and the ac-50 has the choice of using either 16 or 8. as i dont know how the conversion of ohms goes. if u know which setting I should switch to, I would love to know

thanks in advance!

drbob1 · 15th August 2011

Wow, hard to know what you've got there. First off, I'm not sure the speaker column idea is great for guitar. They tend to be more treble oriented (for reproducing vocals). Of course, you can remount the speakers in a 410 cab and that would solve that problem. You can build or buy a 410 cab for not too much money.

Second question is, what speakers are they? Celestion made many, but not all of Vox speakers in England in the early 60s. If you can get a frame number (usually 4 or 5 digits) that should help identify what you've got along with the cone number. If you can find the Marshall book by Michael Doyle, he has descriptions of all the Celestion speakers from the 60s.

3rd, what condition are the cones in? Often speakers from that era will need reconing before they sound good.

newnostalgia · 16th August 2011

Thank you very much for the reply. I opened up the Collumnes today an
d took some pictures. One of the collumns seems to be totally original and has all vox speakers inside and i couldnt read the numbers on them as the print is barely readable i think it said 8015 something or 8150 I'm not sure, ill open it again tommorow and get back to you if i can somehow decipher what is says. The other collumn looks to be identical, but missing the vox stickers, and one of the speakers has been replaces with a random speaker. The cabinets have different logos and im not sure if they are from the same set/same year or that the logo has just been replaced over the years.

here are some pictures:

drbob1 · 16th August 2011

Those appear to be cast frame speakers, as opposed to bent sheet metal? That'd make it unlikely that they're Celestion, as every celestion I've seen has been a bend metal chassis. They actually look like Fanes to me, cast metal frames in a hammerite finish. If so, those are super cool, although good luck finding anything out about them (Fane records are really poor).

The guys at ampaholics.UK (Ampaholics.org.uk,Vintage speakers ,Amps,Cabs,Spares,CDs,Celestion,Goodmans,Elac,vox blues,Alnicos ,original ,recones repair service offer,d) know way more about this than I do, why not email them?

Those cabs are not going to sound great for guitar, and that extra speaker is pretty suspect in my mind (big, ugly ceramic beast). I'd consider getting a nice baltic ply 410 or 610 cab made for those speakers. BTW, what ohms are they (disconnect the speaker from the cab and measure ohms across the terminals, then multiply by a fudge factor somewhere around 1.3)?

12th August 2011	#1
newnostalgia Gear interested Joined: Feb 2011 Posts: 4 Thread Starter	1960's Vox LS-40 PA speakers +ac 50 Hi, I just bought a set of 2 Vox LS-40 Pa speakers, to go with the 1967 vox ac-50. I bought these speakers hoping that they were grenadiers collumns hoping to get a badass sound out of my Ac-50. As i have little to no knowledge of these Ls-40s except that they are 4x10 inch speakers and that they were designed to be PA speakers. as my ac-50 is getting worked on in the shop i have no idea how they sound together yet. Are these speakers good for guitar play aswell, or are they strictly vocal focused speakers? Any extra info on these speakers is welcome and much appreciated as there is very, very little information about them on the net. voxshowroom.com has a tiny article on them, for the rest i havent seen anything. also the speakers are 16 Ohm a piece and the ac-50 has the choice of using either 16 or 8. as i dont know how the conversion of ohms goes. if u know which setting I should switch to, I would love to know thanks in advance!

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15th August 2011	#2
drbob1 Lives for gear Joined: Nov 2009 Posts: 1,420 3 Reviews written	Wow, hard to know what you've got there. First off, I'm not sure the speaker column idea is great for guitar. They tend to be more treble oriented (for reproducing vocals). Of course, you can remount the speakers in a 410 cab and that would solve that problem. You can build or buy a 410 cab for not too much money. Second question is, what speakers are they? Celestion made many, but not all of Vox speakers in England in the early 60s. If you can get a frame number (usually 4 or 5 digits) that should help identify what you've got along with the cone number. If you can find the Marshall book by Michael Doyle, he has descriptions of all the Celestion speakers from the 60s. 3rd, what condition are the cones in? Often speakers from that era will need reconing before they sound good.

16th August 2011	#3
newnostalgia Gear interested Joined: Feb 2011 Posts: 4 Thread Starter	Thank you very much for the reply. I opened up the Collumnes today an d took some pictures. One of the collumns seems to be totally original and has all vox speakers inside and i couldnt read the numbers on them as the print is barely readable i think it said 8015 something or 8150 I'm not sure, ill open it again tommorow and get back to you if i can somehow decipher what is says. The other collumn looks to be identical, but missing the vox stickers, and one of the speakers has been replaces with a random speaker. The cabinets have different logos and im not sure if they are from the same set/same year or that the logo has just been replaced over the years. here are some pictures: