Matching vintage speakers - FabFilter Pro-Q...woah!

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BluegrassDan

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Just finished this video on the FabFilter Pro-Q's "EQ Match" feature. I was totally blown away at how well this plugin matched the tonal character of the reconed Jensen speaker to the original. Did not expect it to sound this good.

I can imagine this tool could be useful for lots of studio situations.

Check it out!

https://youtu.be/0BVL27OJdLo
 
Thats very cool Dan.   

Keeping the sound of an old amp is trickier than it sounds. No pun intended.    Nice use of match EQ.  I have Nugen SEQ and it has similar capabilities but not as straight forward .  I am an old amp collector and amazed at how my taste have changed over the years to qualities in the old amps with vintage speakers. 
 
I’m in conversation with someone who really knows old Jensen speakers. He has had little luck with over 50 recones. They all come back darker - something to do with the paper forming machines and the thickness of the new paper today.

If anyone know where to find recone material that matches the original timbre, please let me know.
 
Have you tried the Weber speakers.  I remember them going after the sound of old Jensen by trying to match paper which is unobtainable.  Not recone but maybe a better match.  Anybody?    This topic might do better in ampgarage.com. 
 
BluegrassDan said:
I have been considering trying a Weber 12A150W. It's supposed to be like a P12P.
I have a 12F150 in my 5e3 build and I love it. I haven’t compared to any vintage speakers though
 
BluegrassDan said:
I’m in conversation with someone who really knows old Jensen speakers. He has had little luck with over 50 recones. They all come back darker - something to do with the paper forming machines and the thickness of the new paper today.
It has probably a lot to do with the age and wear of the cone and suspension. Water content of new paper is 4-6%. A 50 year old cone is bound to have a fraction of %. That changes the damping, so cone resonances and break-up change significantly.
OTOH suspension gets more compliant so LF response changes also.
 
Something's not quite right. I have two early ribbed re-coned 50's Jensen P12Q (Q=40W vs R=25W). And the funny thing is that one actually looks exactly like that original one with the beat-up green bell housing. The problem I see is that they shouldn't sound that different. Mine both sound exactly the same. I would say either the re-cone was not done perfectly or the original one is just more "broken in" (makes me think abbey road d enfer is spot-on).

As an exercise, I once used a dummy load to run dry through an old inductor graphic EQ and adjusted to match Jensen's published curves for the P12Q just to see how close it was. It was very convincing. But just crushing everything above 5K and making the 15dB dip-then-boost to 2K with a broad dip at 400 was pretty close too.

I love those speakers. I mix them with the monitors when listening to music or even watching TV. They add a pop for sure. Most speakers are pretty flat by comparison. For recording voice and other mid-frequency instruments, the radical high frequency crush of an old Alnico speaker is hard to beat. Band-passing in general is underestimated IMHO. I love high/low cut filters like the Pultec HLF3C. I high/low cut just about everything to some degree. Almost as effective.
 
Ironically I use Fab Filter to hi and low cut everything. I use the Pultecs for flavor.

squarewave said:
Something's not quite right. I have two early ribbed re-coned 50's Jensen P12Q (Q=40W vs R=25W). And the funny thing is that one actually looks exactly like that original one with the beat-up green bell housing. The problem I see is that they shouldn't sound that different. Mine both sound exactly the same. I would say either the re-cone was not done perfectly or the original one is just more "broken in" (makes me think abbey road d enfer is spot-on).

As an exercise, I once used a dummy load to run dry through an old inductor graphic EQ and adjusted to match Jensen's published curves for the P12Q just to see how close it was. It was very convincing. But just crushing everything above 5K and making the 15dB dip-then-boost to 2K with a broad dip at 400 was pretty close too.

I love those speakers. I mix them with the monitors when listening to music or even watching TV. They add a pop for sure. Most speakers are pretty flat by comparison. For recording voice and other mid-frequency instruments, the radical high frequency crush of an old Alnico speaker is hard to beat. Band-passing in general is underestimated IMHO. I love high/low cut filters like the Pultec HLF3C. I high/low cut just about everything to some degree. Almost as effective.
 

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