Eminence L'il Buddy. Has a hemp cone. I fitted one to my Fender 65 Princeton Reverb Reissue and was very happy with it. It was on recommendation from other board members here.
Yeah, I have seen that one mentioned a LOT but it has almost always been in combination with others in multi speaker cabinets. Thanks for the heads up!
---------- Tom "Bad Paw" Lauten Loch Ness, Scotland www.nimbacreations.com
Last Edited by Tom Lauten on May 14, 2019 3:04 AM
I’m sure I don’t know what’s best, but I installed a Weber 10A125-O in my silverface princeton reverb and it was much improved over the stock speaker. I have a celestion tube 10 in my SE6L6. It was very horrible when new, and still a bit horrible now. I probably should play that amp a bit more and see if it gets better, but I seem to keep plugging different speakers into it for instant gratification
I used a 10" Eminence Lil' Buddy in my '61 Gibson Explorer, push-pull 6V6 tweed circuit. I had not liked the bright tone of the amp. I tried a Jensen Alnico reissue and it was bright, but not in a good way. The Lil' Buddy fixed the brightness issue without needing circuit mods. I also use a Lil' Buddy with my EHX 44 Magnum as my sit-in amp. The 44 Magnum has enough power that when you push it the sound is gets some cut, but still not that "ratty" sound. I like the speaker for the sound I want: smooth distortion and not so much hair on the sound.
However, for a single ended 6V6 amp you may want more cut, more "ratty" sound, and not so much "smooth". A Weber Signature 10 (probably not 10S) might work for that sound. It would cut...
So despite really liking the Lil' Buddy for harp, it all comes down to what sound you want and what amp. I don't have any single ended amps, my tube amps are all push-pull. ----------
Tom: I tried a few different speakers in my Kalamazoo - a Jensen Jet Tornado, Eminence 1028k, and Weber 10A125O with H dustcap if I recall. I picked the Weber as it had the most musical sound of the bunch and a nice breakup at optimal volume.
On a different note, do you have any cool Nessie stories?
I’ve got a Harptrain speaker in my Harptrain 10 amp. Love the sound but realize the speaker was made for that amp and it’s circuit and controls. How it would sound in a different cab, circuit, wattage, etc is hard to predict. Also I swapped out the 12ax tube for a 12ay to reduce feedback and it does alter the tone. The early breakup varies with the “Balls” setting on the Harptrain 10. Again, I don’t know how that would respond with different circuitry.
Oh, I also have a Lil Buddy in a Fender Super Champ XD whose tone I also love.
Last Edited by ME.HarpDoc on May 15, 2019 3:11 PM
I have brought several Teb Weber speakers over the last 20 years and I know for sure that the dust caps cut down on the shrill highs from conversations with them and my own experiences as well! I have even ordered dust caps to glue on the ones that did not have them and it works, doping acts as a shock absorber at high volume to reduce ghost notes and cone cry !
I would LOVE a Weber 10A125O but unfortunately there are no stockists here in the UK anymore and shipping from the States is near enough the same price as the speaker...It’s getting insane! Can’t get a 10” WGS Veteran either! ---------- Tom "Bad Paw" Lauten Loch Ness, Scotland www.nimbacreations.com
Tom, maybe you can't get Weber or WGS speakers over there, but we can't get Tombo harmonicas over here.
Speaker experimenting can get pretty expensive. I bought Weber and was happy so I stayed with them. If I was going to experiment, I think I'd follow Doug S's advice.
Something I have been doing of late is cannibalizing speakers out of old organs. My theory on this is, they would have been selected (by engineeers) for organ voicing which is right up our alley, most have lived a charmed life (for a speaker anyway-easy break in/low volumes) and a lot of them are alnico.
I just did a quick search for Lil' Buddy speaker with a smaller amp and found this video of a 5 watt amp with a 10" Lil' Buddy. I don't know the amp, the player, mic, or anything but what you see.
I thought it sounded pretty good.
Also, here is my previously posted video of EHX 44 Magnum to a Lil' Buddy using 4 mics. I cued this up to the Astatic Biscuit with CM element. This was a quick and dirty audio track with pictures added. I wanted it to break up and it was a bit too loud for the room in which I recorded, thus the occasional ringing.
Here is another single ended amp through a Lil' Buddy, played by Nic Clark a while back.
I like the Lil' Buddy for harp! ----------
Doug S.
Last Edited by dougharps on May 19, 2019 2:39 PM
