Nice score! How much did you pay for it? I'm
always in the market for a sweet deal on 215S or 200S cabs, and I guess I just want to torture myself with someone else's good fortune...
The 215S is one of the most versatile cabs I’ve ever swapped drivers in, it really sounds good with any driver I’ve tried in it.
Last weekend I gigged my “go to” 215S loaded with EVM15L’s using a Reeves Custom 400 and it sounded glorious. Nice tight bottom and sweet mids and highs, I was hitting it pretty hard too;
stupid strong amp un-assisted in a hard rock cover trio in a 150 person venue, tight and defined, no flab or chuffing.
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Originally Posted by f64  Congrats - that's a great cab. I picked up one a few years ago and have since had to recone both speakers. Partly because I play it near it's max values, partly because of the age of the speakers. There are plenty of posts walking you through reconing here if you're up to it. Check the speaker codes and look at eBay for NOS cone kits. If they are JBL's you'd be best to recone it with original parts. Kits are going for $80 to $100 and it will take you 30 minutes to do each. One of the best suggestions I got here was to use a lazy-susan to turn the speaker frame on. As you squeeze out glue you turn the frame and it helps keep a consistant bead and speeds up the process. Good Luck and keep everyone posted. |
By the time the 215S came out Sunn no longer used JBL for OEM “premium” drivers. The upgrade was Cerwin Vega in that era. However if you were "somebody" Sunn would put in anything you wanted to pay for, my 215S came from the factory with D140F’s but it was an aberration.
My cab was part of a special endorsement deal where JBL’s were specified as part of that agreement, but they were
not offered as OEM through retail purchase.
Also, as far “factory” recone kits,
AFAIK AlNiCo D and K kits are unavailable, and have been obsolete for years. I’m not saying that there are not a few caches of them around, but I haven’t been able to find them and I’ve looked pretty freekin’ hard.
I will say this though; I will gladly pay $80 - $100 for as many factory JBL D140F or K140 kits as you can turn me on to, AND pay a 10% finder’s fee for every single one I can get. Just point me at the “real McCoys” and I’ll PayPal, CC, or send a check.
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Originally Posted by B-string Those look like CTS speakers. |
Pretty good chance of that. In the early-mid 70’s Sunn/Hartzell actually had their own speaker shop in that “speaker corner” of KY. That area where Sunn and CTS was, and Eminence and WGS still are. They certainly used CTS as OEM in that era, as well as their own manufactured drivers.
It’s kind of gray, all of the builders there used the same sources for components and even the codes on drivers from that era in that area are a little convoluted. I think it was kind of a scratch back, help each other out scenario; if somebody needed more drivers than they could get built the other builders would fill in the gaps.
Just my guess from talking with some of them, I don’t really have a firsthand perspective.
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Originally Posted by Vintage Guy I just picked up a Sunn 410H cabinet unloaded for $25.00. I had four brand new Bugera aluminum cone speakers that have since been installed. Sounds really great with decent speakers in it. I am now looking for a vintage Sunn head to pair with it. |
I’ve heard those are nice cabs; but they aren’t really Sunn cabs. Those are
Fender cabs wearing Sunn badges.
Not that makes them bad cabs, I’m sure they rock, but they aren’t really vintage Sunn gear.
My vintage Sunn amps sound amazingly good through Hartke 410XL’s.
