earliest surviving Model 6 ?

[Guest bottom_feeder]

So earlier this year at one of the MIT Swapfests, I came across what could be the earliest surviving KLH Model Six -

Serial # 0066

tweeter works, as I'm sure this has the nice oil caps in the crossover. . . 12 ply marine plywood, really classy joinery at the corners, and of course the epoxied-in woofer . . .

Speaker sounds great - it's one of about 8 Model 6's I own . . . I have another early one which also functions nicely, so they make a nice pair for jazz & classical.

anyone else got a Model 6 this early ? any guesses on build date ?

anyone got serial # 0067 so I can have a closely matched pair (YEAH RIGHT!)

[Andy]

Very nice, thats indeed very early. # 0066 should be sometime in the winter of 1958, Jan, Feb. The model six was introduced to the public in march of '58.

I have an early pair, Numbers 000684 and 000711. Same cabinet as yours - the 12-ply marine plywood is truely an amazing cabinet. You can see why KLH didn't make many of these, it simply cost too much. Kloss was very proud of the Model Six, saying it had the "Most right sound" of any speaker he'd developed.

I found my pair at Todd farm flea market in Rowly, MA about four years ago.......I was leaving empty handed as a rain started to fall when I saw this pair of birch speakers across the field that looked KLH-ish, so put the truck in park, walked over and they they were #'s 684 & 711 - gave the $20. asking price saving them from the heavy rain which came five minutes later. they are in great shape, cabinets, cloth with badges plus hey sound fantastic.

Andy

[Andy]

Very nice, thats indeed very early. # 0066 should be sometime in the winter of 1958, Jan, Feb. The model six was introduced to the public in march of '58.

I have an early pair, Numbers 000684 and 000711. Same cabinet as yours - the 12-ply marine plywood is truely an amazing cabinet. You can see why KLH didn't make many of these, it simply cost too much. Kloss was very proud of the Model Six, saying it had the "Most right sound" of any speaker he'd developed.

I found my pair at Todd farm flea market in Rowly, MA about four years ago.......I was leaving empty handed as a rain started to fall when I saw this pair of birch speakers across the field that looked KLH-ish, so put the truck in park, walked over and they they were #'s 684 & 711 - gave the $20. asking price saving them from the heavy rain which came five minutes later. they are in great shape, cabinets, cloth with badges plus hey sound fantastic.

Andy

One further observation....looks like the tweeter may have been replaced, many of the early Model Six's had an epoxied-in tweeter just like the woofer. The way to tell would be to pull the tweeter to see if a hand cut hole exists. This would have been done by someone to get inside the cabinet.

No matter, thats a great pice of KLH history and you'll be hard pressed to find an earlier Model Six...a nice find !

Andy

[Guest bottom_feeder]

One further observation....looks like the tweeter may have been replaced, many of the early Model Six's had an epoxied-in tweeter just like the woofer. The way to tell would be to pull the tweeter to see if a hand cut hole exists. This would have been done by someone to get inside the cabinet.

No matter, thats a great pice of KLH history and you'll be hard pressed to find an earlier Model Six...a nice find !

Andy

yup - agree on the tweeter - me thinks some small toddler fingers killed the original one

When I lived in Salem MA, I went up to Todd Farm a few times - they always had cool stuff, although I never found any $20 Model 6's ! Last I heard, the owners were selling the property . . . luckily, I live in flea market heaven now - just north of Brimfield

I'll probably never pry that tweeter out - it's nailed in, and I wouldn't want to damage anything. Listening to it, and another early 'epoxied' KLH 6 right now. I do love the Model 6's . . .

[tysontom]

yup - agree on the tweeter - me thinks some small toddler fingers killed the original one

When I lived in Salem MA, I went up to Todd Farm a few times - they always had cool stuff, although I never found any $20 Model 6's ! Last I heard, the owners were selling the property . . . luckily, I live in flea market heaven now - just north of Brimfield

I'll probably never pry that tweeter out - it's nailed in, and I wouldn't want to damage anything. Listening to it, and another early 'epoxied' KLH 6 right now. I do love the Model 6's . . .

That is a rare find! Congratulations! I wonder who owns the really early ones -- probably Henry Kloss' son. Andy, as chief KLH curator, you should be the owner of serial number 0001, if it is out there. The real early ones will one day appear. I have AR-1 serial number 0074 (see attachment with AR-1 on live-versus-recorded tripod), which I thought was the earliest one out there until I found, quite by accident in a thrift shop in Palm Springs, California, AR-1 serial number 0006 (see attachment with AR-1 lying on its back during inspection). AR-1 #0006 was one of the early prototypes used in hi-fi shows during the fall of 1954. You never know what you will find out there. I also have AR-3 serial numbers 0005 and 0015.

That is definitely a later version of the KLH Six tweeter, but I doubt the original tweeter failed due to small toddler fingers. The grill cloth on those early KLHs was stretched pretty tightly across the front baffle board, and the tweeter had some protection behind it and the black cloth under the grill material. Probably what happened was an over-exuberant college student listening to rock music simply over-drove it, burned out the voice coil, and it was then sent back to KLH or to a field-repair center to be fixed. Since there is no grill cloth on the speaker, perhaps the repair was made by someone without the resources to return it for factory service. Staples on the front seem to indicate that an attempt was made to re-fasten the grill, insofar as the original speakers had the grill tucked down in the front panel between the molding.

The image of the tweeter is for the original KLH Six epoxied tweeter. This image is very poor, and the tweeter dome is pushed in, but you can get the idea of how it was attached.

--Tom Tyson