Rogers LS3/5A value

thank you @lowtubes ! I lost the bids but I will keep my eye out for them. Sounds like they are wonderful speakers!

I owned both (the electrostatics were the ESL-63) many years ago.  I bought the LS3/5A because I was commuting each week to Tasmania and I needed something portable.  But really, they are a bit of a joke, designed by the BBC scientists as a lightweight speaker that could be easily moved around, for example for outside broadcasts.  The scientists did a good job of controlling the lightweight cabinet walls with internal bracing, but full-range, they are certainly not!

They are full range enough if you use them how they are suppossed to be used - near-field. The response goes down to 100Hz, which is fairly good for a box of that size in the 1970s. Current versions will go down to 75Hz.

There is also no internal bracing, only some bitumen damping pads on the panels, and the cabinet is also not particulary light weight, using 12mm thick baltic birch ply. The original prototypes were a more fragile 9mm thick ply but they were probably switched in order to be more rigged and suitable for engineers moving them around without a lot of care.

Because they act as such a point source and image very well they do give the Quad Electrostatics a run for their money, and with some bas augmentation they can be fantastic.

I’ve been listening to the LS3/5a speakers for around 30 yrs.

I beat that - bought my first pair in either 1987 or 1988 with my BBC staff discount, as my first job was at BBC Research Department and they were all over the place.

I differ somewhat from many users as I've never particularly liked the 15ohm version and prefer the 11ohm. There is a smidgeon less (false) bass but they are a lot easier to integrate with subwoofers, and I used to use old M&K mx70b subs to good effect.

The 15ohm versions always sound a bit compressed to me, and often with too much midrange, which can be a lot worse in 2nd hand examples as the driver develop a fault in the glue holding the dustcaps on (the white-belly disease) and it results in a peaked response at 1Khz. See https://ls35a.org/white-belly-disease/

Falcon Acoustics do a Q7 speaker which is basically their 'gold badge' LS3/5a but in a cabinet that is slightly deeper and matches the B110 bass driver better, and from comments I've seen comparing the Q7s to an LS3/5a version I know well, which is normally preferred by a good margin over their gold badge LS3/5a, it looks like the bigger box gives better results. Falcon Acoustics have the original Kef designer so know what they are doing and are probably the closest current version to the original 15ohm versions, the others on the market are either implementations using modern drivers (designed by probably the best BBC style designer currently working - Derek Hughes of Spendor fame), or use cloned drivers that look like the originals but may or may not perform like the originals - and that included Rogers although they have Andy Whittle to make sure they sound right, and he ran Rogers for years.

The original LS3/5as were designed an built at BBC Research Department and were renowned for their sound quality. I've not heard any but I have heard the pair labelled 001/002 that belong to Paul Whatton and, given the right music that isn't too complicated, they present an incredible soundstage/image. They sound old though with anything complicated.

One reason for their good sound is that they, and the Kingswood Warran prototypes, were housed in cabinets with 9mm thick ply walls instead of 12mm. They also had screw-on back panels, although I am not sure that is really significant in a cabinet of that size with only small distances between the screw holes. 

I switched my original 11ohm LS3/5as into such cabinets around 1999 when Stirling Broadcast were lent the 001/002 pair to measure and started replicating the cabinet.

I also switched them over to use the external Cicable crossovers, which were also designed by Derek Hughes, so I never really isolated whether the cabinets or the crossovers had the most effect, but the difference from the standard LS3/5as was huge - much more detailed and transparent, super smooth, etc. No doubt some came from the huge (40%) reduction in THD at some frequencies.

However I have just sold some 9mm cabinets to someone who has been building and tweaking his own LS3/5as for years and he was pretty gobsmacked at the difference the new cabinets made compared to the 12mm, to the point of not understanding why more manufacturers aren't using them. Falcon did actually do a couple of very expensive versons with the thinner cabinets.  

One reason the 15ohm versions might sound better than the 11ohm, part from the compression I seem to hear, is that the manufacturers all produced/sourced their crossovers from different places, whereas the 11ohm crossover was simpler and all supplied by Kef, along with matched drivers. That gives more scope for their being variance between different 15ohm versions.

Later I got some Stirling Broadcast V2s and then V3s - the V3s were very good and it seems from users comments that they were vying with the Falcon gold badges for user preferences. There's nearly always a preference for the midrange performance of anything that Derek Hughes designs, so this is where preferences for the V3s generally lay.

Then I happened to visit Doug Stirling a couple of years ago as I had blown a T27 and was looking for some help with the repair, and found that he was becoming ill with Alzheimers. He had built up a big stock of loudspeakers but hadn't been selling any, probably because of his Alzheimers and lack of interaction with his dealers.

As I live relatively close (60miles) I took on the challange of checking his stock and selling it to raise money for care.

After we sold all the V3 LS3/5as we asked Derek to provide more V3 grade crossovers so I could convert the V2s to V3s as they would sell easier - as I was doing this for free and mainly because I am an LS3/5a enthusiast (also owned ls35a.com for years, although I point it at Paul Whattons site) I wanted to be selling the best version rather than just a competant version.

The new v3.2 crossovers are basically the same circuit as the V3s, but because they use more 'boutique' components from Jantzen they seem to have upped the sound quallity quite a bit. Customer feedback has been uniformly excellent, notably with comparisons against that Falcon Q7 I mentioned being a bit less conclusive.

It's been a long slog (I've started so I'll finish...) but I am approaching the end with about 43 more LS3/5a pairs to sell.

The Stirlings have the advantage of the thinner 9mm cabinets and also drive units that can handle more power than the originals.

The v3.2s sound excellent, but interestingly my original 11ohm LS3/5as in their thin cabinets and with the Cicable external crossovers might actually sound better, apart from the bass being better with the more modern drivers. I also have some similar Xtracable external crossovers on my V2s and they also sound excellent, but the Cicabled 11ohms still hold their own in some areas, I think the T27 tweeter might still have the edge over some of the modern ones.

So if I was after an original style LS3/5a I would be looking at the Falcon Q7 as, because they sell direct, they are excellent value. Put a felt square around the tweeter and add tygan grills and they are an LS3/5a in a deeper cabinet, and if you really wanted that compressed, bloated and slow bass of the original then you could source some original cabinets. BK Elec often sell actual new Rogers cabinets on ebay.co.uk for arond £240.

Do not use Solid State as it can damage the speakers and will not sound as good as with tubes, especially EL34 tubes.

I had a Rogers E40a, which I think is EL34 tubes, and it did sound very good indeed. But there was a slight hum on the power transformers and I also did not like the idea of tubes changing performance over time, so I set about looking for a solid state replacement.

I got very lucky as I managed it on first attempt. I had evolved from a Quad 306 to a 707, and had ditched the Quad 34 for a passive early on so know how good they were.

I saw some Quad 909 monos for sale so went to get those, and the seller also had a Music First Audio TVC based passive preamp, which I knew worked well with 909s from so many user reviews on the web.

And that was it - just as sweet as the tube amp but with better bass - the 909 monos where similar to the 707 but more relaxed and refined.

I later upgraded the Music First passive from the V1 to the V2, but this lost a bit of the ’tubiness’ as it wa less compressed and midrangy - although overall an improvement.

I now have Quad QMPs in the main system, which are fractionally better than the 909 monos but probably because I am running balanced all the way from source to power amps. I’ve just upgraded the preamp again to the V2 baby reference and that is better again. 

I did have a Bryston B9 SST for a while - apart from sounding like electronically processed sh1t it also totalled two B110 drivers, but my powerful Quads seem a lot safer and I am confident using them with old LS3/5as. 

It's nice to see a spirited discussion in regard to the LS3/5A!  Most of the speakers that I have owned over the years have been of the small bookshelf type.  Included here are: 15 and 11 ohm LS3/5A's, Harbeth HLP3ES, Linn Kan 1 and 5, KEF Reference Series Model 101 and Sequerra Metronome 7's.  They have all been very enjoyable speakers to use over the years.  I do agree with the comment that the LS3/5A does not produce a lot of of bass. However, neither do most bookshelf speakers, which is why many years ago satellite/subwoofer speaker systems became popular. 

Most of the music that I listen to usually involves very simple instrumentals with only one or a few musicians playing at a time.  For this, I find speakers like the aforementioned to be ideal due to their clarity. Especially when they are slightly tilted inward so that their axis cross directly in front of the listener.

Also, IME aside from the audio gear itself, one of the most impressive aspects of the play back chain has to do with improvements in the way that music is recorded. The quality of the microphones in particular as well as the improvements in streaming, have made a significant improvement in the lifelike reproduction of uploaded music to various Internet venues, including YouTube.

For example, I was listening to some of Tommy Emmanuel's guitar uploads last night and felt as though I were seated right there in the recording studio with him! And this was on a mostly older system which included a pair of Quicksilver Minimite monoblock tube amplifiers and a pair of Linn Kan I's. I was using a new Audio By Van Alstine preamplifier and an Amazon Fire tablet; run through an ifi Zen Dac Signature digital to analogue converter (first generation). 

Nothing fancy at all, but the music really sounded great!

I also find that there's a great disparity between the quality of audio uploads, with some of them being outstanding while others are barely listenable.   As such, I spend quite a bit of my audio related time searching for outstanding recordings, since I've heard how good my audio system can sound with well recorded music.