Vintage speaker re-coning...?

[singlehum]

Anybody have experience with reconing vintage speakers? I've got a vintage Fender ('early 60s) that has original speakers (Oxfords)...one cone has a minor tear, the other is dried out pretty bad but not yet torn. I'm afraid to push the amp at all to get that nice breakup for fear of destroying the speakers. I don't want to all-out replace the speakers as I want to keep it original.

What's the deal with re-coning? Is it just the cone that gets replaced? Voice coil? Does it affect the sound? Is the value affected?

Any input appreciated.

[JohnnyB]

Around the Sound in Seattle. Reconing vintage and current musical instrument speakers are this old guy's stock-in-trade.

[Disturber]

Re-coned one of my early 70's Celestion G12H-30s last year. Was really worried that it would lose it's mojo. But LH Musik in Stockholm, Sweden, have an old man there that know just about everything about old Celestions, and other brands as well. He did a killer jobb. The speaker sounds like it used to, just great. It cost about 150 bucks, but it was worth it.

Regarding worth so, at least for old Celestions, it sure takes some of the value off. But a broken speaker is hardly worth anything anyways, and a re coned old speaker will still probably sound better than buying new.

[tomteriffic]

Around here, a quality recone has little negative impact on value unless it's some super-rare high-endy piece that the prospective buyer is looking for everything original. No complaints here on recones I've had done. Factory parts are something you should insist on, but that may be impossible with some brands and especially older stuff.

[Ting Ho Dung]

Are you wanting to recone it yourself? To answer your question, all the guts get replaced. You can't just do the cone if I understand it correctly. So the Voice coil, dustcap and cone are replaced. If you are going to have it done, they will use original parts or suitable replacement parts. I can recommend Speaker Exchange in Tampa. I have used them since the 80's. Price is probably going to be North of $125..

ETA: If you want to do it yourself I searched UTube here. I watched a video a long time ago from Weber IIRC but was not able to find it but it looks like there are a lot of videos for you to watch if you are interested.

[marcnorth]

You could check these guys out.

http://www.speakerrepair.com/page/BRND.html

[mc2]

This company on EBAY sells drop-in recone kits with voice coil spacing pre-set, etc., so you can do it yourself pretty simply.

My old soundman used to own a recone shop. Not all that hard if you are handy and can run a bead of glue.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Recone-Kit-for-JBL-2206H-8-ohm-Pre-assembled-Kit-/380720960754