Speaker Restoration: – Ohm C2

Many vintage speakers have been stored in garages or basements for decades. They have scratches, stains, sunlight made the wood pale or in very bad cases water soaked into the cabinets and the wood expanded.
However, it is possible to deal with many issues of vintage speakers with little effort and only little money. For our test, we used a pair of Ohm C2 speakers in considerably bad condition.  The pictures were all made directly after finding them at a local garage sale. the C2s had been stored in a basement for about a decade and have a series of damages, some of which we will fix here:

The Ohm C2:
The Ohm C2 is a decent vintage speaker. Once it had been sold for $695 in the later 70ies and early 80ies, nowadays you can get them for about $20-50 dollars in generally “ok” condition. However, most of the C2s need refoaming as the foams have deteriorated over the years. Our pair (see picture) has the same issues. The tweeters were fine, but the foam of the woofers was completely gone.
To restore our speaker with little effort and money, we focused on the more severe damages that can be fixed.

1. Condition of Speaker Cabinet:
The lower side of both cabinets is in fairly bad condition. The speakers were standing at the same place for many years and moss and dust became very persistant and difficult to remove. It will be difficult to restore the lower part of the speaker.

The Side of one of the cabinets has paint drops on it. We failed to remove the paint with warm water and assume it is some latex based paint. Unfortunately, this means we will have to work with some cleaner, which is potentially harmful to the old veneer.

The condition of the veneer is rather bad. It is overall very rough and urgently needs some oil and finish. The surface of the cabinet is more pale at some spots, has many scratches and a few water stains, which will be very difficult to remove. The color of the top and bottom veneer of the speakers is significantly brighter than the sides, which can be caused by more/less exposure to light.

2. Ohm C2 Woofers:
Both woofers have to be refoamed. Cones and general condition of the speakers is good, but the foam has deteriorated completely. We ordered this Refoam Kit by Parts Express and will refoam them, which is less difficult than many people think.
 

 OHM C2 Refoam Kit Speakerrepairs.com