Anyone Familar With ESS Speakers?

I have to agree with the other guys. The AMT 1 was somewhat overated when it came out.Also, that Heil transformer was in my opinion was a step backward and hurt this company.Before Dr. Heil took over, ESS made a line of speakers which used standard drivers, that is, KEF drivers from England and I think Vifa tweeters from Denmark. They produced about 5 models. I owned the ESS 7 which to this day was the most exciting speaker I've owned. I am sure some of this is just nostalgia. But they were clean,fast with outstanding bass response. I would look around for these models, someone may have a mint pair to sell. If you can't find them, spend you money on PBS, Paradigm, or even the new Tannoy Revolution 2 speaker reviewed this month in The Absolute Sound. Good Hunting!!!

The other posts have pretty much said it all, but I'll throw in one more point. I sold audio gear on a part-time basis in 1974-75, and the store where I worked carried the ESS Heil speakers (that name always makes me want to put on German martial music, goose-step around the room, and yell "Sieg Heil" ...). The speaker design was interesting, but they were/are terribly inefficient. The pair in the store was driven by the old Phase Linear amp, one of Bob Carver's earliest designs (also known as "Flame Linear" for reasons that should be self-explanatory). Even with 300 wpc driving them, the Heils still sounded pretty awful, and I can't imagine they'll sound any better today.

it you want a good vintage speaker that can be had for little money, try the shihanian obelisk

I owned the AMT 1A's in the mid-70s and thought they were the best thing I'd ever heard. But this was my first "high end" system after graduating from college and these speakers replaced some little AR bookshelf box speakers. The woofers rotted out after a few years, and the cloth lid contraption didn't hang right after a while. I guess the tweeters were a *little* bright, too. I gave the speakers to my sister in 1980 and she still uses them! The woofers are probably not even functioning by now, but she doesn't notice it. anyway, if someone is giving you these speakers, sure, try them out, but for even a couple hundred dollars you can buy much better used speakers these days.

Heard these speakers once. The heil drivers could sound very good but the woofers"Never" intergrated with the heils..I wouldn't touch them because of that. You can probably find something with better driver matching for similar dollars. I believe the Oskar speakers use a form of the heil drivers. Uhf loved the oskars...cheers, Bluenose

Had a pair in the 70s with a kenwood receiver--- Probably sounded like the fellas described. ---But hey it was hi fi to me. (back then)There got to be better/ cheaper designs out there without spending lots of bucks.

I only responded because I hear confession is good for the soul.

Tried out a swiss 90's version of these. The AMT tweeter and the woofer just didn't like each other and the Lord knows I tried my best: tubes, ss, stereo amps, monos... and even when the sound spectrum was somewhat balanced, the woofer didn't keep up with the tweeter.

The AMT sounds good on its own though.

Yo Lpsforever, the AMT 1B is a little better than the original AMT 1, but they were not great speakers. A friend of mine had a pair back in the 70's. The tweets were too good for the transistor junk that was available at the time. They would drive you out of the room (unless you had severe high freq. hearing loss) when connected to any of the mid-fi amps/receivers of the 70's. Yeah the woofers were flimsy and his cat used to use the grill cloth as a scratching post. A pair in really good shape might be worth a couple hundred today, but you'll need a very good amp to get decent sound out of the AMT (Air Motion Transformer) tweeters. They are similar to a ribbon, but folded like an accordian. If you buy them, assuming the drivers are in perfect condition, you will probably want to update the crossovers...especially the capacitors.

throw those speakers in the trash woofers are rotten high energy tweeter sucks cloth top falls off speaker easily.