speakers for BAT vk-55 mono blocks

Wilson's are reputed to be tube friendly. 110 wpc should wake up the N802s very nicely, as well. I've heard 802s sound v. nice w 55 wpc Lectron JH-50; 802Ds even better.

I auditioned WATT Puppy 8's with VK-55 monos. Fairly good sized room, and I heard no indication the BAT's weren't up to it. I also heard Sophia's driven by a BAT SS amp, and thought the Sophia/SS combo was more musical. Magical in some respects. This was in a different room, and I heard the Sophia's in a more near field set up. If the Watt Puppy 5's present a similar load to the 8's, I would think you should be fine.

Thank you very much for your input. Any thoughts on planer type speakers?

Well, I'm a die hard Maggie fan. I auditioned a lot of dynamic speakers, including Dali, Dynaudio, Magico, Sonus Faber, Aerial, and Theil, ranging in price from 7K to 17K. I ended up buying Magnepan 3.7's. It was an easy decision. The only speaker I liked as much as the Maggie was the Sophia at 17K. BUT--- I would not go in that direction if I really wanted to stick with the BAT-VK55's. You will however find people who swear by tubes with Maggies. Most planars tend to be rather inefficient, and they tend to like plenty of current. To me, that argues strongly for solid state.

I already had my system built around Maggies, since I was replacing 1.6 QR's. It just made sense to spend 6K on the 3.7's vs 16K at a minimum, and then not really knowing if the rest of my stuff would mate well with the Wilsons. If I were you and I already had the BAT's, I'd try to find a used pair of Sophias. Those are mighty fine speakers, they are very flexible with respect to room placement, and they are not that hard to drive. The BAT monos are outstanding amps. I could see the BAT's and Sophias being a pretty sweet combo. I have not heard the Watt-Puppy 5's, but it seems there is a consensus that Wilson has come a long way with the new Sophias and Sashas over older designs.

You can get way better speakers than WP 5.1 for similar money.

I had the 5.1 a long time ago and a pair of $3k Usher speakers actually outperformed them in most ways.

A pair of Dali Helicon 400 MK II sound awesome with the BAT amplifiers, also the Ushers as well. If you don't play crazy loud or low the Vivid speakers are amazing. I have owned all of these speakers contact me if you want more info.

I would love Maggies, but space is a problem. so I am leaning toward a pair of Focal 826W. There is a good used pair of Sophia 2's out there for $8,500. I am not sure I want to spend that much, and again, we are talking about a 15 X 20 room with my rack in a corner and a fireplace to work around.

Any thoughts on this?

The room I heard the Sophia 3's in was probably about 18 x 12, with the speakers along the long wall. The speakers were less that 2' from the back wall, about 10-12 feet apart. I actually talked to 2 different wilson dealers and they both indicated the sophias actually do better with long wall placement and don't need to be out far from the wall.I haven't heard sophia 2's so I can't comment on those.

I very good match with your current monos are the Audio Physic Scropio first generation speaker, and there is one for sale currently for $2,000 here on audiogon. A full sounding speaker like the 2ce, but betters them in just about every aspect of music reproduction. Best of all its very easy to drive, and you should have enough headroom, if you should want to crank them up, where these speakers simply excel, but are also exceptional at low volumes. The Absolute Sound had a good review explaining the characteristics of this speaker line when they reviewed their Avantera speaker, which is very similar to the current Scorpio but with a better cabinet. I won't recommend the newer and upper models with the ceramic coated aluminum drivers, they may be a bit too revealing for your amps, Bat's upper models are a better match for these models.

Btselect.