Steve Guttenberg finally reviews the Eminent Technology LFT-8b loudspeaker.

I am going to contact Bruce about creating an updated LFT-8b and C......like an EXTREME version: the new 90db Neo drivers, new woofer to match and all upgraded parts: WBT posts, cryoed wires and super xover parts. Probably would be at least 2-3K more......but can you imagine?......Way, way more transparency and dynamics!!!...add the C part and super bass too......would not need another speaker.......ever! The older ones could then be upgraded to the latest since all the drivers are the same size as the older ones (I am assuming here).

Yes, the new 18LS would be even more dynamic.....but who has the room and money?.....and you can always add super subs to the 18b Extreme or C Extreme.

Will see what he says.....certainly what I would do if I were him.......it would blow the roof off the industry.....90db....easy to drive maggie beater.......send one to Steve Guttenberg and he will use it as his reference for years.

The LFT-8b can be turned into a world class speaker that has few equals... for those who appreciate coherence and staging. They play loud enough and only change level, not character no matter the request.

Replace the passive XO with active DSP. Time align the system. Drive the mid and tweets with very good tube gear. Replace the woofer drivers if they are original Usher or Tymphany with the Dayton RS225-8 and drive it with 200WPC of good SS. Roll the bottom octave from the woorfers w first order HP. Add a pair of subs with controls to integrate properly: multiple XO slope, polarity inversion, continuous phase.

Add in a decent cable loom and put them in a very good room.

They will "float like a butterfly and sting like a bee" when required.

Former bi-amped Tympany IV owner - a long time back...

See ieLogical Audiophilia Redux

...just hook 'em up to a nice amplifier and enjoy.  

Years before Steve Guttenberg had a listen to the LFT-8b, Robert E.Greene gave the speaker a very interesting review in TAS (in 2014).

TAS reviews are the worst on the planet. They love everything and do no equipment comparisons because it makes their lives much easier and the ability to crank out reviews because they do none of the hard work that would constitute a real review.  They’re total hacks.  Ok, maybe hifi+ is worse.

ALL equipment reviews are specious and designed to sell product to the naive.

There is now an LFT-8c. It has a new woofer and a price jump to $4800 pair.

First off, this is the speaker value of the century. It is a Line Source Dipole (for the most part) with a force over area drive. All points of the diaphragm are controlled by the signal unlike regular dynamic speakers. It creates way less room interaction than a regular dynamic speaker.  It will create a much more life like image. The width of the drivers was properly chosen to create even horizontal dispersion. It's transient response is excellent. 

Like every loudspeaker out there, it is not perfect. When you stand up the high frequencies disappear as soon as your head gets above the tweeter. The vast majority of us listen seated so it is a quasi problem. But, the same thing happens if you are on the floor having fun with the wife listening to Sade.

The woofer is not a line source. It is a point source radiator. It is going to loose acoustic power with distance much faster than the rest of the speaker which is line source. Consequently, the balance is going to be right only at one distance. For most rooms this is a trivial problem because you can not get that far away from the speaker. The driver is actually a subwoofer driver and is capable of very long excursions vibrating the heck out of the rest of the speaker. The woofer set up was a compromise ET had to make to keep the price down and the morphology of the speaker more acceptable to most people. You have to be able to sell speakers. Ideally there should be four subwoofers spread across the front wall creating a line source and isolating the rest of the speaker from direct involvement with the woofer driver. 

As suggested by ET I would definitely biamp this speaker. It is not very efficient and two lower powered amps are probably less expensive than one very high powered one. You also get to lose an analog crossover that is probably limiting efficiency to some extent.

Mr Guttenberg has not heard 8 foot ESLs with a line source subwoofer array. But, that speaker system costs $100,000.  The ET  LFT 8c is accessible to just about all audiophiles at a very reasonable price. I hate the tonearm but I love the speakers!

@ieales , As a former Tympany user myself just what are you doing now? The system you described above? 

@ledoux1238: I myself am opposed to the proposition of subjecting the output of analogue sources (phono, reel-to-reel and cassette tapes, FM tuner) to digital conversion, so won’t be getting the 18LS.

However, for those wanting one of the other advances of the LFT-8c and upcoming 18LS---that of dipole woofers in place of the 8b’s monopole woofer, there is another route available: just use separate dipole woofers, leaving the LFT-8’s woofer disconnected.

A dipole woofer system has been in development at Magnepan for quite a while now, and is reportedly about to be introduced (price not yet known). And then there is the Rythmik Audio/GR Research OB/Dipole Sub, which is two or three (your choice) 12" free-air woofers installed in an open baffle "frame" (@ricevs mounted them on a flat open baffle---3 layers of MDF!), the woofers powered by a servo-feedback plate amp. The plate amp controls include those for phase/time-alignment for woofer/loudspeaker mating, and of course output level (again for mating with the speaker), x/o frequency and slope, 1-band EQ, etc,., but accomplishes those jobs electronically, not digitally. It’s a great bass system, but is available only as a kit. You can get a CNC-cut flat pack that is a breeze to build (just wood glue and clamps, finishing of your choice) from a Canadian woodworker connected with GRR, and he will even build and finish the frames if you pay him.

And if you have the room, you can use the two bass panels of the Magnepan Tympani’s as woofers for the LFT-8b. They won’t play as low as the OB/Dipole Sub, but with enough power (and bracing) will get down to the low-30’s. Harry Pearson’s favorite bass reproducers!

@mijostyn 

As a former Tympany user myself just what are you doing now? The system you described above? 

Yes

Harry Pearson’s favorite bass reproducers!

I thought the Tympany were OK at the very bottom, not great. BUT, at the time I owned them, I was a recording engineer. Perhaps my perspective was colored by the awesome low end in some control rooms. OTOH, the Maggies' midrange and top were sublime.

Properly setup and configured in a good room, the LFT-8b, as I mentioned to Bruce, are "Merciless on bad material and sublime on well recorded."

@bdp24 I convert everything to 24/192 and RIAA correct the phono stage in the digital realm. I use digital crossovers, EQ and room correction to amazing effect. You have no idea what you are missing. But, I understand the purist approach. I drive an old 911. I have own new ones and do not like them, too darn refined. 

@ieales , You are not imagining anything. The bass of the Tymps is flabby at best. In total I think the 20.7 is a better loudspeaker. It still has less than optimal bass.

You are 90% of the way there with your speakers. IMHO your next move should be to disconnect the woofers in the speakers and build four 10 or 12" passive  subwoofers and space them evenly out on the front wall flanking the ETs. I would drive them with two amps and keep the channels separate, not mono. The crossover point I believe is 180 Hz. If you use a steeper slope (10th order) with your digital crossover you can safely push the crossover point down to 160 Hz. Time align everything and your bass energy will simulate a live performance. I use my old JC1s for subwoofer duty but I use to use a pair of QSC  commercial AB amps to great effect. Much less expensive. Dayton and Parts Express make incredible subwoofer kits at great prices. You can build for 12" subs for less than the cost of some commercial 12" units. Their drivers are absolutely top notch. I use 8 of their 12" Reference HO DVC drivers in my new subs. Each enclosure gets two drivers. I will be publishing the photo history of their construction on Imgur shortly.

@mijostyn Back in the mid to late 80's I had Tympani 4's. The earlier version where the 3 panels did not separate.

I converted my garage with advice from the Winey's to have one wall built on a slight angle to eliminate parallel walls. I then installed 2 layers of 1/2" drywall that were glued and screwed to the studs with glue between the layers along with 3 sets of headers between each stud location. The headers were about 20", 45", and 72" approximately above the concrete carpeted floor.

The amplifier for the bass panels was a Levinson ML-3 with dedicated 20 amp circuits for each of my 3 amps I was using at the time.

The bass performance was rock solid that it's equal I have never heard.

Describing the bass as flabby leads me to believe you have not heard the true bass potential of this speaker.

I recorded my Gretsch drumset (with a 26" bass drum) with a pair of small capsule condenser mics plugged straight into a Revox A77 reel-to-reel, using that recording to scrutinize and evaluate the sound of loudspeakers. For years the Magnepan Tympani bass panels came closest to replicating the live sound of that bass drum of all loudspeakers I auditioned: freedom from bloat (caused by driver "overhang"), percussive impact (i.e. attack), tonal timbre, texture, etc. For the sound of my Paiste 602 cymbals, it was ESL and ribbon tweeters.

The sound of a bass drum (even a 26" one) is more mid-bass than deep-bass, but those Tympani bass panels were very, very good at mid-bass. The sound of open baffle/dipole woofers is the closest dynamic driver equivalent to planar bass I’ve heard, the sound of the Rythmik servo-feedback subs second. For context, I own a pair of transmission-line loaded KEF B139 woofers (used by David Wilson as mid-bass drivers in his original WAMM loudspeaker), and owned Infinity RS-1b loudspeakers in the past, which had woofer towers containing six 8" servo-feedback controlled woofers.

@ricevs What you are describing for the 8c ' Extreme' is certainly interesting. I already have the 8c; however, I would be interested in knowing if Bruce would be willing, at a minimum, to provide a neodymium mid range panel replacement. Please keep us posted. 

What will be the benefits of the neodymium upgrade? The lighter weight of the neo is moot as the moving part is the mylar in a planar system.  Will the more power magnetic field generated translate into more clarity and detail?

@bdp24 It certainly would be informative to listen to your set up vs 8c. The main difference being DSP vs electronic x-over. But as @mijostyn mentioned you are a purist on this issue. While I don't always agree with @mijostyn, especially his adamant refusal to accept the merits of under slung tonearm ( he he ), digital signal conversion, even on analog source, is something I have come to accept. I don't understand why it works, but......

@ieales The timeline of your 8b upgrade around 2021-2022 coincided with Bruce's upgrade work on the 8c. Did he mentioned anything to you about it? It seems such a coincidence!

Oh, and I recorded the sound of my two year-old son and then-wife’s voices, using those recordings to evaluate loudspeaker freedom from vowel coloration (thank you JGH ;-), and midrange transparency. A brutally-revealing test! That led me to---of course---the Quad ESL.

@ledoux1238 

Bruce first mentioned the new panels in April 2022.

We bought a new motorhome in May 2022.

Our heating system died Dec 22nd.

Still on the radar... but since the system is so outstanding, there’s a bit of "Ain’t broke,,, Don’t fix" trepidation.

The Sound Anchor custom made heavy gauge steel speaker stands improve the sound of 8b substantially, especially in areas of imaging! Almost essential!

Better the amp & front end the 8bs wont be the limiting link in the system. You do need an amplifier with good power supply, high current if used in medium size room If used with REL reference subs arrays , the 8b will compete to any speakers at any price.

I was able to find and purchase long out of production custom edition big LFT 6s, and these go almost full range, but require nuclear plant level of power to really shine.... After these LFT 6s , most other speakers sound like carbon copy of music. 8bs come pretty close, having owned them both at the same time.

I’m definitely interested in these speakers but I’ll have to wait for a bigger model with more output. My seating distance is around 4.5m.These have a max spl of 105db at 1m. That would mean a max spl in the low 90’s at my listening position.

Edit: I just realized that 105db may be per speaker , if so max spl would be in the mid 90’s

Edit: I just read that planars only drop 3db so that would mean around 100db max spl at my seat. 

@kot: I’m green with envy! I for awhile unsuccessfully attempted to get myself a pair of the LFT-6. I was however able to find a pair of the smaller LFT-4. Interestingly, the LFT-4 has sloped "side wings", a technique for tailoring the tonal balance of the speaker’s output (the wings prevent dipole cancellation, the frequencies of which are determined by the dimensions of the wings), which Danny Richie also employs in some of his GR Research open baffle loudspeakers. The LFT-3, -4, and -6 are rather rare, Bruce Thigpen having made only a few hundred pair of each.

By the way everyone, Grant Mye will make you stands for the LFT-8, with support arms that extent up to the top half of the planar panels. I have heard from one LFT-8 owner who got a pair, and he found the Mye stands to provide a worthwhile improvement over the Sound Anchor bases. I’m gonna get myself a pair, soon as I sell my ARC line stage.

@bdp24

My LFT 6 are something else: custom wired with Cardas wire, and with Mundorf caps & other exotic parts in their crossover done at the time of production at the factory! The only pair like these in the world! Just extraordinary!!! Had to pay an arm and leg for these! But worth it! Having said that I have to reiterate: LFT 8 are awesome too! Amazing speakers and absurdly great value compared  to todays insane hi fi prices!

@bdp24 Could you elaborate on the Mye stands? I wrote to Grant last month. He did not have any visuals of the LFT stands. From his descriptions, they clip onto the panels at the mid point of the tweeter, and screwed to the sides of the woofer units. They work  together with the Sound Anchor stands, correct?

From what I understand, they prevent the front to back swaying  of the panels and thereby increase image stability. 

Amen @kot! The value of the LFT-8 was my motive for bringing them to the attention of Audiogon members. For he who questions the varacity of the opinion of Steve Guttenberg (and/or Robert E. Greene, as well as a number of UK hi-fi critics), you're missing the point. You needn't consider his (and their) stated opinion(s) as fact, but merely as evidence that a consideration of the speaker might be of interest and/or benefit.

As for all of Guttenberg's reviews being positive.....both he and his pal Herb Reichert have stated that there are so many good components they want to bring to the attention of audiophiles, they are not going to waste our time on bad ones. If you find that a specious argument, fine, ignore them. Your loss!   

@bdp24

Actually Robert Greene’s review in the TAS was fairly thorough and critical in his assessment of the LFT 8. I disagreed with some of his points, but overall he is a very well respected (at least by myself) reviewer from the good old days of The Absolute Sound, when HP ruled the ship.

HI-FI World UK also did a very good review of the LFT 8. Worth seeking out and reading it by  prospective customers, and  by "the just curious" types :).  

How is the sweet spot compared to Magnepan? With Magnepan it's too small for me with the tonal balance shifts. 

I have had a pair of LFT8b speakers for over 3 years and recently updated them to the LFT8c versions with the DSP bipole woofers.

The panels are welded up and assembled in Florida, not China. I don’t know if the ribbons are made in the US or not, but remember - this until recently was a $2,500 pair of speakers with superb sound quality.

We had a problem with buzzing in the right side midrange ribbon, and Bruce sent two offset cams to better adjust them. Eventually, the buzzing returned, so he had a brand new panel (welded steel frame that holds the neodynium magnets and ribbon assembly) made and shipped to me at no charge since the problem surfaced while under warranty.

Last year I blew out the tweeter ribbons accidentally when hooking up a new electronic crossover incorrectly, and Bruce sent me new ribbons and some tweeter fuses and fuse holders at no charge (I replaced them myself). His customer service is excellent and he has always been prompt to reply with answers and solutions.

The speakers are hand-made, and the fit and finish do reflect that, as well as the very low price for the performance. Meaning, they aren’t perfect, but they are very attractive and mostly well-built. I’d prefer some refinements, particularly in the wood trim and metal threaded inserts in the woofer boxes for the panel attachments, though the new 8c woofer cabinets have a nicer, more refined look and finish than the original.

I don’t think these are the best speakers for the listener who doesn’t have some mechanical/technical abilities, because they do require assembly and over time, the ribbons are likely to need small adjustments as the material stretches or shifts in the panels.

The sound quality is excellent and well above the price range, in my opinion. I’ve listened to some very expensive speakers at our local shop, including Maggies, and these are better than many/most of them, and better than my MTM+subwoofer Seas Prestige-loaded box speakers. The efficiency is not a problem for any of our amps, including a 100wpc Mark Levinson, several 200-250 wpc high-quality amps we also have, and our 125wpc KT120 tube monoblocks. There is no problem driving the speakers with the tube amps, and the volume level is almost as high as with the more powerful SS amps.

For my tastes, the 8b didn’t have enough tight, low bass (though it was never flabby, just lacked power and dynamics to our preference), so I supplemented them with subwoofers with SEAS drivers, which I found to integrate nicely with the LFTs. After updating to the 8c, I used them as intended by feeding the preamp into the DSP amps, then splitting the processed signal to the amps. Even with the various settings for phasing, etc. of the rear-firing woofer, I didn’t feel the bass was quite up to what I was used to, so the subs went back into service, but adjusted for frequency and volume.

After a month or so, I decided that the sound of our amps without the DSP was more appealing to me, so I hooked up our active crossover and now the system feeds the low frequencies into the DSP amps and dipole woofers, and the mids/highs to the amps, which I feel handle those frequencies with more clarity. I can still adjust the DSP for woofer response, but choose to let my nice quality amps provide an analog signal instead of going through the DSP amps.

The speakers are in a fairly large room but with plenty of clutter. They are toed in a bit so we have a sweet spot for listening, but the sound coverage is much better than my 40" tall box speakers. The ribbons are tall, so the vertical coverage is great.

Do doubt there are better speakers, but not for the price as far as I have found. Not sure what I’d have to spend to get better sound, but judging these without hearing them properly set up, or assuming that because the efficiency is fairly low they require a lot of power would be an error.

The way ours are set up, the sweet spot is actually about 2' wide and 6-7' long. Our couch is closes to the speakers, and our dining room table is inline with the centerline of the converged speaker output. My wife can sit inline on one side and I on the other, and we are still in the sweet spot for great frequency response. 

The same is true whether sitting or standing within that roughly 2' wide path.

@ledoux1238: From what my correspondent told me, the Mye stand bolts onto the bottom of the woofer enclosure, the support arms reaching from the back of the base of the stand up to about the middle of the planar panel (similar to the Mye Maggie stands). The Sound Anchor stand is not used at all.

I need to go back through my emails and find the pics of his Mye stands my correspondent sent me. Send me your email address and I will forward them to you (give me a few days ;-).

I spoke with Grand Mye, and he told me he had made only the one pair of LFT-8 stands, those my correspondent ordered. Grant asked me to send the details on bolt hole locations on the bottom of the bass enclosure when I was ready to go ahead with an order. The stand is hollow tubes, which can be filled with sand.

My correspondent told me the Mye stand improves the sound of the LFT-8 in terms of low level resolution and details, overall clarity. Because the LFT-8’s planar panel is attached to the bass enclosure, it doesn’t "sway" as much as do unbraced Maggie panels. But the LFT planar panel is about 3-1/2' long, so it may exhibit a little flexing.

The LFT (Linear Field Transducer) driver has the Mylar diaphragm attached to a very stiff metal frame, to which the fore-and-aft magnets are also attached, that frame bolted onto a solid wood frame. Maggies are constructed with the Mylar glued and stapled directly onto an MDF frame. I don’t remember how the magnets are secured to the MDF.

I've heard the ET's at a few shows, and he's had several chairs in a single file line between the speakers, all perfectly in the sweet spot.  This tells me everything i need to know.... they have a super narrow sweet spot.  They sound amazing there,  and they sound dull everywhere else.  Sorry, but that's not for me.  I need speakers that sound good all around the room, and around the house.

IN that sweet spot, however, they rank amongst the best I've ever heard. 

@bdp24 Just PM my email to you. Thanks!

https://www.audiogon.com/systems/7309

Manley 440 (monoblocks) with Genuine Gold Lion KT77’s set to triode mode 275 watts into the panels.

Manley 440 with 6550’s set to tetrode mode 440 watts into the woofers.

The whole room is a sweet spot. Move around and the musicians remain in position completely stationary. With 1/2 inch Studer A80, it is the sound of live.

People say you cannot reproduce the experience of an orchestra. This system says otherwise. The side and back walls disappear. You are in the Musikverein listening to Der Phil.  

Loud enough for Mayberry’s finest to pay a visit at 4 in the AM.

Richter conducting Bach’s Mass in B Minor: ethereal.

Mehta conducting Holst’s Planets on Mars: invasion.

Weather Report Boogie Woogie Waltz. Boogie ON!

* Benz Gullwing in ET 2 arm mounted in Oracle 6. Super Lumi phono stage.

Point of clarification on woofer replacement:

Since I’m using subs, I don’t need the low bass extension of the LFT’s woofer which is obtained by mass loading.

Bruce did a superb job with original Usher, lowering the free air -6dB to 15.3Hz

See Measuring Loudspeaker Driver Parameters (sound-au.com) for more info on measuring driver parameters

The Dayton RS225-8 functions more like a upper-bass / low mid driver in my system.

Nothing above a transistor amplifier and for maggies is this the most important thing. How is it possible that people are using subwoofers for the mg20 and the 3.7 totally nuts. The most clear instrumental bass is with the maggies also the 1.7i. the amp is the most important thing with magnepan. I used first conrad johnson and later i changed it for the cello performance. And a friend of mine the cello duet and that was the moment no more tubes.

@mirolab, that single file seating sounds like the Sanders electrostatic speaker set up.  I've seen it at multiple audio shows.  It doesn't appeal to me either.

Now I don't remember ever seeing ET speakers at an audio show.  But all the photos or videos, including in this post, that I've seen show regular rows of seating with ET speaker demos.

To the imbecile above who commented they are Made in China on the fact that  they’re cheap, and without doing any research whatsoever, I hate to burst your bubble.

Thigpen builds them in Florida. I have a pair of LFT-8b’s and they say ‘Made in the United States’ right on the label.

Image: https://imgpile.com/i/9X7Kzh

@dynamiclinearity ​​@bdp24 - as @mijostyn pointed out, the SPL dropoff with distance has nothing to do with the speakers being planars or dipoles.  

Line source speakers produce a cylindrical wavefront (whether they are dipoles or not), which has an SPL falloff of 3db with each doubling of distance. A point source speaker (most conventional speakers) produces a spherical wavefront which reduces SPL by 6db with doubling distance. 

This is why you'll see a stack of speakers on stage for large rock concerts, creating an effective line array so that the audience sitting close to the stage doesn't get totally blasted out when the sound is loud enough for the audience in the rear. 

Using a dipole sub vs a conventional sub isn't going to affect the SPL falloff in the bass, but since the wavelengths are so long, the sound pressure at any point in the room is affected as much by room modes as anything else. 

That said, I do prefer the sound quality from dipole subs (for music). I think they sound more natural and integrate more seamlessly with dipole main speakers. 

Okay Albert (@ledoux1238), two pics sent---Eric.

For others interested, the Mye LFT-8 stand looks just like the Sound Anchor bases (including the two front "legs" which extend out from the bass enclosure), with the addition of support arms (I believe Grant Mye calls them "struts") that are attached to the back corners of the stand and reach up to the side rails, right at the middle of the tweeter’s length. The two arms clamp onto the side rails just as seen in the Mye stands for Maggies.

I suppose one could just add support arms to the Sound Anchor bases, but it would take some fabricating ability and tools.

@bdp24 Eric, thanks for the photos. I would like to keep the SA stands, so I may end up fabricating a set of struts with a local metal worker.

@chowkwan Very impressive set and twin LFT 8a's! What is a ' Super Lumi ' phono?

It is clear that LFT 8's suffer from a lack of brand identity and a lot of disinformation. Some of the un-truths have been floating around for ages, and despite continuous attempts to correct, still persist. Refuting  some of the un-truths : They are made in the US of A; they are tube amp friendly, 20 W min; they have a wide and deep enough sweet spot; .......etc

What I don't understand is this: The ET 2 linear tonearm from the same brand enjoys a very healthy reputation and respect. A thread here on Audiogon on the ET arm has over a million views. However, the speaker from Eminent Technology seemed consistently under-rated. Is the speaker world much more competitive with many more choices? Did the ET arm established itself  in an era of less good tonearms , and hence garnered good reviews and established a fan base  early?

That’s a great idea Albert. From the pics it appears the only difference between the Sound Anchors base and the Mye stand are the struts. I had thought of cutting some 3/4" Baltic Birch plywood into appropriate length strips (maybe 1/5" wide), screwing two of those homemade struts onto the top of the bass enclosure and back of the planar panel (at each top corner). Not elegant, but then I’m not an elegant guy. ;-)

I too am mystified by the low profile of the LFT-8b. Everybody knows about Maggies, very few about the Eminent Technology speaker. Of course ET having only five U.S.A. dealers and not advertising doesn’t help! I was lucking in having a great dealer who actually had a pair of LFT-8’s in his listening room.

Brooks Berdan was one of ET’s biggest dealers, installing a LOT of ET arms on Oracle, VPI, and SOTA tables. Brooks was also a Music Reference dealer, and the RM-9 Mk.2 and RM-200 Mk.2 amps work splendidly with the LFT-8. Both tube amps, 125w/ch and 100w/ch respectively. Unlike the 3-4 ohm Maggies, high current not needed.

Today I took delivery of a pair of Orchard Audio Starkrimson GaN mono amps. They are Class D analog switching amplifiers with outboard power supplies. 
I bought them from the owner of ArgentPur cables, a nice fellow named Ernie Meunier. They came with a short run of silver speaker cable wired to each amp manual. The Starkrimson monos were the TAS Budget product of the year in 2021. I can see why; more aptly, I can hear why. 
 

 I’ve generally been a tube guy over the past 25 years, but I’ve never owned a high power tube amp nor tried any with LFTs (I became a dealer aroun2004 or so).  I should have; my QS EL34 monos are underpowered at 35wpc into 8 ohms.  And so is my Pass Aleph 30 and it’s gain and input sensitivity are low and I use a Khozmo passive balanced pre. The Orchards are balanced only and my Sim Moon LP5.3 phono stage and Soekris DAC 1541 are also balanced with SE  option. I also have both original Quads and ESL 63s in lovely condition. To my ears, the 8B beats them in my room with these amps. They are utterly liquid, natural, dynamic, spacious and  resolving. So beautifully balanced and relaxed that I can listen all day.  I don’t want for anything else; they have the virtues of nice tube amplifiers and none of the problems plaguing so many solid-state devices I’ve heard over the years, such as dryness, brightness or any hardness or other artifacts.

All that remains is to get the 8C upgrade. I’ve already sent Bruce an email-:)

@harryz Just looked up the Starkrimson Amps, 500W class D, very interesting! I believe you will be happy with the 8C, unless you want to hold off until the LFT 18s' are released. 

There are folks here with tube amps from Music Ref. - 100w @bdp24 and @chowkwan with 400W Manleys.  I have a pair of Von Gaylord Nirvana 100 W with 8 Tung Sol 6550s'. However, I really like the LFT 8C with a 20W Mactone MH-300b, a little known Japanese amp with 300Bs' in Push-Pull configuration. It is harmonically richer, with better bass and slightly wider / deeper soundstage. A 20W tube amp would be quite comfortable driving the LFT 8Bs', and most definitely 8Cs'. I think Manley makes a pair of 300b monos' that can be switched into a 20W P-P or a 10W SE mode. in my estimation,  that would be a good fit with the ET. I guess I am the low power advocate for the ETs'.

Thanks Ledoux1238-

I imagine that the 8B is great with higher power tubes amps and I’ve experience some magic with my lower powered ones, but I prefer the Starkrimson amps. They just seem to work better with my associated gear in my room. As I noted, I’ve never had sound like this, even with wonderful horn speakers and original quads.

I bet that the 18s are magnificent and I’d love to hear them someday. I’m certain that they will be too big and too much speaker for my room.   Bruce has already responded and I’m going to order the upgraded woofers. 
 

Harry

Oops: that should have read 1.5" wide, not 1/5".

Hey Eric-

Did you replace the Sound Anchors with the Mye stands? I thought I had read that you had…

Harry Z

@harryz: Nope Harry; I'm a huge procrastinator. ;-)

My correspondence regarding the Mye stand for the LFT-8 was with a swell guy named Scott (I'll keep his last name private, as he may not want it made public). He contacted me after seeing my posting on the LFT a coupla years ago, telling me about the Mye stand. He told me the stand made a noticeable improvement in the sound of the LFT, well worth the cost of a pair.

I gave Grant Mye a call, and he said sure he'd make me a pair, to send him the locations/dimensions of the mounting holes in the bottom of the speaker. The mounting holes in the Mye stand will presumably be the same as that in the Sound Anchor, but a measurement is of course a good idea.

The stand isn't pictured on the Mye website, and neither is the stand Grant makes for the Quad ESL, which looks incredible (he sent me a pic). It is also not included in the Mye price list, so I don't know what the current price is.

Thanks Eric. Following your idea of fabricating something, I’m wondering if it would be possible to weld in a rod diagonally on each back leg of the Sound Anchors. There’s got to be a way to mod the stand. 
 

I forgot to ask Bruce if the 8C woofers will screw onto the SA stands. I hope so-:)

@harryz thanks for the shoutout.

@harryz: I too wondered if the woofer enclosure of the 8c has the same footprint as does the 8b. The rear of the 8b woofer enclosure is sloped, the 8c not. Perhaps both enclosures have the same bottom dimension, the 8c just having a square shape, for greater internal volume. A call to Thigpen would get the answer to that question.

For those who don't want the 8c (with it's digital processing), but like the idea of a dipole woofer, a separate dipole woofer can be used in place of the stock monopole 8b woofer. For those interested and not adverse to a little DIY, look into the OB/Dipole Sub offered by GR Research in conjunction with Rythmik Audio. It's sold as a kit, but is not much harder to build than an IKEA dresser (I assembled one for my sister ;-) .

@bdp24: No, the 8c is not as long, front to back. The width and height are the same, but the terminal blocks have been moved and one sits where the rear grillcloth frame rests, so I my rear grill sits up about 1/8" higher than with the 8b woofer cabinet. 

I like the dipole woofer, but don't use the DSP for the mids/highs, as I explained previously - my signal is split into an active crossover (Bryston 10B).

Regarding the Sound Anchor stands, I think I've missed why there is an interest in modifying it with additional struts. They are very stable as-is - is there a concern about small vibrations from the woofer box?

@gktaudio: Thanks for that info on the 8c. Using the DSP for the woofer only is how I too would run the 8c. I have a First Watt B4 x/o, a nice little unit from the mind of Nelson Pass.

The rational for the struts of the Mye stand is to brace the planar panel, not specifically from vibrations of the woofer enclosure, but just for any flexing of the wood frame of the panel. The struts secure the planar panel onto the stand's base, to which the bass enclosure is also secured. The Mye stand for Maggies features the same struts, which the Maggies really benefit from (those Maggie MDF frames are not nearly as structurally rigid as are the LFT-8 solid wood frames).

As I have described for the benefit of non-LFT owners, the LFT driver has it’s magnets and Mylar diaphragm built into a very stiff metal (aluminum?) frame assembly (which is bolted onto the panel’s wood frame), while Maggies are constructed with the Mylar diaphragm (and magnets?) stapled and glued onto the speaker’s MDF frame, far inferior to the construction of the LFT-8.

By the way, though the 8c’s bass system is a dipole, it is of course not an OB. Though an open baffle dipole woofer has it’s own challenges, it also has rewards unique to it. The GR Research/Rythmik Audio OB/Dipole Sub costs a little more than the 8c bass system, but offers those rewards. An interesting alternative, at any rate.

Bruce had a prototype new reference in Tampa at the Show back in February.  Plus, don't forget about his propeller sub and guitar speaker...This video shows a bit of those aspects from the Florida International Audio Expo

https://youtu.be/91ybrCypcKk

Right @audiophilejunkey, the LFT-18LS. That was mentioned back on page 1 of this thread, where the same video (which you filmed ;-) is posted as well. But thanks! I followed your build of the NX-Treme on YouTube, which is one reason why I didn't build a pair myself ;-) . Building the OB/Dipole Sub was pretty easy, but the EX-Treme looks to be quite a bit more daunting. Plus, I really like the ET LFT-8b!