I had my big altecs for about month now. Only thing I did to them was restuffed the cabs in them. I just realigned fiberglass along the walls/backside and stuffed rest with a lot of premium fiberfill. Cabs are so big I used like 8lbs per speaker of polyfill in order to fill them lol.
I also managed to find extra cinder blocks to use as speaker stands to get them off the floor and more ear level. It actually was pretty easy lifting them to get them on the cinder blocks spite them being around 145lbs each.
They do sound really great and really like how they sound and is good all around speaker. Those old altec woofers too are something else cause they do easily reach as low as they're spec'ed and cleanly too. Ran some organ content on them and you are able to feel the rumble.
I don't hear any horn coloration on what some things I read and definitely no honkiness or anything. But, probably cause my 511c horns are already fully dampened and bolted in the cabs. I know the earlier 511/811 horns weren't dampened and had ringing issues and people would use liquid rubber and spray them or use plumber putty and place them on top and bottom of the mouth of the horn.
Even though I really like how these sound I been curious on how the other altec lansing drivers sound. Only read that the only other good woofer altec designed were the 518's but when come to horns and compression drivers lot seem to prefer the 511 horns w/ either 802d/g or 808-8b drivers over the 811 horns. The 808-8 is supposedly is very similar as 802 or something and only difference is some piece of felt between the loading caps. I don't know and I am not taking apart my 511c/808-8b to find out either. I would buy a pair of 802 drivers to try or as back ups but people are frinkin' nuts on ebay with asking prices and people bidding so they're outrageous so, im not bothering with trying them anytime soon.
Anyhoo, only thing I might try is, is getting an active crossover and activity bi-amp them to see how they end up sounding. Right now though, I think the recapped/reworked 904-8A crossover (pro version of 604-8A. Basically for higher power handling) crossed over at 1200hz been working fine and sound great to me so I might wait awhile on doing that.
Well, these old big ugly (even though I think they look cool) speakers sound really super and still surprise me cause of their age.
