Rhodes Satellite speaker cabinets?

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pootco

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Hi, I'm a newbie; first post. I have some questions about Rhodes Satellite speaker cabinets. Are they still in demand/collectible? Sought after for parts? Or just obsolete old stuff?

I know a guy who has 2 Rhodes speaker cabinets, each with 2 12" speakers. The two cabinets are about the same size as one of those huge Rhodes "suitcase" speaker cabinets. One unit appears to have a preamp; it's the master and the other unit is the slave. Maker is CBS Instruments, so I suppose they date to the '70s. Speakers look pretty old and are probably original.

I've heard they were called the "Satellite" system and are stereo. I'm told that in order to work, the Rhodes piano had to have a special stereo preamp installed. I think it could be retrofitted to a conventional Rhodes Stage or Suitcase. Do you agree?

What do you think they're worth, as-is? I'm presuming they're working; need to test them to confirm that and make sure the speakers aren't blown.

Any input you have would be appreciated. Thank you for your time!



Regards,

Tim
 
The answer to the in demand/collectable question is a guarded yes. Anything to do with a 70's Rhodes sound is in demand to one degree or another, and from your description these should be unique enough to command a fair buck from the right buyer.

Is the Rhodes that was intended to mate with these speakers still available?

Does the master have an amplifier or just a preamplifier? Amplifiers are heavy, and if the master is a lot heavier than the slave that'll be a good tipoff...

What kind of jack does it have? If it has a 1/4", either stereo or mono, you can test them with another keyboard. If it is a stereo jack you may have to back the plug out a little before you hear any sound.
 
Rhodes Satellite Speaker Cabinets?

Ssscientist,

Thanks for the input! I found the same exact model on eBay. Though the seller's feedback rating is not very good, I'll be watching this one to see how it does; that will give me a clue on the demand/market value. The ones I'm looking at are not as nice as this one, though. And yes, the keyboard that went with "my" speakers is gone. I'll have to look at it again to see if it's an amp or preamp in the master, or can you tell from looking at this listing?


http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=1288&item=7324152064&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

Thanks again for your help!
 
It looks to me like there is an amplifier in the master cab and they tried to make sure this would be a Fender proprietary system by using a quirky pseudo-din connector to hook the Rhodes up. If you open up the master cabinet I'm quite sure you'll find one side of the jack wired straight to the slave output.

If you want to test them you'll have to replace that connection with a 1/4" tip/ring/sleeve jack to preserve the stereo-ness of the setup. It probably wouldn't be a bad idea to do this -- or have it done -- anyway since it would make them a whole lot more flexible.

If you do that, you could consider putting them on ebay as Rhodes or guitar cabinets --- the addition of a 1/4" TRS jack could make all the difference to someone looking for a stereo cabinet setup to use with a guitar. The amp is 300 watts and that's enough to crank a guitar plenty loud...
 
I agree with ssscientist, except instead of installing a single 1/4"TRS socket, I would install 2 1/4"TS sockets, as many keyboards feature seperate left and right outputs. Additionally adding a switch to bridge the 2 inputs would be beneficial, especially for guitarists, who may only be using a standard 1/4"TS cable anyways, they could bridge the 2 speakers instead of only running out of one speaker for mono applications. Just a thought.

As far as worth goes, it all depends on the buyer. Some people pay stupid-silly amounts of money for stuff that others don't consider valuable (Comic books for $1000's of dollars :eek: ). I'd say if you can pick them up fairly reasonable, go ahead. But then again, I'm a gear whore.
 
Guys, the previous owner of the cabs wired up an external 1/4" jack and a toggle switch, which hang loose by the control panel of the master unit. So without testing it, I'm concluding one of two things:
- The guy wired it up to allow for broader usage as you have suggested, or
- Something's broke inside and this was a bypass to keep the rig running.


Sorry, I'm a drummer and I'm very clueless when dealing with amplifiers, etc. I'll get a more knowledgable buddy to scope it out with me. Frankly, I'm just looking for gear to flip on eBay. Noticed that the pristine set of Satellites (see above link) has lots of hits but no bids yet...

Regards,

Tim
 
Satellite Speaker Power

sssscientist.

FYI, The Peterson style Super Satellite System is rated as 100 watts RMS per cab. Also, the pseudo-din jack was used because the master unit supplies the power to the Peterson preamp that is mounted on the piano rail, as well as a signal cable. The 4 wires are; power, ground, left and right signal. A 1/4" jack could be used to bypass this jack, but then the cab would be mono---even with the slave plugged in. Of course with both cabs one would have 200 W RMS. In the olden days ( yes I'm that old ) we used to put JBL D130F or JBL K130 speakers in the cabs. That really put out a lot of sound.

Rob
 
You may not realise that you're responding to a thread that's six years old.
 
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