From bruce@ashbysolutions.com Sat Sep 07 06:23:58 2002
Subject:Re: OT (Another) Leslie 3-d Question - Steppenwolf

Hi Charlie,

>> i'll bet if you get an old tube amp like a bandmaster
>> or something, turn it up to ten and unplug your top rotor you'll get the
>> sound or close to it.
>>
>
>I never heard of this before. To be sure that I am understanding you
>correctly, take the high end out of the Leslie cross over and instead of
>going to the horn, route it to an amplifier?

No, I think the sound he's describing is the "Steppenwolf sound" used on the early Steppenwolf albums. It runs all of the sound through the woofer and drum only, without the crossover. Kind of like a Leslie 125 or Fender Vibratone, but with a 15" vs. a 12" speaker, and a wooden baffle. The drum rotor doesn't have as much bite as the horn does, but at Steppenwolf overdrive (and volume) levels, it becomes much less of an issue. It's fairly easy to do -- at least on the older Leslies -- because the woofer and the input to the crossover use the same two-pin plug.

If I had to take a guess, it probably started when Goldy blew out his V21 tweeter, and he (or a tech) bypassed the horn section. He probably liked the slower accel/decel times, and maybe the extra AM in the tremolo, and decided to leave it that way.

As I mentioned before, he seems to have eventually gone back to two-rotor Leslies.

Regards,

-BW

--
Bruce Wahler
Design Consultant
Ashby Solutions™ http://consult.ashbysolutions.com
CloneWheel Support Group and HiNote moderator
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