Recent Review

I would absolutely recommend Aquadthingaudio for any repairs or refurbishment of your Quad electrostatic speakers (ESL57s, 63s, 988s, 989s, etc etc!). I originally contacted Alan Bayliss about a non-working ESL63 that I had…….they only work on Quads and being based close to Banbury Alan was only an easy 40mins drive away. I arrived with the speaker and we went into his workshop – what a wonderful Aladdin’s cave of all things Quad electrostatic! There were panels everywhere in various stages of repair, test equipment of all sorts and I knew at once I was in safe hands. Sure enough within 10mins Alan had diagnosed the ESL63s problem and fixed it….fantastic!

Alan then showed me all of the testing that he does on each panel before he is happy to fit them into a speaker – it’s not just about getting sound out of a panel, it’s about the panel conforming to the correct sound output, being balanced with the other panels in the speaker, showing no / minimal signs of voltage leak and simply measuring right. This all got me thinking about my own pair of stacked ESL57s – I’d simply built a frame and hinged 4 panels into it – they sounded good to my ears but I wasn’t sure if they were performing to their best ability.

So having dropped the 4 speakers off, Alan set about refurbishing them all – this involved adding clamp boards to each one to protect the treble panels, adding a new HT board to each, replacing all of the audio transformer resistors and capacitors, and upgrading all the wiring with silicone cable. And then the important bit – testing each panel to make sure it was in spec, selecting panels of the same output for the top and bottom speakers in the stack and basically getting everything working to its best ability. I picked the speakers up (Alan demoed them for me – wow!), fitted them back in my frames and…..absolutely stunning! The bass is so much more controlled, the treble and mid-range like you’re in the room with the singer and the band. The speakers disappear in a wall of unbelievably high quality sound. To say I am delighted is an understatement….if you are thinking of getting your Quad electrostatics repaired or refurbished then don’t look anywhere else….enough said! Many thanks Alan!!

It's been just over a year since I joined here on the Wam, I contacted Mike @ Stylesound  and told him about my ESL's, he then recommended Andrew Jones of AQuadthing Audio. I got in contact with Andrew and all I can say is, Andrew is a Top Guy, very knowledgeable on the ESL's.

One day I unplugged the ESL's from the mains for a few days to allow them to power down, I then took of the back grill of one of them to have a look inside and what a Bloomin' mess. I took my finger along top of the EHT unit and there was a Quad service sticker from 1980, so these have not been looked at in nearly 40 years! All those years worth of dust, dirt etc as you will see in photo's.  My Granda bought these brand new from Telemech Marischal Street  Aberdeen back in 1979, he paid £465.00 for them. I have seen the original receipt card but it's been lost in the sands of time.

Anyway I saved up for around a year and February of this year i sent off my ESL's in their original boxes and well packed for a full standard service, which includes 4 Bass panels serviced and 2 Treble panels reconditioned , I even paid extra to have the grills resprayed black as they required it, (they have always been black).

Well folks what can I say, roughly 6 to 8 weeks later DHL delivered my ESL's, I unboxed them and I was blown away! they looked as good as new, what a brilliant job Andrew did. I hooked them up, left them on for 24 hours and 24 hours later, I put a record on, Oh Yes! what a sound, as good, if not better than what I remember. Unbelievable!

If anyone out there who has old tired sounding ESL 57's in need of repair, then I absolutely wholeheartedly recommended that you contact Andrew Jones right away!   Andrew will send you updates and Photo's via e mail or WhatsApp during stages of servicing your Speakers, if he has any concerns at all he will contact you to let you know about it.   One of my ESL Treble panels had a small burn on the panel, Andrew fixed this up in Grand Style!

Hi Paul

I am not the right person to be able to advise the technical details of what is fitted so I would suggest that you contact Andrew Jones of AQuadThing Audio who has done all the work on my speakers .

https://aquadthingaudio.wixsite.com/5763/contact

If you ask him what has been done then he can give proper technical details . If what you find out is okay with you then we can make some arrangements after that . If for any reason even if only a slight doubt on your part then my thanks for your offer but I understand why you would not want to go ahead .

After looking for one nice pair of 57s for a few months, we bought two pairs in two days, with the 'inspired' but slightly mad idea of stacking them at the WAM show.

Mark got a pair from another hifi forum and I ended up with these (below) from Andrew at AQuadThing. They've had a couple of Quad services in their 50 odd years, and clamp boards fitted, but nothing '3rd party'. They 'came up' very quickly (within 5 minutes of being switched on), and have excellent balance. Andrew, who has been listening to 57s for over 50 years (and servicing / refurbing them for a fair chunk of that), reckons they as close to original factory measurements as any pair that he has come across in the last 10 or 15 years years. They sound even better after being on for 24 hours, at home. They are not modern hi-fi, but, wow... vocals... like the singer is in the room and you can reach out and touch them. Exceptionally natural, zero fatigue.

I'll be rejigging the room a little in order to get them a bit further apart, but they've been easier to fit in (and get sounding really good) than I had anticipated. At the moment, they're nearly 4 feet from the front wall, and I'm listening from around 10 feet away...

Amazing service, Friendly team, speakers now sound brilliant! Thank you Andy and Alan for all your knowledge and help, from collection of the speakers, the updates whilst you were working on them to the delivery! Spot on! Highly recommend! 

Hi Andy,

We eventually got home. Crane fire on the M1 closed it so we were in the car over 9 hours in total yesterday. 

I set them up to charge overnight and listening to them this morning. They sound amazing, so much better than I remember - I have full bottom end now. 

So far just on vinyl and tried…

Dissolution by The Pineapple Thief (it’s like they mixed this record purely to be listened to on Electrostats - check it out if you haven’t heard it before)

Seeds of Love by Tears for Fear (track 2 is like I’m in the room with the best band ever)

Moving on to some Dire Straits next. 

Thanks so much for your work on these. I will definitely have a set of stands later in the year once I’ve got used to the sound of this upgrade. If you get a second hand set in (unlikely I know), just let me know, I’ll take them. 

Thanks again 

Neil

I have finally got round to listening to music and I was blown away by my “new” Quads. What struck me very forcibly was the depth of bass and so musical. On from there was the spaciousness and the depth of the listening field. Mid band is a dream and the treble has regained its sweetness. In a word I am as pleased as the proverbial punch. Thanks a million guys. 

Kind Regards

I am writing, after a few days listening to my re-built ESL 57s, to say that my wife and I are delighted with the transformation and very pleased we chose your full service with new OTEC panels. 

We are not the youngest of your clients (ESL 57 owners for 47 years), but our ears picked up the extra detail in the first few bars of the first piece of music. We are already hearing the most realistic sounds we have ever heard from our system, even though the speakers are still being run in. 

I am now enjoying large scale choral works again, although I have to admit that poorer recordings are exposed by speakers as revealing as these. 

Finally, thank you very much for keeping me in the picture when the speakers were in your workshop. 

Kind regards,