Kenwood S-3 (1975–1977)
The Kenwood S-3 is a 2-way bass reflex speaker system produced from 1975 to 1977. Documentation is thin. No original brochure material or launch pricing has surfaced. The specs that do exist come from a German database and a single owner's blog, and they describe a serious, substantial floorstander from Kenwood's mid-1970s lineup. Kenwood was advertising its new top-of-the-line receivers in HiFI-Stereo (June 1974, p.58) around this era.
The cabinet houses a 300 mm cone woofer crossed over at 3,500 Hz to a horn-type tweeter. Frequency response is rated at 50-20,000 Hz, impedance at 8 ohms. Power handling is the one spec that varies between sources. One lists 55 W nominal / 80 W maximum, the other 60 watts. The exact figure is uncertain, but this was clearly a speaker meant for real amplifier power. Dimensions are 360 × 625 × 300 mm and it weighs 12.5 kg.
What little is known about real-world reception comes from a collector who acquired a pair as new old stock in Europe, where they were apparently hard to find. He paid $180 for the pair, which he called very reasonable. He described them as "beautiful and powerful-sounding," with impressive depth and a knack for handling rock and electronic music at high volumes. The same source calls them a "12-inch 3-way" in one breath, while the spec table says 2-way. That may mean the horn tweeter was perceived as covering two ranges, or the blog post wasn't carefully edited.
Known specifications:
- **Type:** 2-way bass reflex
- **Woofer:** 300 mm cone
- **Tweeter:** Horn type
- **Frequency response:** 50–20,000 Hz
- **Impedance:** 8 Ω
- **Crossover:** 3,500 Hz
- **Power handling:** 55 W (nominal) / 80 W (max) - one source says 60 W
- **Dimensions:** 360 × 625 × 300 mm
- **Weight:** 12.5 kg
No service manual or marketing materials have surfaced, and period reviews are limited to Kenwood's broader product line. Details on crossover components, connector types, and common failure points remain undocumented. For a speaker of this era and construction, a recap and check of the crossover is the usual starting point for restoration, but that's general practice, not specific knowledge about this model.
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