AKG C414

In a previous post I spoke about the Coles 4038, a mic that has not changed at all since the 50’s and is still in production today.

On the other end of the scale is the AKG C414 which has had 9 different iterations to date, and all quite substantially different.

The first was the C-414-comb, the FET successor to the venerable AKG C12 valve microphone, and shares the same brass-ring #CK12 capsule which is the best large capsule AKG ever made, and considered to be one of the finest capsules ever made, not only used in the C12 but also the ELA M251.

Around 1980 AKG discontinued the brass-ring CK12 and changed it for a nylon-ring which is by no way a bad capsule, but doesn’t live up to the performance of the previous brass-ring version.

A few revisions down the line we come to the C414 B-ULS which is the model in the picture and was introduced in 1986. A mic which shares very little in common with the first C414s other than the name and a similar shape. While this mic is not in the same league as the C414 variants with the brass-ring CK12 capsule I find it to be a very good workhorse mic which doesn’t sound bad on anything.

I find it to be the best example of the nylon-ring capsule equipped mics and it is the last variant to have an output transformer. It was discontinued in the early 90’s and since then there have been a few more variants of the C414 but none of these later transformerless versions I hold much regard for.

I use my C414s on the underside of the snare quite regularly, it is also very useful for percussion and stringed instruments but it really excels on nylon stringed guitar. Perhaps it’s the nylon in the capsule that causes some sort of symbiosis with the nylon strings.