Searching for spaces

[Gary Hodges (NOAA Affiliate)]

Current computer: Kubuntu 14.04 and emacs 24.3.1
Previous computer: Kubuntu 12.04 and emacs 23.3.1

With the new machine I'm no longer able to search for consecutive 
spaces.  Specifically, I regularly want to search for 5 consecutive 
spaces as part of a keyboard macro.  The beginning of that macro is as 
follows:

C-x-(, C-s-<space>-<space>-<space>-<space>-<space>

The above would locate each instance of 5 consecutive spaces.  This is 
no longer the case.  How can I get the old behavior back?

Thank you,
Gary