Thiel Owners

Jhouse - your speakers certainly do look altered, that's not a Thiel factory finish. The veneer looks to be Mahogany, which has a natural color in the salmon spectrum, which is generally stained some shade of red-brown. It looks like yours have been stripped, leaving some color in the scratches and pores. They could be refinished professionally or DIY with readily available finishing materials.
Thiel used very little Mahogany due to a combination of low demand and high hassle factor. There are many types of figure, grain, color and embedded expectations regarding Mahogany. Mahogany with its terminology and nuances is well understood in the world of fine furniture, but practically invisible in the world of audio. We would have needed an education and interface department to promote Mahogany, and chose instead to just offer it as an option on demand. Hard to guess why your cabinets got stripped.

Thanks @tomthiel and @thielrules. My first thoughts they were the lighter color that Thiel offered then they stained this color. They don’t feel like they have been sanded and you can see on the edges where the runoff was. I guess once I get them sanded down carefully, I’ll be able to see what’s underneath. 

FYI: Thiel stained bare wood; if stained, the clearcoats would be on top of stain. If natural, the clear sealer and topcoats would be on bare wood. Refinishing is serious business. Are you experienced? You might consider some form of over-coat, like a pigmented topcoat, or translucent or opaque paint.

Keep us posted on their resurrection tour.

Hello everyone! Wow, what an informative thread this is! I’ve really enjoyed reading through here and learning so much about Thiel speakers. Such a wealth of information.

I picked up my first pair of Thiel speakers a few months ago. I found a pair of CS7’s locally and couldn’t pass them up. When I bought them, they were described as fully functional, but, as soon as I got them home, I realized there was an issue with one of the 12" woofers. I could hear the coil rubbing the former on bass notes at moderate levels. Thankfully, Rob Gillum was able to help me out. I shipped the woofer off to him and he rebuilt it back to factory spec. Turns out the suspension was a bit tired and allowed the cone to sag which caused the VC to rub. It’s good as new now. I may rotate the other woofer 180 degrees as preventive maintenance. However, removing these woofers is no easy task. Definitely a two person job to minimize the risk of damaging the concrete baffles. The woofer alone weighs 30 lbs!

Anyway, I’ve had them up and running for a few weeks now and I’m really enjoying them! They’re much different from the other speakers I have in our home. In a good way! Excellent detail and imaging. Some of the best I’ve heard in that regard. Bass is clean and tight with no trace of boxy boominess. Really exceptional speakers! I’m running them on a modest setup at the moment; Tidal/Amazon HD, Bluesound Node 2i, SMSL M8a, Anthem Pre 2L SE and Parasound HCA-3500. I’ll be changing things up in the coming week. Curious how the CS7’s will respond. :)

Here’s a shot of them in situ:
https://flic.kr/p/2jeBrwZ
https://flic.kr/p/2jeEdNK

And check out this woofer:
https://flic.kr/p/2jipdwi

The woofer is secured to an internal cross brace via a 3/4" bolt through the phase plug/magnet.
https://flic.kr/p/2jimg5Y

Also note solid core wiring used throughout:
https://flic.kr/p/2jimjGC

Happy listening, All!

@tomthiel I have a pair of Klipsch Chorus II I will be stripping down and doing a restrain before I encounter my 3.5. I also have a pair of the lighter  oak finish (ash?) cs2.2 that has a light cup stain on top that I wouldn’t mind fixing.