Tweeter life


My guess is after 10 yrs, best to buy new ones.
I have some 17 yr old Millennial tweeters, 1 has gone bad, the other on the way out.
I got some good years out that tweet. My suggestion/advice is this< If the tweeter is over 10 yrs and has served well, do not buy replacement voice coils for $50 each,,Go ahead and buy brand new tweeters. 
The Excel midwoofers are working as new.
Its the tweeters which take a  beating, as the components are delicate and sensitive.
This is my advice, 
mozartfan
New, I agree, same exact model available? any technical changes?

My son burnt out my JSE Model 2 Infinite Slope Tweeters (Dynaudio I seem to remember) EVERY party he had. His friends would have the wrong input, keep turning the volume up to max, then randomly find the correct input, WHAM!

Cost him $60./party way back when.

I finally chose a Focal model, they never burnt out.

Speaker crossover remains unchanged.

If different, make sure all aspects of the tweeter are similar enough, especially SPL.
Why to replace tweeters and not the woofers? Dry ferrofluid can be replaced. Large midrange drivers in my speakers also have ferrofluid, plus unique design - not replaceable. Replacing tweeter is not an easy task, unless you reinstall exactly the same. In addition to sensitivity, that you might have to measure somehow, you need to match resistance and inductance of the coil. Also dispersion characteristic might be different. My 11 year old tweeters are short horn by unknown manufacturer while speaker manufacturer bankrupted. There is no provision to replace ferrofluid - would have to unglue membrane. I found similar short horn tweeter (Morel), but would have to measure and compare inductance and sensitivity. Current speaker has no markings on the posts. How to determine polarity of the tweeter? (some speakers have tweeters wired in opposite phase). Would new speaker improve sound or make it worse? My brother’s Cabasse speakers are over 20 years old and tweeters still
work fine. Perhaps "if ain’t broke don’t fix it", unless you have "Gardener’s Syndrome" (constant trimming and repotting).


If they’re working well, why replace them at all?


Well thats what Richard Gray told me, when i asked him 2 months ago,, he said Quote<< do they produce sound?>> *Yes* , <<Then they are ok>> Now after the tweets are on his test equipment,,he says,, **they are out of balance* = perhaps its time for new tweets, @ $350 each,, well, they are 17 yrs old,, but for 10 yrs i had no sound system as i could not finda line stage preamp to mmatch the Defy7,, So lets just say, with new xovers,, why not replace the Millennials. ?? uh? why not? anyone care to dispute,, the old ones with new voice coil diaphrams will go up for sale on ebay.
Who know they may sound close/same to old ones.. I just don’t know.. But again its time after 17 yrs to go ahead and replace,, This way, I will never have to worry about changing the Millenniums ever again.
paul
New Orleans
The Audiophile Mountaineer.