Electrostatic Speakers


I have been lusting after a pair of electrostatic speakers for my entire life. When I was a kid the Infinity Servo Static was the big dog in town. I heard a pair of stacked (4) QUAD electrostatic when Mark Levinson was saying they were the only speakers up to his standards.

So, It was with great excitement when I ordered a pair of QUAD ESL-2912 speakers. I set them up in my listening room and they were fantastic. Even the bass was impressive, tight and went very low. However not the bass output one would get from a big powered sub-woofer. One night I was playing internet radio and I heard thunder. I walked outside and there was no rain. The thunder was coming from the speakers! Not loud but deep and tight.

I have owned lots of speakers over the years. I sold stereo systems for years when I was younger. I worked for AR for a few years. In all those years I have never heard any speaker that came close to the QUAD ESL-2912 for clarity and transient response.

Then one day the party ended. One of the speakers made a loud single CLICK, just one and then back to normal for days. Then it got much worse. It clicked and thumped every few hours. Then it clicked and thumped every few minutes.

I sent an email to the Distributor asking what to do. No answer. I sent a few more emails, no answer. The clicking was making me nuts so I removed the back cover and disconnected the panel, there are five, that was making the noise. All was back to wonderful except the left speaker was a bit softer in volume than the right speaker.

Over the next few months I sent more emails and my tone turned angry. Finally they sent me a replacement panel. Before the replacement panel arrived more panels went bad in the first speaker and then the second speaker.

Next we shipped both speakers to the factory repair center. Six months they returned with banged up cabinets, torn speaker cloth and one speaker still not working!

So my $ 13,000.00 dream speakers have bitten me. Years ago I had KLH 9 speakers (also full range electrostatic) and never had trouble with them until they died and couldn’t be rebuilt.

Any of you have experience with QUAD electrostatics? Some people say a rebuilt pair of the old ones are way better than the new ones. I assumed that new modern manufacturing methods would have made the new speakers super reliable.

Thoughts?? Am I within my reasonable rights to sue these guys?
davidclarke
But wait. Why did these supposedly reknowned speakers fail? Is this a fundamental design flaw or...?
The rumor was bad glue holding the charge plates in place.

However I was told the new panels didn't have that problem.

I think now I only have 1 bad panel out of 10 panels.
 
Between the bad shipping job and 1 speaker not working directly from repair I am not a happy camper.
I don't understand that at all. Here's why. Martin has been building high quality acoustic guitars for more than 100 years and they are held together with glue and yet one can bang away on them as hard as one wants to, under great tension, and they don't fall apart. I mean, what gives?
Try Martin Logan’s. I’ve had mine for almost 25 years and they have been great the whole time.  You won’t find a better electrostatic speaker!

@stevecham, the word is, the Quad glue problems started after their production moved to China. For those who like to shoot the messenger, I’m not saying it’s true (or untrue, for that matter).

I have original Quads (57’s), but if I was going to spend $13,000 on new ESL’s, it would be Sanders or Music Reference I would buy. Both made in the U.S.A. by people who care.