Thiel Owners

Bluetone - Please pursue this 3.5 midrange matter. Make a chart of the # and parameters original driver and the various replacements. As ketchup says the original cone was paper. Kevlar is "better", but its resonances would be different plus it gives up 1dB of sensitivity to the 8640. For perspective, we must find something very close to the original because the whole speaker system (enclosure, xo, other drivers, etc.) works together and changing any parameter of the midrange driver requires re-engineering the xo. That is a possibility as long as most of the parameters match and the ones that don't match are friendly.

This investigation would make lots of people happy. It is not on my current list because of its scope and competing priorities.
Keep up the good work. - Tom

Tom, will do.  I'll post the analysis on my website, which I will link to once I complete it.  

The original 3.5’s mids had paper surrounds.

Is there a good program that would measure the speaker specifications?

tomic601 - one thing to check is the coax drivers, be sure your 2.3s have the upgraded drivers - sn#4567 was the first to have been converted to these at the factory per Rob.  I bought my 2.3s used, lower serial number, but luckily the coax (and xover) had already been upgraded.  The upgrade gets you the same coax driver and xover as 2.4s, if I understood Rob correctly.  

Here's Rob's full response to one of my questions re this upgrade - 

    There were two versions of the CS2.3. New style, and old style. The new style began at serial numbers 4567. The new style consisted of having two magnets on each of the coaxial drivers. The old style had only one magnet. Both versions used ceramic magnets, and the CS2.4 incorporates Neo magnets. Much stronger magnet 10x. The CS2.4 coax cannot be used with the CS2.3 properly. The coax rebuild is $250 each, plus shipping, and can be rebuilt in either version. The new style coax had a two part change to the crossover network as well. You can remove your coax for inspection, and tell whether it is a double ceramic magnet or only one, like the old style. If you need to rebuild both coaxes, then the associated crossover parts are free. Let me know how I can help.