Thiel Owners

tomthiel,

"...hiss is coming from the amp chain, not the speaker.The CS5 has rubber pads on the upper and floor woofer and the 5i has center weights..."

Tom, please bear with a couple of basic questions:

1. Reducing hiss then, is around acquiring quieter components in the chain. This would then also reduce the noise floor and allow more detail to be heard?
2. If I want to check if I have CS5's or CS5i's, I simply unscrew one of the woofers and look at it?

Thanks for your advice!

Dsper

dsper - noise floor reduction is an element of greater dynamic range, but the ear-brain is very good at inferring musical signal that "should be" buried in the noise floor. Yes, quieter is better, but it isn't everything. I suggest classic troubleshooting - find some other components to swap and determine where your noise is coming from. Could be tube noise.Speaker noises can include a throaty hissing, usually under load, if capacitors are failing, but I would rule out the amps first.
No need to unscrew anything. Take off the grille and inspect the bottom and third (sub) woofers for rubber mats (CS5) or center weights (CS5i).

@tomthiel     
Sure wish I could post images directly.  Doing a google image search on the speakers in question will produce a few with the correct angle to view the issue at hand, below.

The 1.6 (and 1.7) are similar to the 2.4 about my concern of the recessed baffle.  The 1.5 is a very different mounting strategy from the 2.3.  The 2.7 baffle is again different from both the 2.3 and 2.4.

I will play with your felt solution with my 2.4, but in their case, this will disallow use of the grilles w/o some klugy modifications: most of the grille weight is supported by a pin above the coax, requiring the grilles remain flush against the baffle; the magnets help support the grille perimeter.  In my home, the grilles must remain on.

Here are quick and dirty links to reasonably good views of the 2.3 and 2.4 baffles:

https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Thiel-CS-2-3-Hi-End_11195163.html

http://www.hifi4sale.net/t38695-thiel-cs-2-4-used

sdecker - thanks for the photos. On my 1.6s I put a strip of aluminum at the bottom of the pocket to support the weight of the grille. Of the various felts I have tried, the best is F11 pressed wool from Sutherland. F15N (needle punched) is nearly as good and costs half as much. I have tried 1/8" and 3/8" and don't hear or measure much of any difference. Probably land around 3/16" depending on physical parameters.

Thiel Owners ,  that's a dyeing breed