Smart move. Many years ago I was in the same situation only with turntables. Used some connections, pulled some strings, got into CES as a vendor with a (very) early prototype. That one long weekend seeing what the business is like from the inside turned me off so much, and happy for it, saved me what would have been an awful lot of emotional and more than likely financial pain. The idea that if you build a better mouse trap the world will beat a path to your door is so laughably off it could be a feature length Monty Python movie.
Mystery Capacitor and the Tangent RS4 Crossover
I have a pair of
Tangent RS4s whose crossovers I am currently in the midst of trying to
rebuild (Early 80s British 2 way speaker). I used to power them in the 80s with an Adcom GFA1 amp (200
watts/channel which I understand both Bob Carver and Nelson Pass had a
hand in designing back when Adcom was based in New Brunswick, NJ, my old
home town). Apparently, either time or I did a fair amount of damage to
those caps (probably both) and some are hard to id, particularly one
that looks like a piece of pink sugar coated candy with green, white and
violet stripes? I'm working on a schematic for this crossover so I can
get some expert opinion on the project and maybe id the capacitor value by process of elimination. But I am new to this and am
learning as I go. If there is anyone out there interested or who could
lend some assistance I would be happy to share/learn.
I set out to simply replace the caps but am beginning to question the design and wonder if it could not be improved upon. For starters it seems to have a lot of caps for a two way crossover (8 in five styles), plus 2 resistors and 3 coils. Modern designs I have looked at typically have two or three caps for 2 two way crossover.The drivers and cabinets are in good shape and I have always liked this speaker which sports a 200mm Audax bextrene cone woofer and a 19mm KEF t27 dome tweeter, housed in a nicely crafted 42.5 liter walnut veneered mdf cabinet, all of which has held up amazingly well over the yearsI'll try to figure out how to post pictures to this site if anyone is kind enough to offer assistence.
I set out to simply replace the caps but am beginning to question the design and wonder if it could not be improved upon. For starters it seems to have a lot of caps for a two way crossover (8 in five styles), plus 2 resistors and 3 coils. Modern designs I have looked at typically have two or three caps for 2 two way crossover.The drivers and cabinets are in good shape and I have always liked this speaker which sports a 200mm Audax bextrene cone woofer and a 19mm KEF t27 dome tweeter, housed in a nicely crafted 42.5 liter walnut veneered mdf cabinet, all of which has held up amazingly well over the yearsI'll try to figure out how to post pictures to this site if anyone is kind enough to offer assistence.
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- 29 posts total
@millercarbon I hear ya, I have been to at least 20 C.E.S as a buyer, not as a vendor. Even on my end, it was easy to see how cutthroat it could be from the vendor side. Years ago, Randy Patton who briefly owned Threshold, Sumo, Meitner, PS Audio and a few others, recommended me to Martin Logan. I had a call from them asking me to come interview in Kansas. I had no interest in moving to Kansas and did not go for an interview, but that started me thinking about doing my own thing. I would still love to produce speakers, but as I eluded to earlier, I’m getting older. I would love to market this 15 inch 2 way.... At this point, not likely. |
@timlub Your 15 inch/1inch speaker sounds interesting, particularly coupled with the efficiency rating it sports. Have you considered selling it as a DIY kit? I was looking around and was surprised at the lack of selection of DIY speaker kits. Maybe a part of that problem is related to the fact that audio reviewers generally ignore kits. For instance if I had not come across reviews of the amp camp amp and the bottlehead crack headphone amp I would not have even considered kits. As it was I did build a Amp Camp Amp and am working on a second because it was fun and it sounds really good.I think that the urge to build and tinker is under exploited in this hobby. Too many people just think it is all about going out and laying down large sums for beautifully finished final products. There is nothing wrong with this mind you, but you don't learn anywhere near as much as when you get more involved.I for one might very well be interested in building a version of your speaker if it were available. |
The cap was somewhat damaged as I removed it from the circuit board so I was just a bit concerned about whether it would measure accurately.That "infamous pink mystery cap" also known as "Tropical Fish Capacitor". Some DIYer still using it for speaker and amplifier building due to its unique mid range sonic signature. Here is an image of 0.022µF 250V 10% tropical fish film cap: https://www.pedalhackerelectronics.com/Mullard-022uf-250v-Tropical-Fish-Film-Capacitors-p/.022mul.ht... |
- 29 posts total