Thiel Owners

jeff_pvd

Welcome! Good to see yo here today. Thank You for sharing your Thiel 03s experience.  After 34 years, you are certainly due for an upgrade. IMO, the sweet spot is a pair of CS 2.4 loudspeakers. These are easily found all over the internet.

Model CS 2.4 can be placed 8-10 feet apart. Then, 2-3 feet away from back walls/side walls. This particular speaker sounds great with as little as 75 watts up to 200 watts per channel (wpc). Again, easy to drive and easy to place without too much fuss. Most sellers are honest about the condition of a demo/used pair of Thiel Audio loudspeakers.

What other gear is in your system? I look forward in reading more about your Musical taste.

Happy Listening!

Happy Friday! All

Hello everybody.

I would like to ask your opinion on the crossover update of my CS3.5.

I have already ordered (and am awaiting delivery) two 8.2uf ClarityCap CSAs, which will replace the two equal capacity Solen polypropylene caps installed in the tweeter’s cell (these are the two units to which - following the precious advice of Tom Thiel - I want to allocate the largest budget).

The doubt concerns instead the replacement of the two electrolytics in the woofer cell. As you may know, in the latter there is a 66uf electrolytic cap (branded "Versa-Tronic") and another 24uf electrolytic cap (also branded Versa-Tronic). These two capacitors are bypassed by a 1uf polypropylene (Solen) and a small 12pf polystyrene.

Now, as the two electrolytics mentioned above have come to the end of their service period I would like to replace them.

With which units do you recommend replacing them, having to replicate the overall capacity of the two groups of capacitors (that is 25.012uf (24uf + 1uf-12pf) and 67.012uf (66uf + 1uf ​​+ 12pf))?

Thanks to everyone who will want to advise me!

magnet7 - Others here might help you find your best brand fit. Here’s my broad input. Those woofer electrolytics are in shunt (shaping) resonance circuits which are the least sonically important. The Solen 1uF bypasses are very good. The styrene ultra-bypasses are extravagantly good. Those woofer shunt circuits are least worthy of expensive audiophile electrolytics.

On the other hand, the caps in the midrange circuit are of greater sonic importance. The 100uF electrolytic mid feed cap is worthy of the best cap you can afford, perhaps a ClarityCap 250 volt (or $higher) CSA with a very good 1uF bypass and then decide by ear to keep or toss the styrene bypass. Similarly the 100uF mid shunt.

The tweeter also has a 100uF electrolytic feed, which is at least as important as the midrange.

Short story, concentrate your budget on the upper drivers. I suggest looking at Nichicon for those woofer shunts. (high quality pro-level audio cap.)

jafant  - Thanks for your response!

After looking at all the Thiel models on https://coherentsource.wordpress.com I can see why the CS 2.4 would be considered the sweet spot, the most modern model before the price starts doubling. 

I know this is a hard / subjective question to answer, but I'll ask anyway :) If I go from my 03s to something like the CS 2.4s, what can I expect? Will it sound like a completely different speaker/a huge jump in performance or just a nice refinement of what I already have?

As for my system: I'm guessing it's rather basic or maybe even "crude" to what others have on here, but I have a good ear and find it highly enjoyable to listen to. 

I  play mostly high quality recordings / files from a MacBook Pro feeding a Schiit Modi Uber DAC then to a Rotel 1052 receiver (100 wpc) out to the 03s.