Thiel Owners

Greeting All,

Started reading this thread skipping to January 2018 to present. Having viewed Tom, Beatle, Halco, marqmike and others comments and pictures, my sincere gratitude to all for the great discussion. It’s very enjoyable reading and learning as a CS2.4 owner.

A local audio store, Audioport, introduced me to the 2.4 with Classe Delta back in the early 2000’s. More that could be shared but after several years of enjoying the current setup, with a few changes along the way, it’s time to update. The evolution of this thread with its 2.4 crossover development has drawn the mind multiple directions landing on taking it step by step and a small journey. Each step trying to understand, by ear, what improves and what may be less desirable.

Since 2018, 2.4 specific discussion seemed to touch on:

• Original crossover source (i.e. Lexington, FSB)
• Coax and woofer capacitors, resistors, inductors
• Internal wiring
• Binding posts
• Cabinet considerations such as bracing and fill materials (i.e. fiber, wool)
• External vs internal crossover placement
• Build recommendations such as Masonite, component placement/alignment, and thermal considerations (i.e bluetack)
• Driver source and capabilities

There will be a document posted with pictures and information in case anyone has interest. Hopefully something can be contributed to the discussion. I am open to trying a new path or two along the way.

Progress to date:

1. CS2.4 Serial Numbers 4021 and 4022 original crossovers are exactly the same as marqmikes (https://tinyurl.com/ffcerraa).
2. After a quick exchange with Rob Gillum at Coherent Source Service, a SE upgrade was purchased and installed. Break-in is in progress and will share thoughts in the next week.

Next:

• Mills MRA-12 resistors have arrived. The 4 Ohm is Vishay Mills MRA-12. The 16 Ohm will be parallel 8 Ohm Mills. This change seemed universally agreed on with the option to use Path. As a value buyer and understanding of my listening abilities, using Path resistors would take convincing.
• Move to Masonite? Seems inevitable with future growth. Could save the originals with SE capacitors if someone was interested in them when appropriate to let them go.
• More to come….

anzen

Welcome! Good to see you today. Always great to meet another fan and owner of CS 2.4 loudspeakers. Thank you for the kind words, and citing your Serial Numbers. Excellent! Low numbered speakers. Equally, great to read about DIY capabilities , in part to Rob at CSS. The SE version is very special indeed.

Over time, your Ears will be reward. I look forward in reading more about Musical tastes and System.

Happy Listening!

@anzen 

2 x 8 ohm resistors in parallel do not = 16 ohms 

use resistors in parallel calculator at sengpielaudio.com/calculator-parallel.htm

The closest uses a 39 and a 27 ohm resistor and luckily Mills makes those values. 

Remember to measure the capacitors that you are replacing since space is limited.

Good Luck 

anzen - welcome. There is quite a bit to unpack. I’ll make a brief overview here as a bit of an update of work in process. All of our work is well beyond the SE version. The SE substituted only 2 feed caps, changing nothing else. That ClarityCapSA was their state of the art about 20 years ago. Major improvements have ensued. Extensive comparisons have landed on CC’s CSA with copper end caps - Purity is even better, plus a super bypass can be paralleled for greater definition. RTX or Duelund .01 to .1uF where it matters.

Your coils look good. Keep them. Foil coils would change other parameters and would require redesign. Resistors are worth replacing. Mills in series feeds, others can be Dayton precision 10 watt or their 20 watt (hollow tube) vairety if values available. (from Parts Express).

Regarding boards, it’s not so simple. Your coil values are tweaked for PCB mounting. If you revert to P-to-Point, slightly different coil values are required. Also we’ve learned that one-sided wiring of masonite P-t-P is sub-optimal. So, an entirely new layout scheme is required with edge mounting rather than stock flat mounting of the boards.

I am pleased to be working with duramax747 on CS2.4s as a live developmet project. But whatever comes of that, your largest consideration is your budget. You could responsibly spend $thousands or $ hundreds depending on the scope of your choices.

Send me a PM if you wish.

And on a bright note to all: remember those custom Clarity and Purity caps from last year? They’re scheduled for delivery this week after an odyssey of delays.

Hi @jafant , appreciate the warm welcome and you have been moderating a great topic!  Make any changes to your 2.4 SE's?  I'll share more on musical tastes and system in the next few evenings after work.

Thanks for the correction @vair68robert!  I should have said series (Rt = R1+Rn) vs parallel with just 2 resistors as the site you link pointed out Rt = R1*R2/(R1+R2).  You are right about capacitor sizes which was reenforced looking at @beetlemania crossover pictures.  The switch to Masonite seemed to be required at some point for film capacitors and perhaps even for the resistor switch using the 2 resistors you kindly provided or the 2x8ohm I have.  As @tomthiel said, is "not so simple" and my mind hasn't quite fully realized yet.  Quite a lot to learn. 

Hi @tomthiel, I appreciate the information and clarity.  The project with duramax747 will certainly be of interest as I don't have a clear understanding of the desired end scope.  The new layout scheme, ClarityCap PUR and more learnings along the way would be good to know before going too much farther with the build.  

Frankly, my technical knowledge is being relearned from a job building magnetic card readers for video game arcades back in college 25+ years ago, so it is rusty but starting to comeback and expand.  Part of going with ClarityCap SA capacitors from Rob to get the crossovers in hand and study the existing design beyond photos and documents.  It was a straight forward update vs CSA (i.e. 27uf+1uf, unknown size constraints). Good learning experience plus, out of pure curiosity, I wanted hear what the SE model might have sounded like.  Not too logical from a project perspective though the SE sound has been enjoyable.

Audiogon might have a minimum requirement for sending a PM, so either I missed how it's done or needs to be enabled.  Will send one when that is figured out. It's been many years since being on a forum.