Best Capacitors for Crossovers

I am, same name without the underscore.

Best,

E

Parts Connexion will often give you a discount if you ask. :)

http://www.partsconnexion.com/

Hi Ozzy,

You should take these questions over to the DIYAudio forum where there are lots of speaker builders who would help you, or Parts Express Tech Talk.  Plus you can post pics and schematics and stuff there too so it's easier to share your problems and questions about speaker buiding. :)

As for power required for a resistor, I use XSim’s power charts.

It is also important to know where your resistor is going! :) Since power in music is weighted towards bass, your tweeter will never have the full music power. I assume only about 1/10 of the music power will ever go to the tweeter section. I then set XSim to that level of power, and then examine the resistors.

If in doubt, go bigger! :) Plus, bigger resistors have less thermal noise and are more stable.

http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/

Best,

Erik

@grannyring Thanks for that. I've been seriously considering the Jupiter line, especially since Soniccraft has them on sale often.

I have a pair that sounds very nice, but I am thinking about completely re-doing the crossover design, and Jupiter caps in the tweet would be just the thing. :)

Best,

Erik

You might want to try DIYAudio, but in the "affordable" boutique crossovers my favorites so far:

Clarity MR (now CMR)
Clarity ESA
Mundorf MKP
Mundorf Supremes

Yeah, I list the Supreme’s lowest due to an artificial Disney-like sheen or scintilation. It is NOT natural, you don’t hear it when listening to live music, but if you like it, do it! :) Magico is enamored of the entire Supreme line and why I’m not enamored of Magico. :) Clearly I’m in the minority.

Solen’s have been such a mixed bag now I refuse to even look at them. I hear good things from the top line models, but meh, not about to try them.

I also like Audyn Truecopper (Bypass values only)

The Mundorf MKP is a great upgrade for many, and the prices are hard to beat.

Hey @dgarretson

When will CSA range become available in the US?

I'm happy to note the CMR is already orderable from Parts Connexion.

Best,

Erik

While I admire technology, I believe in results. I can take pretty much any DAC chip, put it on a circuit board and make it sound like garbage. Same for most technology. Beryllium tweeters, AMT, etc. can be implemented well and poorly.

I think knowing about the capacitor tech is good, but results are results.

And as always, let your own ears be the judge, not me nor a website.

Best,

Erik

If you are going to compare caps, I would use screw in terminals or even speaker binding posts. You'll definitely hear relative differences that way.

@dgarretson Technically, it is only a conflict of interest when you serve two masters. Promoting your own wares over another may be biased, but not a conflict of interest. :)

For instance, if you were being paid by a rag/mag to do "unbiased" research on capacitors, but were also being paid by Clarity, that’s a clear conflict of interest, especially if undisclosed.

Best,

Erik

I have a 3rd order filter for some of the most revealing tweeters in the world on the way, the Mundorf AMTs. I’ll post when I have them in circuit.

They behave practically as if they are massless and are easy to integrate with drivers thanks to a very smooth frequency response and flat impedance above resonance.

Best,

Erik

Ozzy,

Possible but unlikely.  Avoid shortening the leads, and make sure your iron is hot enough, and the tip wide enough.

Melting solder should take like 5 seconds or less! If you are sitting there for half a minute waiting for solder to melt, then yes, you could definitely have injured the cap.

But also, most caps take 24-48 hours to finish breaking in.

Yep. Sorry my friend. Temperature controlled soldering iron with a large tip FTW!! :)

Vaguely, caps are often not rated to withstand more than 200 degree environments, electrolytics and film. Of course there are exceptions, and higher temp caps. Also, this is usually rated lifetime. LIke, 10,000 hours at 105C or something. The cooler they stay, the more life. The hotter, the faster they can die. Using high temp caps also means longer lasting in the same circuit.

I think this is very much in the scale of temperature we are talking about. Even low temp solder can’t melt until it reaches 360 degrees or so. So yeah, holding a soldering iron to the leads for a while can really damage a cap. I usually have my iron around 620-650 depending on how much metal has to heat up, BUT....

The time of exposure matters a lot. A quick hot iron can expos parts to less total thermal energy than a slow one, and therefore the internals of the cap will heat up less.

Anyway, this is all theory. :) The fact that the cap that failed was in fact exposed as I was worried about kind of explains it in my mind. :)

The cap is dead anyway. Try again and make sure you can solder fast. Lesson learned.

Best,

Erik

I should have added, this is the soldering station I use, from Aoyude. Includes various sized tips, which have been a god-send. Cheaper kits don't usually include extra tips. Hakko is the usual standard for soldering stations, but I think Parts Connexion may a knock-off even cheaper. Just make sure you get a variety of tips.

But for your testing, I'd really encourage you to stay away from soldering. :) Screw down terminals will be fine.

Best,

Erik

About 2-3 days of continuous play.

You may be better taking this thread over to DIYAudio where you can post images like schematics and measurements.

Best,

ERik

NIce. I like silver, and copper, but really not impressed by silver/copper for speakers.

Best,

Erik

Hey Ozzy, what caps are you trying right now?

If you are going to try 1 brand at a time but can’t burn them in, it will take you a while to try 2-3 brands. :)

Totally worth it to find another amp around the house to use for burn-in.

Erik

Cool, never tired them. Troels Gravesen loves them, but he's sponsored. :)

Best,

Erik

Wait, used?  Shouldn't need to be broken in that much.

Ozzy, it’s really rare an audiophile blows a tweeter, unless you use a very low order filter and it’s too low an F.  In additon to the filter, there's usually resistors padding them down, so you have to work kind of hard to blow them.  Leave extraneous things like that out unless you are making a party/pa speaker.


Best,

Erik

Hi Ozzy,

Yes, resistors in the tweeter section are usually to pad down the level.  Tweeters tend to be very sensitive, around 98 dB for instance at 2.83V, while woofers, when all is said and done, may be around 87 dB for a small diameter woofer. So that's 11 dB difference. It's close to 10x the power needed in  the woofer than the tweeter.

I just posted sample files for my own DIY kit. It includes simulation files so you can play with the design and see how each part contributes to the sound.

Best,

Erik

Ozzy,

Here is a link to the LM-1 speaker kit. This particular page discusses the crossover, and how the tweeter level is set.

http://speakermakersjourney.blogspot.com/2016/05/lm-1-bookshelf-crossover.html

Best,

Erik

Ozzy,

You need XSim which is also free. :)

We have a couple of threads going on in the DIY forums regarding simulation and crossover design. Feel free to join in.

Best,


Erik