Focal Tweaks

Many years ago I tried Felting around a tweeter and didn’t like the results, so perhaps it’s not a universal tweek. I would be willing to try it on my new speakers but the copper beryllium tweeters are in a very small waveguide which would make it harder.

A pair of speakers I now use in My HT system has the entire front, top and bottom wrapped in leather, so perhaps that has the benefits.

Kenjit is correct.....almost all commercial speakers can benefit from felting, removing the xover from the box....changing all wire, caps, coils and resistors to better parts, hardwiring it all, etc. etc.. Clarity cap MRs bypassed by copper foils are way, way better than CSA caps....there is no end to tweaking.

You can use just cheap thin wool felt. You really want to cover the entire baffle around the tweeter and also the midrange...right up to the edge of the speaker....the only thing not covered is the actual driver.....right to its surround...covering any frame. major improvement.

I have been building my own speakers or modding the ones I bought for over 40 years......never used a stock speaker for more than an hour (except in the mid 70s). I have modded Quad Electrostats, Acoustats, Gallo, VMPS and Sanders sound Electrostats.

Back in the mid 70s I had a three way speaker I made using the Altec 500 cycle horn and driver and an Electrovoice horn tweet.....also 15 inch Trusonic driver in box.....Speakerlab xover. It was horny sounding as hell. Burned my ears off. So, I thought all horn speakers were horny and bright. I found this store in Berkeley (first high end store I was ever in) run by a very tweaky guy. He had Klipsch corner horns and also Quad electrostats in the same room. His corner horns were unfinished and he had taken the Electrovoice horn tweeter out of the front of the speaker and mounted it right on top of the midrange driver against the corner of the room....essentially time aligning the drivers. I asked him if we could A/B the Quad and the K-horn.....to my amazement....they sounded very, very close.....blew my mind! Roger, the store owner, told me that if he moved the tweeter back to its stock position I would go running out of the store. I am sure he is right. Why would you want the tweeter sound to hit your ear a year before the midrange does? The K-horns midrange horn was a straight shot jobbie and smaller (giving less resonance and distortion) whereas my Altec horn was weird inside and made from tons of ringing aluminum.....we did not know notin back then. Klipsch to this day does not time align his bigger speakers.....some learn, some never learn. Also, I cannot quickly find a pic of the xover on the latest K-horns but I bet it uses ordinary parts.....the binding posts are cheap looking.

There are incredible speakers today.....Spatial, GR Research, Tekton Moab, Lii full range super inexpensive drivers.....lots and lots of cools stuff.  However, a lot of the stuff out there needs some serious work to make them sound the best they can.  Even the stock Spatials, GR Research, Tektons and Liis sound great.  But, of course, you can tweak them more......it never ends for the perfectionist.

“I'm qualified to be here since I am a genuine audiophile.”   There are no qualifications to be here. 

“Its the rest of you that need to elevate your standards to the required level of a true audiophile.”
Sorry, no merit in this statement.  Self proclaimed status has no root in reality. 

“I care about sound quality. I want perfection. Do you? If not, what are YOU doing here?”
-Well, as a musician I would say I care about sound quality. My own as well as the musicians around me. 
-Knowing there is no such thing as perfection makes it much easier to accept reality.  So I have been here for twenty years enjoying, for the most part, the United journey of musical enjoyment through equipment and like minded people on the same journey.  That’s what I’ve been doing here far longer than you.  
My query to you was regarding this post below of yours, which I guess the flag option was hit out of anger.  But this is your typical dump and run, deflect and redirect.  

“Could do the same with any speakers. But most speakers are so bad that you would need to do more than a bit of felt to fix 'em.”

This has zero pursuit of perfection in context.  The vast majority here are not interested in self indulgent narcissistic behavior.   

Hey Kenny, if everything speaker related sucks then why not find a different sandbox to liter?  If everyone at AudiogoN is so inept why are you here?  There are plenty of other forums for your pedigree.

I'm qualified to be here since I am a genuine audiophile. Its the rest of you that need to elevate your standards to the required level of a true audiophile. I care about sound quality. I want perfection. Do you? If not, what are YOU doing here?

Yeah, you’d need to throw random drivers and caps at them, then cut out the backs of the speakers in addition to cutting out the exterior wall of your house as to eliminate any back waves.  Also, convert your listening room into an anechoic chamber.  Only then will you achieve perfect sound.  Please don’t be duped fellow audiophilers.

Get a room you two.

Could do the same with any speakers. But most speakers are so bad that you would need to do more than a bit of felt to fix 'em.