Thiel cs2.4 upgrade to cs 2.4 se

Dear all, 

I noticed the overall sound is changing. The initial perception of " imbalance" has become more balance. Also, it put more hot glue to secure the caps to board. It helps to reduce the vibration and makes the system sounded quieter. 

I will let it run in further before making further assessment. 

@desmond888 I now have CSAs in both channels (although 2nd channel without bypass caps). At first, I thought I heard a subtle “hallway echo” on male vocals and “silvery sheen” on female vocals. But now it all sounds clean, so I assume it was a burn-in thing. And all I can say is “WOW”! The transparency and resolution are top shelf. Super clean sounding with textures previously unnoticed. Intelligibility of lyrics previously mumbled. 

Now, my upgrade is much different than yours but I give CSA a big thumbs up! 

@desmond888 
interesting report, thanks. Holco’s report is earlier on this thread.

My preliminary take is that the CSA is more transparent and resolved for pretty much all instruments and vocals. More open and clear, with notably better microdynamics. I will have more to say later, on the Thiel Owners thread.

But my subjective take should differ from yours. I have a late SE version with XOs sourced from FST. The coax feeds are Clarity SA but all other caps are CYC MKT, which is a lower quality. Also, I’ve been running Mills resistors since May. And my upgrade is a full rebuild with Multicap RTX bypasses on the coax feed CSAs. There is nothing from the OEM boards remaining, not even the coils. So, my starting and ending places are both substantially different than yours.

As the year ends, it marks a beginning of another new year and new hope.  I would like to take this opportunity wishing you and your family a wonderful year ahead.

Btw, holco, may i know what is the character of  jantzen capacitors?

Thus far, i found out the clarity caps csa tends to produce a less fatigue sound/ golden sound, something similar to class A amp sound but it is not my cup of tea. 
 I prefer a more neutral and clean sounding caps. I might need to recap or mix the cap later after confirming the sound.

Dear beetlemania, 

I did not change other thing except the caps i mentioned in the forum. The only variable is i used two clatitycaps of (10uf +3.9uf= 13.9uf) as compared with its original caps of (13uf +1uf = 14uf). There is a deviation of 0.1uf. 

I will let it run in further before making further assessment.

@desmond888 
Thiel used unleaded solder (high melting point) but I do not know the brand. I am using Cardas (leaded) for my new boards. In my case, I plan to replace everything from the terminal posts to the driver wiring. Posts and wire will be Cardas, so OEM solder is completely omitted.

I do not know the brand of caps Thiel used on your boards. Solen is a good guess but I suggest you ask Rob Gillum.

Are you still hearing an imbalance with the woofer? Did you change anything on the woofer board? The 2.4 layout I have says the DC resistance is 32 ohms for the coax (measured from hot in to hot out). @holco posted the same layout but someone wrote 31 Ohms DCR. My new board checked in at 30.4 ohms. I will measured the OEM board very soon to see how it compares. DCR on the woofer is <1 ohm. My new and OEM woofer board measured 0.4 ohm. Changing caps and coils can affect DCR even if the resistors are the same. This could have small effect on the sonic balance but shouldn’t change to the degree you reported. Perhaps something else is wrong?

Also, I am surprised you report no problems with your room. I suggest a few simple wall coverings, such as throw rugs to the side and rear wall, to dampen early reflections.

desmond888
I have really enjoyed reading your thread. You have quite a DIY skillset.
Hope your project is going well.  Happy Listening!

Btw, may i know what brand of the solder thiel is using? I found out that the melting point is higher. I used wbt solder with silver content but intend to use thiel solder to match with the rest of the soldering points.

Beetlemania, for my curiosity, may i know what brand of the mpt caps thiel is using ?

Dear holco,
Thank you for your concern. In fact, i dont have any room issues. I have a tall ceiling, it is about 14 feet high and my system is opened and layback. If i play full orchestra classical music, it sounds like i m sitting in the concert hall with a tall ceiling.
I guess  the video picked up some echo from the back wall where the recording was made.

Hi desmond888,

It is very difficult to judge the sound quality in your video, but I can hear that the sound is nicely open, also notice that your room has a lot of problems with reflections, think it's a good idea to do something about it, the reward will be great!!

These are the video taken from my system  before caps upgrade.

.https://www.dropbox.com/sh/je1j26kz490h60m/AACXIv6OTbbT7nor-L1yhFraa?dl=0

For comparison, i will share the video after the caps upgrade 2 or 3 weeks later when the caps settled in. I welcome any opinions and views after the upgrade.

Dear holco and beetlemania, 

The mid and high have opened up with more air and sense of space. The tonal balance has shifted towards slightly warmer as compared to very neutral in the original caps. All acoustic instruments  sound wonderful particularly violin as it sounded sweeter but less impressive for modern instruments. Imaging also improved significantly with a larger object.

Nevertheless, i hear the sound is changing with the caps started to break in. I shall post my exprience and seek advices from Tom  in thiel owner thread after the caps have run in.

Perhaps, i can post a video for sharing.

@desmond888 You might post this over on the Thiel Owners thread where Tom Thiel will see it. Your perceived shift in balance *could* be an artifact of altered total resistance on the coax board compared to woofer board. For example, the CSAs might have less resistance than the original caps. Might need to change the resistors to bring the balance back. But get Tom’s advice before proceeding! It might also be that your experience is shifted more so than actual frequency response . . .

Your boards appear to be second generation for the CS2.4. Printed circuit board but with good quality caps (MPT) and coils. Again, I strongly recommend upgrading the resistors, after you consult with Tom Thiel regarding possible value change. But good job!

The radiator can be a real challenge. It seems that there is one sweet spot where you can get it in or out and finding that spot is frustrating!

Great desmond888 :-)

Apart from what you describe, the most striking difference to me was that the space was depicted much larger, how did that work out in your case?

The degradation of the low-end is not something I experienced, I would even say that for the modification the low/mid was leading at the mid/high and there is now a better balance.

In theory, that is also true because a capacitor (the best capacitor is no capacitor) is much more detrimental to the signal than a bass coil.

In my situation I also use a closed DIY dual opposed 15inch subwoofer (> 45Hz) and the setup is tuned with Dirac-Live (MiniDSP), in my case a big improvement because the stereo setup is placed in the living room.

For information, i used hot glue to hold caps to the board.

Thanks holco. Finally, i managed to get it removed from the enclosure. Removing the caps and having the csa caps soldered are not easy tasks for amateur like me. I did the soldering within the enclosure as i was  reluctant to disconnect the connecting wiring.  I took about 6 hours to eventually completed the task.

Attached  herewith some photos for sharing.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ao0sy7r7uybljls/AABS6soB9u_rDu7CnWUizpbPa?dl=0

Initial audition showed that the high and mid are more resolved, sweet and opened as opposite to be more recess for the original caps. In addition, the timbre and textures of the instruments are more prominent with more mircro dynamic and details.

The only complaint is it is not as balance as yet with the high and mid improved at the expense of lower bass. In particular, the ratio for high and mid overwhelm the lower bass.

But It is not fair to make such a negative comments now as the caps need time to run in. 

My opinion is it is a great upgrade and i shall post further comments after the caps have run in.

Thank you guys for the wonderful advices.

It's the only way.

Shall i push much harder through the screw hole by a smaller screw driver or there is other alternative?

Dear holco and beetlemania,
I tried to remove the radiator but unsucessful. The radiator is still stuck with the enclosure. As adviced by holco, i shall remove the radiator by push it through one of the screw hole. Shall i push much harder through the screw hole by a smaller screw driver or there is other alternative. I'm worried that i might damage the radiator. Your help is much appreciated.

Beetlemania, thank you for the wonderful information.

630 V version has thicker film. Tom Thiel (and his sources) is confident that will sound better. We are putting 630 V on the coax feed (ie, 14 and 28 uF caps) for maximum SQ. Where you are runnng in parallel to get proper capacitance, you might use a 250 V for the heavy lifting and 630 V for the final icing on the cake. Eg, 25 uF 250V plus 3 uF 630 V for 28 uF cap. The 43 uF subfeed cap is downstream from a 16 ohm resistor and will be a 250 V CSA. Elsewhere, I will be using 250 or 160 V caps, except for the Multicap bypasses which are 600 V.

That said, have fun and please relax about getting this “right”. CSA 250s are certainly going to be a notable upgrade over the OEM caps!

MRA-12 will give you more headroom compared to the OEM 10 W resistors. That is good!

Hi guys, 

I just realised that there are two versions of claritycap csa i.e 250v and 630v. I have ordered 250v version. Is there any concerned and or any sonic difference?

For beetlemania,

From the thiel owner thread, you have changed all the ceramics resistors to Mills resistors and gained vast improvement. Nevertheless,  I noticed all the original ceramic resistors are rated 10w but Mills MRA12 are rated 12w. Is there any particular reasons that you changed the spec?

desmond888
Excellent! I am looking forward to the outcome of your cap-replacement project.  Happy Listening!

Thank you guys for all the valuable information. I have just ordered the claritycap csa combinations i suggested earlier. I'm no expert in this area therefore decided to only upgrade a few caps at this juncture. I hope i can complete  the project in dec or jan and share its result with all of you thereafter.

@desmond888

Your Clarity Cap plan sounds good. You can save money and space by going with the 250 V version for the larger capacitance value (ie, 10 and 18 uF) and 630 V version for the smaller value (3.9 and 10). Another path to 28 uF is to get 25 + 3. Madisound has the CSA 250 in 25 uF and I think Partsconnexion has the 630 V version of 3 uF. You might also get add a small bypass to each, say 0.1 uF. I’m going to try Multicap RTX at ~1% but Cornell-Dubilier is a worthy contender, among others.

You might also upgrade the 43 uF cap which is a subfeed. That cap is downstream from the 16 ohm resistor so you can go with a lower voltage. Until I started working with Tom Thiel, I considered a 39 uF ERSE Pulse X (100 V?) + 3.9 uF CSA250V. Finally, those 100 uF electrolytics should optimally be replaced with MPT-type capacitors. Again, ERSE PulseX is a worthy contender but you might have trouble fitting those on your boards. At the least, I suggest replacing the electrolytics with fresh ones (see Tom Thiel’s recent post on the Thiel Owner’s thread).

While you’re in there, I highly recommend replacing all resistors with Mills (or Vishay-Mills) MRA-12s. Sonic Craft has all the CS2.4 values although you have to mix and match the old (Mills) and new (Vishay-Mills). Only about $100 for all and makes a worthwhile improvement in SQ.

desmond888

in particular - follow Beetlemania, Holco and TomThiel for answers to your initial query.  Happy Listening!

desmond888

I look forward in seeing your presence over on the Thiel Owners thread. As luck will have it, the Gentlemen are working progressively on this very subject. Stay tuned.

Happy Listening!

Hi guys, i intend to get claritycap csa 10 ohm + 3.9ohm to replace the original caps 13ohm +1ohm and claritycap csa 10ohm +18ohm to replace 27ohm + 1ohm original caps. Do i need to change or remove any resistors?

I think you mean 10uF+3.9uF and 10uF+18uF, that should be fine and you don't need to change any resistor unless you want to upgrade the resistors to higher quality.

Hi guys, i intend to get claritycap csa 10 ohm + 3.9ohm to replace the original caps 13ohm +1ohm and claritycap csa 10ohm +18ohm to replace 27ohm + 1ohm original caps. Do i need to change or remove any resistors? Any opion on this combination? 

Dear Beetlemania, 
I will take your advice to  scrutinize the thread suggested by you.
Thank you for the information.

Electrolytic caps (those 100 uF in a Thiel) will drift after, say, 15-20 years. But everything else should be good for even longer. As far as changing the character, yes, you can make the speaker sound even better by upgrading the quality of the passive parts. The OEM caps and resistors are far from top quality available, especially today. Thiels were built to a price point so that regilar people could afford them. They are really good but can be made even better by improving parts quality in the crossovers. Go read the Thiel Owners thread starting about February when Tom Thiel started posting.

Please pardon my ignorance. I thought it will lose its capacitance overtime.  That is why i  came out an idea to replace the old for new.
For changing to different brand of the capacitors, my worry is it will change the original character of the speaker.

Replace with the same? Why? The only ones that will wear out are the electrolytics in the coax shunt position. In my SEs, these are CYC and those might be the last I would use in an upgrade. Erse has an affordable 100 uF metal polypropylene. And if you’re gonna to replace anything else,  might as well put in something of higher quality than the OEM caps. 

Jim Thiel used Clarity SAs in the coax feeds and Tom Thiel is planning to use Clarity CSA (2 generations newer than SA) for most caps in his 2.4 beta upgrade. More info on the Thiel Owners thread.

Dear holco, 
I intend to give thiel 2. 4 a new heart by replacing the existing capacitors for the wofer w new original thiel capacitors to preserve its original sound. May i know what is the brand of the capacitor that used by thiel? From the photos that you attached i can not view its brand. Your advice is highly appreciated. Tq.

If you get there you know, it's a simply task ;-)

Thank you for the wonderful advice. Sorry to ask one more question. May i know how to remove the crossover module from the speaker box and how to stick it back after the modification?

Regarding access to XOs for the 2.4, here are Rob Gillum’s instructions to me:

“The crossover can be accessed through the passive radiator opening. The base is not removable, as it is screwed, and glued. To access the crossover, you must remove the passive radiator screws and let the passive radiator drop into the cabinet. It can be rotated 90 degrees, and removed while servicing. To re-install the passive radiator, you can place your fingers at the surround, pressing outward to hold in place while re-installing the screws that hold bit in place.”

I would add two things, 1) be patient rotating the radiator to get the right angle for removal; 2) you don’t need to be overly paranoid grasping the radiator surrounds as I was initially. Not nearly as delicate as I first imagined, albeit still need to exercise care.

Sorry guys, busy lately as i need to travel extensively due to job requirement. I therefore have to postpone my project to next year.
Holco, can you advise how to gain access to the crossover? I can not find any opening from the bottom of the speaker. I tried to gain acess via the radiator but unsucessful. After removing the screws of the radiator, the radiator still stuck to the speaker box enclosure. It looks like it was glued to the enclosure. I dare not force open it worrying it may damage it. Your advice is highly appreciated.

http://www.humblehomemadehifi.com/Cap.html

I always wonder how he had time to go over all of those caps.  Reading his reviews is a humbling experience.  

I gave heavy consideration to the Mcap supreme. It’s said to be quite good. One reason I’m going with Clarity is that Jim Thiel et al. did many comparisons when picking caps for the SE version. I don’t know if they tried Mundorfs but probably. They chose the Clarity SA as the best and that cap has been upgraded by two generations now.

I used the older Clarity SA caps in the past, but apparently there is a newer type (CSA) that they claim to have the "CopperConnect" technology.  This supposedly improves the sound over the previous version.

For those who would like to try Mundorf supreme cap but has been deterred by the high cost, you can do 50% mundorf and 50% clarity which would be more cost effective but still have very good sound.

A company has to take many things into consideration, for me as an end user only one thing counts, maximum quality.

I gave heavy consideration to the Mcap supreme. It’s said to be quite good. One reason I’m going with Clarity is that Jim Thiel et al. did many comparisons when picking caps for the SE version. I don’t know if they tried Mundorfs but probably. They chose the Clarity SA as the best and that cap has been upgraded by two generations now. 

Don't know iff it's old news but I share it anyway.

http://www.humblehomemadehifi.com/Cap.html

Thank you beetlemania. Your insights are very helpful. I was looking to get to work on it next week, but since my handy skills are that of a caveman, I am not sure I can have it finished any time soon.

But I will post my upgrade results once everything is finished. I will probably go with Mundorf MCap Supreme since I’ve had very good results with some of my works. It’s sort of my go to caps. They may be somewhat expensive but definitely worth the price.

Also if anyone has any more picture of the xover, it would be very helpful.

@andy2 holco has uploaded the schematic. The 14 and 28 uf caps are in the feed. Note the SE version gets full values in single caps whereas the original added 1uf bypasses (ie, 13+1=14). The 43 is a subfeed. Those big ELs are in the shunt position, so they probably make less audible difference but might still offer a sonic improvement with an upgrade. Even if not, it’s worth replacing older ELs.

The decision to go with CSAs is partly a choice of price. I mean, does it make sense to put $8000 worth of Dueland caps in a speaker that retailed for $4000? Mundorfs and many others were considered. Tom and I spent many weeks researching and we each spoke with several people with good knowledge before landing on the CSAs. I was pushing for the top of the Clarity line CMRs but Tom got some good info that the CSAs, possibly with small Multicap bypasses, would hit the sweet spot and for much less money. Toms decisions are very well considered and one of the considerations was price. At the end of the day, Tom wants to not stray too far from the Thiel tenet of value while still providing a very worthwhile upgrade. Might you eke out even better performance with Dueland and such? Maybe! Let us know whatever you try.

More pictures,
https://holco.picturepush.com/album/1171389/p-Thiel-CS-2.4.html

The picture of the xover seems to show the binding posts are at the bottom of the cabinet.  As far as I know, all Thiel CS2.4s have the binding posts at the back of the cabinet.