Thiel Owners

Thank you jafant , Happy Fathers Day to you and Thiel owners everywhere .

I treated myself to a new LP copy of " All Things Must Pass "  50th anniversary edition and wow does it sound fantastic .

Music is for the soul .

Rob 

CS2.7 upgrading update .

A few months ago I had finished upgrading the woofer board and heard some improvement but nothing earth shattering , I am almost finished with the coaxial and the improvement is way beyond anything  I would have thought possible . 

I kept things simple , replaced the resistors with Mills , upgraded the capacitors , bringing the electrolytic capacitors within  and/or lower tolerance specs , making only one change suggested by Tom , replacing the 400uf capacitor with 4 100uf caps .

What I discovered was that the electrolytic capacitors used on the shunt or negative side were out of tolerance , the 68uf cap used on both the tweeter and woofer were up to 20% over while the 330 and 220uf used on the mid was about 7% over .  The 68uf caps were replaced by Mundorf caps that were about 3% over but replacing the 330 and 220uf caps was a bit of a problem .  First I replaced them with ERSE " 5% " tolerance caps that turned out to be over 11% over ! I didn't even try to listen to them . Then I  tried Jantzen " 5% ' caps , they were about 6% over .  I listened to them for a while and was happy with hearing the improvement that the other upgrades made but it bugged me that Tom was telling me that Thiel's tolerance max was 5% and mostly within 3% , so after asking Tom's advise I went with a 300uf Jantzen cap that together with the 220 I was able to achieve a 2% over tolerance . 

I said almost finished because I am waiting for Clarity to release the PUR series capacitor ,  can it get any better ?  Some say that the 1uf bypass cap is very influential  so I'm hoping for a yes . 

Tom just mentioned that he is replacing the steel screws with brass , do it it does make a slight improvement , I also installed reinforced nylon screws on the coaxial speaker , as for the washers I had to grind down brass ones to fit using them on the woofer , I did see that McMaster Carr has some #8 washers as small as .375" OD but I think they might still be a little to large .  I also discovered that the screws holding the boards inside the speaker were of ferrous metal  and replaced them with brass .

This project has not been easy but it is well worth it .

jafant

Thanks for asking about my summer , so far so good , the cooler and wetter spring has helped hold off the hot and dry summer forest fire season here in Oregon .

Tom has been working with internal wiring for a long time so I'm hoping he finds the Cardas chassis wiring as musical as both beetlemania and myself .  For me the synergy of the Cardas wiring both internal and external are a perfect match with Thiel speakers .

theaudiotweak  

after reading an earlier post by you I started replacing as many screws as I could ,  on the speakers , on the crossover boards , on the turntables tonearm base and even on the fuse panels outer cover ( only 6 screws so why not ) .  I tested screws on the amp , CD player , phono preamp and outlets , while they are not ferrous metal I will end up replacing them as time goes on , like you say a few dollars so why not .

I 

theaudiotweak

a brass door panel and new box are both great ideas but to expensive to explore ,

but you now have me thinking about trying to use MuMetal on the door and/or fuse panel .

thieliste

I installed Cardas silver/rhodium with gold nuts , or CCGR posts .

This was one of the first things I did during the upgrade ,

I didn't notice a difference , maybe if it was the last thing done then possibly a difference could be heard . 

halifax

If you decide to use the original boards and replace the resistors use this site for parallel pairing  sengpielaudio.com/calculator-parallel.htm   .

I would also recommend replacing the electrolytic caps with Mundorf electrolytic caps .   If you measure your film caps you might be able to upgrade them with the new Clarity Purity caps . 

Good Luck 

Happy Standard Time All

tom 

When I started upgrading the speakers I ran single wires from the 3 speakers , with the coaxial mid/tweeter wires + running together and the - running together separated thru the original holes in the coaxial chamber down the width of the back of the speaker behind the woofer and thru the original holes in the bracing that separates the woofer from where the crossovers are .  I kept this setup until my experimenting with the single speaker wiring showed me that while It seemed like I was hearing a more dynamic sound over time I discovered that there was a graininess to it after going back to using Cardas Neutral Reference speaker cables I decided to try twisting the internal wires  into +/- pairs like the the wiring in Thiel speakers (if you remember my speakers had 16awg wires constructed with +/- running together in parallel , one reason that I started the upgrading) , this resulted in a smoother sound .

Maybe the 3 wire single polarity twist will solve the graininess .  I look forward to your findings on this setup .    

Thank You jafant

I agree with you about having multiple copies of the Beatles , but I had never sat down and compared them back to back and over and over again like I did with Revolver .  I remember when I bought the re-mastered version of Sgt. Pepper in mono ( my first mono Beatles LP ) listening and hearing differences from the stereo version pressings that I own , the same can be said about Magical Mystery Tour and Revolver . While I like listening to mono versions for being so well mastered I'm still a stereo guy and Giles Martin did a great job with the 50th anniversary releases and the Revolver release . 

I give another listen when my new tonearm arrives and then again when the last crossover capacitors arrive from Clarity , finishing ( maybe ) my speaker upgrade .

thieliste

The CS3.7 posts look like the 2.7's , if so you will have to drill a round hole since the Thiel posts are rectangle ( I discovered that this is a great idea , one can make a very tight connection ) .  You have to start with a small drill bit and work you way up to the diameter needed .

Good Luck and Be Patient 

Beautiful veneer on your speakers , nice room !  

ronkent

Have you considered a tube buffer or a tube disc player ?

I had the last solid state Carver CD player design , granted it was from the 80's and it sounded digital .  It was replaced with Carvers last CD player that uses 2 tubes in the output and I love it , when I read about it it seemed that for years many considered it their reference player .  My point is that using a tube buffer or finding a tube based CD player would most likely solve your disc brightness .

You might also consider upgrading the components on your crossovers , they made a lot of improvements since 2006 .  

thieliste  

If you do upgrade the crossovers on your 3.7 I believe that you would be the first to do so .

Also , I tried to keep the speakers facing straight ahead with 37" from the side walls, but the music just didn't sparkle almost a little flat sounding .  So being board, free and curious I tried a toe in of 1/2" and bam they woke up , so I tried 1&1/2" and boom to much so I've been listening to 1" toe in with great pleasure (but I might experiment between 1/2" and 1" ) .

The crossover in picture is from a 2.7 , the review / endorsement is for a 6 !

The graph is from Stereophile .

Tom was asked about it many pages ago and poo pooed  the idea  .

@ronkent

Understood ,  using a tape measure lined up with the spikes at 1" toe-in the bi-sect line was 8 1/2" (at the bottom of the cabinet ) , I moved to a 3/4" toe-in and the bi-sect now is 7" .

Boy did Billie Holiday's "Body and Soul"  And Stan Getz's "Best of Stan Getz" sound fantastic last night .

I'm going to leave them toed-in at 3/4" , measured from the spikes to the front wall.

How thick are the outriggers ?  The locking nut on the spikes are 7/16" ,

I would think that the outriggers would be the same are at most 1/2' thick as to not change the speakers height .

I have the outrigger spike sets using the spikes with the original locking nut , but at $500 for the aluminum outrigger bars the cost is not in my budget .

Since things are quiet and I've been patiently waiting for Clarity Capacitors (1 year) to release their Purity series so I could finish the mid/tweeter crossover upgrade I thought I'd update the images on the virtual systems page under Thiel ( almost the last one ) .  

While waiting and being bored since it's the winter rainy season I tried many toe-in positions after giving up on have the speakers straight ahead ( I think that 3 feet from the side walls are not enough ) .  I circled back to a position that I preferred a long time ago of a toe-in of 9 degrees or 1 7/16ths inches . 

I also re-visited the room treatment on the front wall , something that I hadn't done after replacing the rear ported speakers with the 2.7s .  I found out that I was over dampened , boy do I feel dumb .  My though was the front wall treatment affected only the bass frequencies since if I stood behind the speakers that is what I was hearing , WAS I WRONG  . So an old dog can learn new tricks .

Hope you enjoy my confession .

Happy New Year All

prof

If you would like to try the original speaker spikes that came with the 2.7s 

I could send you a set since I replaced them with the spikes used with outriggers ,

the originals have a rounded point so they would sit on your shag carpet .

Rob

@prof

If you would like to discuss the issues and or obstacles to upgrading your 2.7 crossovers PM me  . You can see the finished woofer and work in progress mid/tweeter board on virtual systems .  The finishing touch will be the Purity 1uf caps .

Rob 

There is a pair of White 2.4s on reverb for sale $1850 .

Tom , the grill on the 3.7 looks to be the same type as the 2.7 ,

do you recommend something different ?  and what could replace it ?

Tom & All

No Grill , In my opinion but I do suggest that one should try it .

I hear a taming or muffling ,  without the grills I hear nuonces that are lost but if your system is bright then maybe leave the grills on , again IMO .

So now every time I listen I have to take the grills off ! more work as if vinyl isn't already .

Can hardly wait for the Purity caps to arrive . 

Tom

How are the magnets mounted/installed on/in the front of the speaker ?

There are 4 of them , 2 above each speaker .

Grills off for listening and back on the rest of the time .

I'm in when you find the non metallic grill solution .

jafant , Tom and all 

Thank you , I don't know about the grill on the 2.4 but on 2.7 there is a metal dome over the coaxial speaker and I suspect that this has a lot to do with slight reduction in the mid and treble .  When I left the grills off I heard more definition in voices (like breathing or multiple voices ), I felt that I heard inside a acoustic guitar , listening to a full orchestra it sounded more alive . 

I know this sounds like a lot but as I confessed to prof I'm not very good at describing what I hear .  All I know is that listening now is just a little more work taking the grills on and off but nowhere near the work it takes listening to vinyl  in trying to get every last bit of detail .

I left the grills off my first speakers BIC Venturi 6 and my second set of speakers Image Concept 200 .  When I got the Thiels I started leaving them off but at that time before equipment changes, upgrading and room treatment installation they sounded bright to me , until Tom mentioned it I have been leaving the grills on so once again I have to say Thank You Tom .

Thanks Tom

After looking at images of different Thiel speakers I'm guessing that most just have speaker fabric covering them , since the 2.7 and 3.7 have the same design coaxial speaker that are not recessed that they might be the only speakers with a metal honey cone dome covering them for protection . 

Found this 3.7 with a unique woofer  smileypete.com

Grill on or off ?  While Tom took some measurements on his SCS4 speakers and found very little difference in sound and jafant listened to his CS2.4 speakers and found no difference in sound so I can only speculate that the improvement  I am hearing is do to either the design difference in the steel protective grill of the 2.7 (and 3.7 ) or the design of the flat coaxial speaker in both models and it's interaction with the grill design .  I agree with Tom on grills off during listening or at least try it if you haven't .

I agree with jafant that the speakers look better with the grill on , if only the woofer on the 2.4 and 2.7 were black !

@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

I don't have a 2.4 so I have to ask the question , does the current 16 ohm resistor have a 20 watt  rating ?  because the wattage is added in parallel but not in series .

Good Luck

@anzen

It looks like you have everything in control , I apologize for stepping in .

If those are 100v 100uf electrolytic caps you might consider replacing them with Mundorf caps .

I will be receiving the 1uf 400v Purity caps and installing them on the tweeter side of the 2.7 board , I will be measuring the space available for the 1uf cap on the mid side to see if I can fit a 630v if not I know the 400v will fit ( there is even an 800v that is only 2mm larger than the 630v ) .  I don't know how much difference the higher voltages will make but Tom , beetle and other audiogon forum responses indicate that higher is better . 

anzen

I've posted photos on the virtual system folder .

you will see the original bd. and the work in progress of the coaxial board with 3 Mundorf caps , the board as I am using it now has another mundorf cap and a 15uf ERSE cap on top of the 3 .  You will see the 1uf next to them ,  when you open the VS page count down 19 rows you'll see my Turntable .

@audio1326

I looked at the Emotiva web site and noticed that the Basx 2 stereo and Basx 3

3 channel amps do not have a ground wire connection for the power cord . 

You might try purchasing a 12awg extension cord long enough to plug into an outlet without any appliances on that breaker for a test .

barnett

I had a similar issue , noticeable only at high volume when playing the Cardas/Ayers CD " Irrational But Efficacious! " before the woofers low range of 35hz the passive radiator started what sounded like a flapping noise that when away when the glide tone exceeded 35-40hz,   The rubber surround had become unattached in places so  I glued it both inside and outside to the passive radiator , while my other speaker didn't make a noise I still found loose rubber surround .  If this is your problem then Per Rob  used a water based fabric adhesive .

barnett 

contact Rob at Coherent for instructions on how to remove the radiator.  It doesn't take much of a gap in the rubber surround to cause the flutter noise .  The glue I used is from SpeakerWorks.com .  Also make sure that the screw(s) that you use are non-magnetic . 

Good Luck

Rob 

Purity Capacitors

 " greater clarity in reproduction of sound as well as improved spatial separation of individual instruments and vocals. "

I copied this from the CC web site as I have been trying to think of how to describe the addition of a 1uf 400v  Purity capacitor on the tweeter positive output .

The clarity ( no pun intended ) and definition created a 3D sound that is beyond what I would have thought a single capacitor could create .  I feel that high notes that used to sound edgy , sharp and higher volume now sounds clear and same in volume levels .

I can't wait ( but have to because they haven't been released yet ) for the 1uf 630v cap for the midrange positive output .  I am also thinking about replacing the 1.5uf cap ( that I already upgraded from an ERSE to a CC ESA ) on the tweeter negative side with a Purity 250v .

anzen

I looked at images of the 2.4 crossovers and it looks like they used Jantzen Superior Z caps which measure 17 x 43 mm for the 1uf 100v cap ,  The Clarity Purity measures 18 x 45 mm for the 1uf 250v . Maybe the 400v will fit but it doesn't look like the 630v or 800v will fit  .

Thanks Tom

Yes they were , I replaced the woofer and radiator with brass and the coaxial with reinforced nylon , as well as the crossover boards with brass because they too were magnetic . Only the screws holding the speaker terminals were non-magnetic.

I didn't think about it until unsound wrote about it .

Tom

"It seems that later (after TT) products migrated to a very thin foam interface that essentially collapses under mechanical load while forming an air seal."

I did not notice any kind of seal when removing the speakers from the cabinet , (maybe because New Thiel had removed them first ?)  although they did tend to stick a little the first time I removed them , I thought that they were sticking to the paint .  

Should I be contacting Rob about the availability of these foam seals for the 2.7 speakers ?

Thanks Rob 

Thank You jafant 

It's been a long journey with trails and errors of trying to use different damping materials , wiring gauge size and configuration and scariest of all stripping the threaded inserts out of the MDF ( don't use a drill ) . But upgrading the components on the XO boards has been a great success .  While I am waiting for Clarity to release their 630v Purity caps to finish the upgrades I have started to think about moving the boards out of the cabinet .

1500 pairs of 2.7s !  

My serial #s are 329 & 330 , If I remember correctly prof have #'s slightly higher and those  have been the highest #s I've seen on this forum .  I wonder where the rest of the owners are ?

One major thing I've discovered about the 2.7s is the the crossovers deviated from Jim's philosophy of keeping the capacitors maximum at 100uf . I keep wondering why this was allowed , why the 3.7 coax board was not modified and the 2.4's woofer board was not modified for the 2.7 cabinet ?

PartsConnexion should be offering the Purity line of caps by July .

This was from Tom  5/25/2018

"The 2.7 midrange is fed through a 400uF electrolytic cap, albeit with a PP and styrene bypass in parallel. The 3.7 uses a bank of 75uF polypropylene caps with a styrene bypass. Multiple smaller PP caps provide faster reactions and less distortion than a large electrolytic. "   "I believe this could be the main reason for the improvement in detail and smoothness in the sound  "  Rob

From me 7/3/2022

A few months ago I had finished upgrading the woofer board and heard some improvement but nothing earth shattering , I am almost finished with the coaxial and the improvement is way beyond anything  I would have thought possible . 

I kept things simple , replaced the resistors with Mills , upgraded the capacitors , bringing the electrolytic capacitors within  and/or lower tolerance specs , making only one change suggested by Tom , replacing the 400uf capacitor with 4 100uf caps .

What I discovered was that the electrolytic capacitors used on the shunt or negative side were out of tolerance , the 68uf cap used on both the tweeter and woofer were up to 20% over while the 330 and 220uf used on the mid was about 7% over .  The 68uf caps were replaced by Mundorf caps that were about 3% over but replacing the 330 and 220uf caps was a bit of a problem .  First I replaced them with ERSE " 5% " tolerance caps that turned out to be over 11% over ! I didn't even try to listen to them . Then I  tried Jantzen " 5% ' caps , they were about 6% over .  I listened to them for a while and was happy with hearing the improvement that the other upgrades made but it bugged me that Tom was telling me that Thiel's tolerance max was 5% and mostly within 3% , so after asking Tom's advise I went with a 300uf Jantzen cap that together with the 220 I was able to achieve a 2% over tolerance .

Since I replaced/upgraded the resistors and capacitors ( except the 1uf's ) on coaxial boards at the same time I can't say how much the replacing of a 400uf cap is improved by using 4 X 100uf caps would be , I used Jim Thiels philosophy and Tom Thiels suggestion , if I had the room I would have replaced the 330 and 220 caps with 100uf max caps .  Also I can't say how much better the 100uf Mundorf caps are than Solen or Jantzen caps would have been , the same for the Jantzen used on the negative side .   I will say that the 1uf Purity cap on the tweeter made a large improvement in the sound stage and definition so I'm hoping/exception  that replacing the 1uf " Made For Thiel " cap on the mid with the new 800v Purity cap will take the sound to a whole new level .

@duramax747    The Mundorf 100uf caps are electrolytics ,  I should have the Purity caps by the end of week and installed by the weekend , I'll post pictures on the virtual system page .  

@anzen   Purity caps are available at Parts Connexion in limited values , they are less expensive than Madisound but right now Madisound has more values available right now .  I understand your dilemma , Years ago before I started I considered going external but the workload would have been daunting and expensive, not being sure of the value added I went with staying internal . It's taking me over 3 years between thinking about it and ( almost ) completing the internal upgrades , if I went external I might be hearing anything yet !  What duramax747 is going to do would be my dream now that I've experienced the improvements that upgrading components produce . 

I have installed the Clarity Purity 800v - S 1uf cap in the mid range circuit and am very impressed , this leaves me with wanting to upgrade a 1.5uf cap on the negative side of the tweeter circuit to a Clarity Purity 250v , one that I already upgraded from an ERSE 250v to an Clarity ESA 250v .  While I don't think this will make much of a difference this will be the last cap upgrade .

Question does anybody have knowledge or experience with replacing an inductor  of a small gauge with one of a larger gauge with the same resistance  ?  The inductors are the only components that I have not changed .   

Thank you Tom , as always your knowledge and advice helps steer me in the right direction .

The series feed which is now comprised of a 15uF PP and the 1uF yellow bypass is on the mid range , also the 1uf is a Clarity cap the was " Made for Thiel " and happens to be the exact same size as the ESA 630v cap ( that was used on one of my boards .  Also as of now Clarity does not make a 16uf in the Purity series  and the ESA , MR and CMR are very large in diameter I believe that a 15uf 400v Purity with a 1uf 800v-s Purity cap would be the perfect solution which now you've got me thinking about replacing the ERSR 15uf 400v .

While the schematic says ERSE inductors , Rob and the tags that are still on them say they are from Jantzen .  When researching I discovered that ERSE does not make the values for the 2.7 .  How much difference would one expect by using a 0.68mH 20 awg  .569 DCR verse the 18 awg .440 DCR as used , or even using a 21 awg. .700 DCR or 22 awg .870 DCR ?  The 0.60mH is used on both the tweeter and the mid .

I did it again , I installed the crossovers with the new Purity 800v cap before taking a picture !  But I posted pictures of the board on the virtual systems before showing the original  (replacement by new Thiel)  1uf ESA cap .  They show the 4  x 100uf electrolytics replacing the 1 x 400uf .

Thank You jafant

While it has been a lot of work I'm sure that without the guiding advice from Tom I wouldn't have made this far or near this successful .  All I did was replace the old components with new and higher quality ones and made them fit into the limited space .  This is definitely not for everyone but if you can and are willing you will be rewarded with the results .   

thieliste

Did the loose wire take out one or both ? Was it a wire from the speaker post ?

Do Rob explain why the new ones are black ?

I too had thoughts of the " speaker " being black anodized aluminum , which would have looked very cool since I do take the grills off when listening . While the bright aluminum coax's don't look so bad the bright white woofers stand out like a sore thumb , but since I'm tripping out on the music I can overlook the big white speaker 

https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/reviews/smc-audio-mccormack-dna-1-upgrade-experience-r948/

Great review for upgrading your DNA-1 ,

Does your Sota have the vacuum hold down ? 

The last couple of weeks I've been playing around with a Polk Audio PSW650 subwoofer with stereo 10" drivers .  This was offered as a gift and so I tried to like it.  But it just didn't wow me unless I was listening to Pink Floyd or Emerson , Lake and Palmer and surprisingly to Rickie Lee Jones " Pop Pop " . When I listened to other artist or genres It just didn't blend in .  I had it set to 40hz the lowest setting and just audible enough not to be louder than the Thiels , while it added a little to the music the suddenness of the sub just became distracting , maybe if subs came in gradually like a speaker crossover controlled blending . 

But when turning the sub off and on again I was able to hear just how low and powerful the 2.7s sounded considering the size of the woofer . The sound went down to the 35hz but even with the bass heavy music of the above artist the last 5-10 hz started to fade or get softer .  If I turn the volume up the fading lessons but then it's to loud unless nobody else is at home .  I am wondering if an amp that doubles its output from 8 to 4 then again to 2 ohms would that keep the volume level from falling at the bottom end ? 

The 3.7's and external crossovers that just arrived ? 

Who makes external crossovers for Thiel speakers ?  

Rob suggested the 2.5 ohms and said he heard that 2.7 ohms were used and had positive results .

Two days ago I ordered Mills 5 watt 2.5 ohm resistors from Michael Percy Audio , half the price that PartsConnexion is now charging . 

@jlm86 

There is a beautiful set of 3.6's in NY state and a set of white 2.4's in Virginia ,

both are listed on Reverb and both are local pickup only , 

Awhile back there was discussions about adding a resistor in series with both the tweeter and mid-range speakers on the 2.7 coax speaker .  

I was communicating with Rob and he suggested using a 2.5 ohm resistor and had heard that 2.7 ohm sounded good , another Thiel owner said he used a 3 ohm resistor and like the sound .

I listened for weeks and then took them out and my opinion is without the resistors in sounds better. or even a lot better .  While with them there were songs songs and a few early 60's the benefited from the damping of the higher frequencies but when listening to all music it sounded more 2 D or a flatter and narrower sound stage .  

I curious what using a lower value resistor would sound like .