Thiel Owners

Tom

As always your knowledge continues to educate and guide us in our appreciation for the work that Jim and the Thiel staff created .

As for the higher than 100uf capacitors used on the 2.7s crossovers , I have been able to fit 4 x 100uf caps replacing the 0ne 400uf on the mid positive side but there was no room to replace the 330 and 220uf caps on the negative side , although I did end up with a 300 and 220 cap to dial in the exact designed value within 1%.

Thank You 

@tomthiel 

Yes the difference was definitely an improvement , the definition improved with the speed of the 100uf vs a 400uf which makes for a smoother sound .

The original 220uf and 330uf caps and the two sets of replacement electrolytics that were supposed to be +/- 5% were all about 10% over so I replaced the 330 with a 300 to get closer to 550uf  , I didn't hear any difference but I wanted as close to schematic values as possible .

I'll throw this out there as a possibility , you might have a cabinet leak . 

I don't know if latex caulking was used on the 2.2 but if you find a leak you will have to remove it and then reseal it .

Also I would suggest placing the speaker on it's back with the speakers facing up , this will allow you to see if there is a large or small leak . 

I agree with you about the grills off and I too wish the woofers were black ,

I'm not sure if an aluminum baffle frame would be an improvement but since the woofer and the baffle are the same as the 2.4 ( of which many more were built ) maybe someday the dream will come true .

A while back I had tried adding resistors in series with the coaxial speakers , they didn't sound good . Tom suggested tring a bypass capacitor on the 1uf bypass capacitors on the tweeter and the mid speakers , I found a pair of .01uf Cardas capacitors and installed them on the tweeter I can highly recommend this "upgrade" . I only did the tweeter because I think these were the last 2 capacitors for sale since Cardas stopped making their golden ratio caps a while back (bummer) .

I usually use symphony orchestra music Beethoven's symphonies or Dvorak's "New World " 9th symphony by the Chicago Symphony with Fritz Reiner conducting. I will also use David Crosby's first album to listen to the chiming guitar sounds and how they linger and fade away .

If one feels that your Thiel's are to bright then the adding of a .01uf cap on the tweeter solves the problem ,  the violins now reach the highest levels without sounding bright or brittle , the hall sounds larger than ever , and this was done after installing Mills resistors and Clarity Purity 15uf caps on both the tweeter and mid crossovers .

devinplombier

Out of curiosity what capacitor values were not available, and what manufacture capacitors are you using ?  

thieliste

I rewired my 2.7 with Cardas when I found out that the speakers had wire that (I think) was used on the " new Thiel " speakers , a 16awg stranded lamp cord style .

At first I used 15.5awg for all 3 speakers , I then switched to 17.5 for the coaxial speakers and keep the 15.5 woofer for the woofer and for the speaker cable postes to the crossover boards .  I am very happy with the results especially because I bought the wire on sale and before the price of copper went up .

The one negative I can offer for using the Cardas wires Is that you should to use a hotpot to remove the lacquer coating .

I saw that the other day , did they really retail for $15,000? If so would that have been the most expensive speaker that Thiel produced ?