@jafant we're entirely different species of humans who appreciate what Thiel was trying to do. It's worth noticing I think. You and I are on opposite ends of a spectrum. I don't mean to be critical or demeaning at all. You have something I do not. You have a unique ability to interact positively with people.
Thiel Owners
Guys-
I just scored a sweet pair of CS 2.4SE loudspeakers. Anyone else currently or previously owned this model?
Owners of the CS 2.4 or CS 2.7 are free to chime in as well. Thiel are excellent w/ both tubed or solid-state gear!
Keep me posted & Happy Listening!
I just scored a sweet pair of CS 2.4SE loudspeakers. Anyone else currently or previously owned this model?
Owners of the CS 2.4 or CS 2.7 are free to chime in as well. Thiel are excellent w/ both tubed or solid-state gear!
Keep me posted & Happy Listening!
14,028 responses Add your response
@jafant - yes Alan at HiFi Buys has a good sounding room, it’s before my time but at one time he was ( Audio Alternative) a Thiel dealer :-) funny you mention it, Alan gave over his high end room to myself, Spouse and Labrador for 8 hours one Saturday to choose a power amp to drive 5A and eventually 7’s. You can see a picture of that in my Poverty Bay system pages. fun |
@Jafant - I agree about the cost effective implementation. There's a lot of value in making something people don't need to be rich to own. That approach is why this thread exists. There'll never be a Wilson or magico equivalent. So many people have been able to own and appreciate Thiel products. So few Wilson or magico. People with widely varying backgrounds, tastes, budgets, etc. own and appreciate Thiels. Oil sheiks and stock brokers own the vanity brands. |
@erik_squires, I am truly trying not to be petty, but, though the thread was about specific models, you posted. “Thiel’s”, not CS2’s, and you also posted “anytime”. It’s not the only time you’ve posted a less than favorable perspective on Thiel’s, As far as I’m concerned that’s fine; your entitled to your opinion. I tend to remember the opinions of those I’ve come to respect. Peace. |
On pistonic for less...$$$$$ that is indeed the quest - part of the current issue is affordable core material ( air is free, balsa is not ) CF skins in prepreg, machining, autoclave time and then integrating it all into a top notch basket/magnet/motor and pole piece assy - aka Scanspeak .... but remarkable that it is less than $750k paper midrange... fun, something to do.... |
tomic601 Precisely- articulate and musical (timbre) are the exact characteristics that sold me on the CS 2.4 vs. Vandy 3A signature in the same room, same gear. To date, I have not heard the 5A/5A carbon(signature). I did hear the Quattro and Treo and these two models do not better CS 2.4 through CS 3.7 to my ears. Model Seven is unreal and could very well be the absolute sound (custom room must accompany these loudspeakers). Hifi Buys Atlanta has such a room. Happy Listening! |
@Unsound While I apologize for the confusion, I didn’t think I needed to make a caveat when the OP clearly established the boundaries of the conversation in the thread you posted as being about the Thiel CS2, which was reviewed at least as early as 1985: https://www.stereophile.com/floorloudspeakers/1085thiel/index.html and the Vandersteen 2c which was reviewed at least by 1989: https://www.stereophile.com/floorloudspeakers/914/index.html If you wanted to know if I meant to review all Vandersteen and all Thiel speakers forever, then you should have asked the question as such and I would have said "no, no I do not." If you wish to hold me to an editorial standard of writing complete monologues each time I post on this hobby site then we can discuss an appropriate salary. Best, E |
@erik_squires, At the risk of appearing to be tit for tat, this post just a few days ago on 5/17/20 didn't come with much of a caveat: https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/vandersteen-2c-vs-thiel-cs2 |
Vandersteen’s carbon drivers are, IMO, the best audio drivers ever. If I win the powerball, I won’t look any further than his model Seven. The 2.7/3.7 coax and ribbed diaphragms were a significant step towards the same goal Vandersteen has with respect to pistonic behavior. I’ve long considered Jim Thiel designed drivers to be among the best. Who knows what he would have produced by now. But Tom shared with me the concept of the CS7.3 and it would have a new pinnacle in the Thiel line . . . 10 years ago. We audiophiles are fortunate to have had JT and RV bring their talents to our listening rooms with gear that we can actually afford. That their designs compete with or outperform others at multiple times the price is a testament to their abilities and real-world sensibilities. |
I haven't spent much time listening to carbon drivers per se, but I have to say that overall I've always ended up preferring composite cones, anything from the Focal W construction to the ScanSpeak sliced paper to simple fiberglass/resin construction from Peerless. Certainly I can say that I like composites a great deal more than I do the top ceramics. Still, there's a lot more to a speaker than a driver material and it's' focusing on these single items which leads to out of proportion spending and myths about specific speakers. The system is what matters, but the drivers are always fun to talk about. Best, E |
Tom - building his own composite airplane led Richard to Balsa and it’s the lightweight stuff with sattelite grade carbon fiber - the tough stuff is end grain bonding in a lightweight resin fiber layup. For background I don’t know the secret and I ran arguably the most advanced composite shop on the planet B-2, F-22 wing, 787 fuselage, development wing... low tech stuff... ha We all have our hard won secrets.,, creating drivers w breakup far outside the pass Band is one of the holy grail pursuit imo, especially for those who care about time and phase. jim, Richard, Dunlavey- they all got it ! So glad you carry the torch Tom |
Indeed carbon rocks. And I salute Richard Vandersteen all around, and his implementation of carbon on a balsa core in particular. Jim used aluminum on a styrene core - a poor man's implementation of the same concept. And going back to the 2.2 woofer in 1990, Jim mated a shallow curved front cone with a deeper straight rear cone, trapping a sealed air-space between them to approach the same idea. The air is the damping agent and the two cones' resonant behavior is different from each other. The result is quite remarkable. I would like to hear Richard's latest model 2 iteration. I bet it's not too different from a Thiel 2.2. I could be wrong, but it seems that as time went by, the two brands converged somewhat. It seems that Vandersteen sold as many model 2s as Thiel sold all models combined. He is one for the history books. |
Erik - what is your target frequency response, either outdoors / anechoic, or in a room? Thanks for asking, @tomthiel , honestly I’m a little chagrined sharing what I do with some one who actually has been so successful in the industry. I should explain that the last time I heard a Thiel speaker was before I returned to my electronics background. Mid 1990s perhaps? I wasn’t really measuring anything then, so I have no way of knowing what I was hearing or what struck me then. Long after I decided to take some of what I stole from Dr. Leach at Georgia Tech together with modern inexpensive tools and get into speaker design, so I don’t want to say anything as being definitive of how I would hear things now, or what I might be able to ascribe to what I heard in the 90s. But to answer your question, my target ends up being the old B&K curve at 1 M, but, measured in-room. Of course, these are cheats I can only get away with for a 2-way speaker. However I recently took in-room at listening location measurements and posted here: https://speakermakersjourney.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-snr-1-room-response-and-roon.html The mic was at couch seat level, so probably much closer to mid-woofer axis. now to Eric’s credit, while his opinion of Thiel high frequency performance is dated Extremely dated, I wish people would remember that caveat when they post about my comments. he does have IMO an acute and appropriate focus on room treatments:-) Ty for the kind words, @tomic601 , but for me it is necessity. I am unusually susceptible to room acoustics, and wish I was not. I run into so many audiophiles at shows who can shrug it off. Wish I was more like that. |
I would spend more time on target impulse response and driver breakup and then the cabinet... then low frequency interactions with room, then high passing the mid bass on up ... and then worrying that last db here or there in frequency response.... my buck fifty, which is $.02 adjusted for inflation now to Eric’s credit, while his opinion of Thiel high frequency performance is dated, he does have IMO an acute and appropriate focus on room treatments:-) best jim |
Of huge importance to Jim was that of balanced design. He worked toward a performance plateau where all elements worked equally hard and efficiently to perform at maximum cost efficiency as a whole system. It's really easy, especially as hobbyists, to focus on some particular component like capacitors or the tweeter, at the expense of everything else. It's like putting the most expensive tires on the market on a Honda Civic. Best, E |
Jafant, erik_squires has gone on record here at Audiogon of not being a fan of Thiel’s. I'm afraid this is true, but I'm always surprised anyone remembers what I like or don't. The tonal balance of the Thiels was not for me, though I have not heard them in many years, and it was never a complaint about the quality of the product, just not suitable for me. The MRA case is quite a bit smaller for a lower dissipation factor. So put the MRAs on little balls of Mortite or BluTac for 360° radiation and airflow. Really good advice, especially if planning to ship them, but otherwise, for a home project just lifting them off the board works. Thanks but the Mundorf does not have the value needed Consider the difference in age alone. In the 1980's/1990s electrolytic caps were generally crap compared to even budget bipolars of today. Best, E |
I think a little shot of history might be in order. Let’s look at resistors for a glimpse into Jim Thiel’s working ethos. Of huge importance to Jim was that of balanced design. He worked toward a performance plateau where all elements worked equally hard and efficiently to perform at maximum cost efficiency as a whole system. Let’s look at resistors as an example. In 1977 we were struggling with the 03 - EVERYTHING was audible with phase coherence, and we wanted to upgrade all components; but we also wanted to keep our focus on cost effectiveness. Jim "built" some reverse-wound resistors from OFHP aerospace copper coil wire. Obvious improvement. Judged unaffordable. Audio grade resistors either didn’t exist or we didn’t know about them. Jim went to work with (what later became) ERSE and developed the present Thiel resistors. They are not "dime store resistors" although they look like them. They are actually made from good wire with reverse winding for a low inductance load, set into a ceramic tub for greater dissipation than a cylindrical case. It costs a fraction of the Mills and performs quite respectably. Balanced design. That was Jim’s approach. How do we get most of what we want and pay a fraction of the cost. He was proud of those resistors; the early versions said "Thiel" on the case. You can buy that design from ERSE. They outperform normal sand-cast dime store resistors by a long shot. That said, the Mills MRA-12s are better. BTW: the ones that Jeff Glowacki at Sonic Craft sells are the best. (Not just salesmanship.) I would replace the Thiel / ERSE resistors as low-hanging upgrade fruit. BUT there is a BUT. The MRA case is quite a bit smaller for a lower dissipation factor. So put the MRAs on little balls of Mortite or BluTac for 360° radiation and airflow. A happy coincidence is that the residual inductance of Thiel/ERSE vs MRA is nearly identical, so you don’t have to compensate as you would if going from a normal sand-cast to the MRA. This crossover circuitry is extremely subtle and carefully tuned to include all elements. So swapping one form for another is not simple. I am venturing into the mire, and learn every day how little I know of the finer subtleties of the art. Be careful. |
Thank You theaudiotweak I've already ordered some Mills resistors for the tweeter to test to see how difficult it will be to remove the old ones from all that glue . I'm doing the wire first so I can install fastons for the wiring so the boards can be taken out to work on easily , I'll remove the fastons and solder the wiring last . Plus it will give me more time to gather information and advise . |
Well you would have 2 conversions when really only none is required..And you would have many more component parts including the probable use of a couple of noisey switching power supplys. Other than that it would work. I have run digital eq and xo on my system once and only on the subs which I quickly removed. Tom |
vair68robert..Just saw the exposed crossover you posted. The single easiest most dramatic improvement would be for you to replace all the resistors shown with either non inductive wire wounds from Mills or Mundorf. I would replace the resistors first before the wire..You will always hear the resistors shown and their low level noise will still be present in any wire you try. Change the resistors first/next.. Tom |
Get it all out here..When I did a remodel of my power amps I took the main board Nichicons off and chassis mounted 4 of the Clarity Cap TC's these are hard mounted to the metal bottom with Audiopoints. You could do the same in a speaker when replacing a large value cap. These caps a very nice up grade. Flys high now with the Vishay nude metal films in every position.Tom |
Question can you run a cap and resistor in series to equate the the esr of the original ? @theaudiotweak Yes, you can, though ESR is not exactly a constant at all frequencies, you can definitely compensate with a little eye balling of the relevant graphs. :) 0.1 Ohm difference isn't as important as going from 1.5 Ohms to 0.3. That in shunt can really drop the impedance of the next range. Not as fancy, but I love Mills. Small, very high power, extremely accurate and thermally stable. Remember the same thing with inductors. Keep the DCR the same, or you are changing the speaker. There are a number of designs (including my own) which use the DCR as part of the baffle step compensation. Best, E |
Question can you run a cap and resistor in series to equate the the esr of the original ? The best sounding resistors are the Vishay nude metal films. When I rebuilt my long gone Dunlavys years back..I had to build resistor bridges with several of these low wattage resistors to meet the power requirements. The improvement was almost staggering well that and sealing all the pores of the MDF inside of the cabinet with Cascade Vbloc..the formula now is a little different. Kinda like troweling on concrete. Sucks in and seals and kills the glue..Much more dynamic and open. I sealed 1 and kept quantity measurements, let dry for a few days and reassembled and compared..The treated one sounded like it went out the door and down the street..the other one was still in the box. The pair was amazing. My experience tells me not to replace inductors..go gently with the caps..and replace all the dime store resistors. Tom |
The 400uF electrolytic is in series feed to the midrange.Oh, wow! Welp, on the plus side there is more room for sonic improvement. But 400 uF of film caps will certainly need a new layout/board. And it looks like one of the other ELs is 220 uF. And not only much bigger but also $$$. My new boards were much larger. I compensated in the passive radiator chamber by removing a similar volume of the fiberglass batt. But I only had two 100 uF ELs to replace. 400+ is probably still doable but complicates the issue and makes the upgrade spendy. Clarity CSA 250V is available in 100 uF for $68 each. PulseX 250V is more affordable and should be sonically superior to ELs. Lean on Tom’s Knowledge, Robert! |
Rob and Erik - The 400uF electrolytic is in series feed to the midrange. Bummer Doh, then consider the Mundorf electrolytics: https://www.partsconnexion.com/capacitors-ele-mundorf-e-cap-ac-series.html or Axon film: https://www.partsconnexion.com/axon-true-cap-film-capacitors.html In either case, measure ESR of the original and be aware that reducing it significantly can result in more midrange output. :) Best, E |
Hello all, returning with an update on my 3.5 mids. I received them back from Tom this week and was able to do an A/B test with the original mids, rebuilt by Rob, and the
Scanspeak 12W/8524G00 speaker, which has been floating around on the web as a suitable replacement for the original Scanspeak mids. The replacements were in my 3.5's when I bought them, I was able to score the mids from a fellow Audiogon contributor and had Rob rebuild them. Anyway, I wasn't expecting much of a difference, if all, simply because I don't consider my ear terribly critical. I replaced on of the mids, put my preamp on mono, and played some ZZ Top (I am originally from Texas, so....) and did a close up comparison as well as sitting position in my listening room. I was surprised at the difference! The original Scanspeak obviously worked better with the crossover, the difference being that the rebuilt original was much clearer and articulate, where the replacement was subdued sounding. So what I thought was an excellent listening experience before the replacement has turned into an exceptional one. I kid you not. So I would say this particular Scanspeak (
Scanspeak 12W/8524G00) is not a good match for the original. I think Rob is recommending another one, and Tom may have something to say soon as well. Amplifier update, my last post was lamenting on the binding posts on my Yamaha M85 and Denon POA 1500. I replaced the posts on the Denon to 5 way, and sold the Yamaha and bought a Denon POA 2200, which I now need to replace its binding posts as it used the exact same one as the Yamaha. My only comment on replacing the bindings is I was scratching my head on what to use to replace the strip of metal between the old posts and the PCB. Then I remembered I had some romex wire from my basement finish work, so I stripped sections of the solid copper wire and used it. Worked perfectly. |
Hey @vair68robert Given the cap sizes you are talking about I'm assuming these are in low pass sections, and going to ground. The Solens, or their cheap brand, Axon, will be great choices, BUT, you must maintain the original ESR + R of that portion of the circuit or you may suffer unexpected impedance issues, which causes your amp to suffer, along with changing the crossover points. Save the top-end caps for caps that are in series with the drivers. Best, E |
@beetlemania You have seen one of my obstacles , one possible option is 2 Solen 200uf 400v large but the 400 is at the bottom of the board , Another is a Clarity TC 400uf 400v very large . I'm going to have to do a lot of measuring this project is going to take a lot longer than anticipated as well as way over estimated budget , but after rehabbing 2 100 year old buildings with 5 apartments I'm used to being over on time and money . |
Let me chime in as some one with relatively recent experience with Clarity and CMR in particular, but not with Thiel rebuilds. The CMRs are excellent caps. I honestly don’t know if they are better than the previous generation. I’ve swapped them out in my application and they sounded equally excellent. What I have found in both cases (CMR and MR) is that Clarity caps above 5uF benefit from a small bypass copper cap. This was a suggestion passed onto me at DIYaudio by Speakerdoctor before he passed (RIP). Though he did not suggest it above a certain uF value, I have found this to be about the break point. Below this value, a bypass cap did not help, but above it certainly did. Based on his suggestion I’ve used Audyn 0.1uF TrueCopper bypass caps, and they worked really well. Anyone who wants to ship me Jupiter caps instead please do so! :) I wish I could afford them. Best, E |