What capacitor values?


I have custom-made 3 way sealed box speakers with 12" Hokutone paper woofers run full range (wired directly to the speaker terminals).
The 5 1/2" Scanspeak Woofer/Mid has 1 capacitor with no coils, inductors or resistors.
The 1" silk dome Scanspeak Revelator tweeter has 1 capacitor with no coils, inductors or resistors.
What value capacitors would you suggest for the Mids and the Tweeters?
The existing capacitor values may not necessarily be ideal?
halcro

Showing 9 responses by halcro

And a 3.5uF on top should bring the tweeter in about 7500Hz.
Is this OK do you think or should I be aiming for lower than this?
Thanks again Rodman.
Whilst the formulae indicate that with the 10uF on the Mid it should only come in at 2000Hz, it patently doesn't.
The speakers have always sounded effortlessly brilliant as all my audiophile friends agree.
I don't want to mess with that distinctive balance and by inserting new Dueland VSF caps for the existing cheap 30 year old ones, I hope to hear improvements.
The Scanspeak tweeter comes on song at 1500Hz so I don't understand your thoughts on pushing it up to 5KHz?
I thought if I left the tweeter at 2.2uF and increased the Mid/Woofer to 40uF (compared to the 10uF it's had for 30 years?......it might improve the overall sound without affecting the character that I love?
What are your thoughts on that?
I've had the speakers for 30 years and their sound is extraordinary (due in no small measure to the lack of complex crossovers and the full-range woofer).
The existing capacitor values are impossible to see as they are glue-gunned to the cabinet beside the drivers and I'm not a soldering person.
I need to order the new Dueland VSF caps which will take 2 weeks to get to me and then I will have a technician take the speaker apart and solder in the new caps.
I wanted to know what others thought about the best values for the new caps but if its difficult, I'll have to just the repeat the existing capacitor values.
The reason I may change them is that the Scanspeak Mid/Woofers and Tweeters were substituted a year ago for the original Hokutone drivers.
Whilst they sound OK, their characteristics (eg impedance and X-over frequencies are almost certainly different.
Does 200uF for the Mid/Woofers and 1.766uF for the Tweeters sound reasonable?
Thanks Rodman,
The Tweeter is 6 ohm and the Mid/Woofer is 4 ohm.
The Tweeter at the moment has a 2.2 uF cap and the Mid I believe has a 10 uF cap.
Should I stick to these values?
One final question Rodman,
If I change the cap value on the Mid/Woofer from 10uF to 40uF, what is the possible risk/downside as your best guess?
The Mid starts to drop at 5K Hz as you say so I think a 5.6uF on the Tweeter would bring it in at 4740Hz.
Any risks in that?
Thanks Rodman,
You're the only one in 3 forums to actually help me and not disparage my speaker's lack of X-over and suggest I keep the drivers and trash the cabinets.
It's amazing how some people can so clearly ' hear' a speaker from its specifications....and they must think I've never heard speakers with properly designed X-overs?
There's not a single one I've heard, that sounds like live music.
My cabinets sound like the original Martin Logan CLS but with bass.
Those speakers (obviously without X-overs).......continue to be my reference.
Rodman,
Just wanted to thank you again for your help.
I soldered in some cheap caps of 40uF for the mids and tried both 4.7uf and 5.6uf for the tweeters while I waited for my Duelund caps to be made and sent.
Established that the 40uF and 5.6uf were good values and when the Duelunds arrived I wired them in.
The sound is now extraordinary.
The Duelunds are just crystal clear with no audible grain at any frequency.
The overall balance of the speakers is (to me)....seamless.
There are still no inductors (coils) or resistors so just 1 cap between the Mid and 1 cap between the tweeter.
Until the so-called 'speaker designers' listen to what minimal cross-over complexity can actually achieve, they will keep dishing up boxes which may measure well but which sound little like 'real' music.
The fact that so many audiophiles seek out speakers OTHER than boxes stuffed with cross-overs, should indicate that the formulas and methodology have failed.
Can anyone name a 3 way moving-coil 'box' speaker designed 20 or 30 years ago that people still listen to?
Yet Quad Electrostatics, Klipschorn horns, Accoustat panels still cut it.