Hales owners discussion

A story on Stereophile's site indicates replacement drivers for Hales speakers are available from Madisound in Wisconsin. The article is located at http://www.stereophile.com/shownews.cgi?1093 Madisound has a Web site at www.madisound.com . Their phone number is 608-831-3433.

Just bringing this thread around to update owners of Hales excellent speakers on parts availability.

Colm

Hello,

Great discussion... I own a pair of System 2 Signatures
powered by Classe electronics with MIT speaker cables and
Nordost interconnects. This was a huge improvement over
the Alon IIs (nice speakers) and Thiel CS3.5 (currently in
the basement). I'm waiting for the Audiopoints to arrive.
One of these days I'll have to see how these sound with my
old VTL electronics but I'm afraid hearing this combo will
make me want to upgrade the Classe to the VTL MB225s.

Some experimentation with my Revelation 3s brought good results, so I want to pass the info along. First, given the heavy plate glass window that serves as my front wall, the speakers were moved to within 45" from it (measured from the front baffle). Being closer, of course, enhanced the bass which was needed since so much of the energy is being vented from the room. Still, it didn't sound quite right. The bass was dull and lifeless. Any sense of decay was lost. What was originally tight, tuneful bass, albeit a bit lacking in body and slam, was gone. The following steps really cleaned things up.

The Rev. 3s always seemed to be front heavy; they're very easy to rock forward, almost to the point of being tippy. My guess is the positioning of the footers is the culprit. Mine are later models with four cone footers and this may not be the case with earlier, three-footer models.

Having just bought #30 mesh screened (fine) commercial grade sand to fill the equipment stand (which also helped matters) I bagged some in Ziplocks on a whim and mass loaded the speakers. Putting weight on the top rear of each cabinet turned out to be the key. This cleaned up not only the bottom end, but the upper frequencies as well. Much less smearing on vocals and deep bass has better definition and decay. The speakers are also much more solid on their feet, so to speak.

Right now there is 20 lbs. of sand and 15 lbs. of excercise weights sitting on each speaker. Looks like hell, but sounds much better. I'm looking at ways to add the weight in a more aesthetic fashion. Maybe maple boxes stained to match the speakers with cork feet, maybe? Suggestions are welcome.

Before doing the mass loading I did a couple of other things that seemed to help. First was leveling the speakers by putting brass washers of varying thicknesses between the cone and speaker bottom. Before using the washers I was unscrewing the cones a bit to level them, but the loosened footers were able to wiggle around. Finding the right combination of washers took a bit of twiddling, but it works (and was suggested by AudioGoners). Doing this contributed to solidifying the upper and lower registers a bit, probably because now the speakers aren't swaying in the wind as before. This is not an issue if your floor is even and level.

Following a suggestion also read here on AudioGon, I pulled the "grills" for the first time since buying the speakers (2.5 years) to check the tightness of the driver mounting screws. It was surprising how many were loose! Most were snug, some took less than a 1/4 turn and a few screws, mostly on the woofers, took almost a full turn before seating. All of them, both Philips and torx versions were checked. The ones securing the baffles were all tight. Only some of the ones securing the drivers were loose. For what it's worth, aside from the original shipping these speakers have only moved once and that was just across town while in the original boxes. While the grills were off I also found one other thing that was a little disconcerting.

One of the screws securing a midrange driver was stripped. Not completely as it wasn't falling out, but it wouldn't seat snuggly. To fix this I used a length of shrink tubing smaller than the hole like a straw, filled it with carpenter's glue and blew that into the hole making
sure to get good front to rear coverage ON THE SIDES OF THE PRE-DRILLED HOLE. That mixed with the sawdust already in the hole and after allowing it to set overnight the screw was replaced. It seated as intended. Phew!

Also, I found that the diagonally-mounted grill frame rang like a bell just as reported in the Stereophile review. Wedging rubber grommets between the bar and the front baffle solved that issue. One on each speaker and no more ringing. Almost anything would work; the grommets were handy and the groove in their side fit around the bar which will hopefully help keep them in place. Not sure if this had any real effect, but it made me feel better. ;-)

The end result of all this is a very noticeable improvement in the character of the bass. There's more slam to the bottom end, lower register instruments have a distinct and believeable decay, the overall sound is more palbable and upper treble clarity is improved. I guess some would say that the proverbial "lifting of veils" has occurred.

The cost? $3.69 for the sand and a trip back to the hardware store to get a second bag for the stand. That helped, too, so I'm like a pig in s... well, you get the idea.

Enjoy and, oh, remember to double bag the sand and wipe the Ziplocks off so as to protect the cabinet's finish.

Enjoy.

Wow, you've done some work. You have me thinking about the tighness of my drivers, but I really don't care to take the grills off. Have you put the grill back on? Was as difficult as it is made out to be?

I have same issues with spikes and leveling. My spikes don't move about to badly, but I need to get some washers. There is a bit of weight in that front baffle and the spikes are back a bit.

With the Twos at least, I am finding that they are pretty flexible about where they are at in room, and can accomadate many types of rooms. They are, however, picky about toe-in and (ear/seating) height.

Thanks for your report,
Brian