Crossover Caps;

I wouldn't bother with Teflon insulation. It will be expensive and improvement will be very slight if at all. It could make them strident. Get some nice solid core copper wire. Cable length should not make too much difference.

Akai fly's under the radar. They made great tape decks and their receivers were very well built and sounded great. I don't know too much about their speakers.
 
I asked for teflon insulated wires, because i have plenty of these.
Anyway, rewiring is done, thanks for suggestions :thmbsp:
 
Thanks for the link. I replaced electrolytics with Clarity Cap pp's. Results is beyond my expectations!
 

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After two days of struggle, cabinets finally done.

When I look at the crossover before mounting drivers, i saw LF driver cables wired differently on each speaker. On one speaker minus lead wire goes to 0.35mH inductor, on the other speaker minus lead wire goes directly to post.

I tried to draw crossover. Do you guys any suggestions for this?


Thanks.


ps: my drawing is awful :scratch2:, sorry for that.
 

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"-" is electrically common in your drawing. Try to follow the "-" signal path. Connected to the 0.35 coil, or to the "-" post at the speaker terminal, is the same in this circuit.
 

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Yes, I know '-' lead eventually goes to '-' post. My curiosity is; why minus lead from LF driver goes thru 0.35mH inductor? :scratch2:

Sorry for my noob questions :D
 
Yes, I know '-' lead eventually goes to '-' post. My curiosity is; why minus lead from LF driver goes thru 0.35mH inductor? :scratch2:D

It doesn't go through the inductor. It kind of looks like it does but look closely and you'll see the line has no small triangle at the inductor. It's just a poor diagram.
 
It doesn't go thru the inductor. they are just connected all together to the "-" post. The "-" from the 0.35 inductor and the "-" from the woofer. It would be the same if the "-" from the inductor were connected to the woofer "-", and from there to the "-" post.

It's just a question of longer or shorter wires, but everything is connected to the same point.

Watch out, depending of the crossover design, some driver should be connected "phase reversed", (positive wire to negative terminal on the driver). Check both speakers for that. Sometimes the tweeter is phase reversed, sometimes the mid-range. It would be good to get the original crossover schematic.
 
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Thanks for clarification.

About reverse polarity; Yes, Both speakers mid range driver connected to crossover in reverse phase.

I know that I'm asking lots of silly questions, sorry for that :D

In addition, I want to re-arrange damping in speaker cabinets. It has carpet like material for damping cabinet walls. Lots of uncovered areas. Top, bottom, back and right side covered with this material. As I see it doesnt have any damping on left wall. This is ported speakers, port location is also at the left upper side, under the HF drivers. Do I need to cover this left side too? I don't want to mess around.

Also I want to use bitumen sheets on inner walls, on top of bitumen i'm planning to use same damping material. Is it a logical approach? Am I on the right way?
 

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Basiclly i cant understand why they're so clear and balanced!! :scratch2:

IME speaker crossover cap upgrades can make the big differences you're hearing. In the future (with these speakers or another project), if you want to get really fancy you might try something like the Audio Note tin-foil-in-oil capacitors, which are sold by DIY Hi-Fi Supply. I have them in a pair of Triangle Stella bookshelf speakers, and I feel they were worth the price. I'd love to try AN's copper and silver foil versions, but they've very, very expensive. Here's the tin foil version:
http://www.diyhifisupply.com/node/126

Furthermore, VH Audio offers some pretty amazing capacitors. I've also got a pair of their OIMP version in my speakers. Also quite expensive, unfortunately, but in these cases I think you get what you pay for.
 
I'd add some damping material, including some fiber fill, and give it a try. It can reduce the boominess in ported boxes. Do only one box, and compare with the empty box.
 
Congratulations, you must be doing something right, eh?
In the pair of Akai speakers that I have the cabinets were lighter than the better quality speakers. They glued the cut out circle from the woofer hole to the back wall inside to stiffen them. There light weight construction indicates that they would benefit from additional bracing on the inside to reduce cabinet resonance. Cutting tight fitting dowels or two by twos and glueing them in from to back and side to side will help stiffen the side panels and the baffle board. This will result in crisper bass.
Rewiring sounds like a good idea. The 18 awg should be fine if it is at least as big as the wire you are replacing.
The length of the wires is not critical.
Also the capacitor value if no one has mentioned it before can be corrected by using two capacitors that add up to the original value in parallel in place of the original. Although it looks like you have replacement values that are close enough to the original specs to be well within the tolerances of the original design, as was stated previously.
Have fun.
 
IME speaker crossover cap upgrades can make the big differences you're hearing. In the future (with these speakers or another project), if you want to get really fancy you might try something like the Audio Note tin-foil-in-oil capacitors, which are sold by DIY Hi-Fi Supply. I have them in a pair of Triangle Stella bookshelf speakers, and I feel they were worth the price. I'd love to try AN's copper and silver foil versions, but they've very, very expensive. Here's the tin foil version:
http://www.diyhifisupply.com/node/126

Furthermore, VH Audio offers some pretty amazing capacitors. I've also got a pair of their OIMP version in my speakers. Also quite expensive, unfortunately, but in these cases I think you get what you pay for.

Thanks Mr.Lin, i checked AN caps, but they're very expensive for my tiny wallet :scratch2:

When i compare my modern Jamo S608 floorstanders with this old and rusty boys, Jamo's sounded poor and very narrow sound stage. Like a shy boy sitting on a corner stone. Anyhow, this questionable old akai's sounds damn good. Half an hour ago I was listening Fade to Black from Dire Straits, i can hear every bit of brush sticks mixed with breath of Mr.Knopfler! It has a bigger sound stage and feels like alive.
 
Congratulations, you must be doing something right, eh?
In the pair of Akai speakers that I have the cabinets were lighter than the better quality speakers. They glued the cut out circle from the woofer hole to the back wall inside to stiffen them. There light weight construction indicates that they would benefit from additional bracing on the inside to reduce cabinet resonance. Cutting tight fitting dowels or two by twos and glueing them in from to back and side to side will help stiffen the side panels and the baffle board. This will result in crisper bass.
Rewiring sounds like a good idea. The 18 awg should be fine if it is at least as big as the wire you are replacing.
The length of the wires is not critical.
Also the capacitor value if no one has mentioned it before can be corrected by using two capacitors that add up to the original value in parallel in place of the original. Although it looks like you have replacement values that are close enough to the original specs to be well within the tolerances of the original design, as was stated previously.
Have fun.

Which one do you have? This sw-156's made from 1" plywood, including front. All cabinet walls have additional wood blocks next to each other. Thanks for suggestion.
I done rewiring few days ago. Cable thickness more or less same as old ones. Btw, old wires doesnt look like copper. I think they're nickel plated wires?. As for capacitors; Old electrolythics had %20 tolerance when they were fresh, replacing these with %3 tolerance clarity caps made a huge difference. Maybe final result is not related with only recap. I replaced internal wires and damping, plus sand veneer&clean&lacquer, L-Pads and spring loaded posts cleaned also. Well it could be a result of all of these.
 
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Which one do you have? This sw-156's made from 1" plywood, including front. All cabinet walls have additional wood blocks next to each other. Thanks for suggestion.
I done rewiring few days ago. Cable thickness more or less same as old ones. Btw, old wires doesnt look like copper. I think they're nickel plated wires?. As for capacitors; Old electrolythics had %20 tolerance when they were fresh, replacing these with %3 tolerance clarity caps made a huge difference. Maybe final result is not related with only recap. I replaced internal wires and damping, plus sand veneer&clean&lacquer, L-Pads and spring loaded posts cleaned also. Well it could be a result of all of these.

Hi starbender
Old post I know, Was wondering if you still had the sw-156’s if so what’s your long term opinion now ?
I just picked up a pair today and found your post, will be looking at recapping the crossover as well.
Thanks
B264E112-AB81-40FE-B9E6-F6745CF6A89E.jpeg
 
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