ADS 780/2 Woofer Reglue/Sealant - Need Advice

Sanc

Sanc

I'm Hiding in Honduras
Hey all. About six months ago I was given a pair of ADS 780/2 speakers from a relative who was moving down south and didn't want to take them with him. I had recently acquired my current setup so I wanted to spend a good amount of time with my Paradigms before trying the ADS pair. Today I decided to give them a whirl and unfortunately the first thing I hear is a "fart" like noise from the left speaker's woofer. After examining it further I see that the woofer surround isn't properly glued and is cracked. Attaching a picture below.

I've never really had speakers repaired before so I'm unsure as the best/necessary steps to get this one fixed. I got these speakers for free so I'd be willing to spend a little cash to get them going appropriately. Will this require new woofers or can this be salvaged, reglued, etc? Everything else seems fine on the woofer if that makes a difference. They innards aren't cracked or anything. Just the glue holding them down is cracked.

Thanks for the help.
 

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All the way around? No, but I would say if you imagine it like the face of a clock it is from 7 o'clock to 2 around the left side of the clock face.
 
When you gently and evenly push in on the woofer cone with your fingers around the center of the cone, do you hear or feel any rough grinding rubbing sounds when you exercise the cone in and out?

If you dont and i think you wont since most of the surround is still glued and is still keeping the voice coil centered, you should be able to just put some glue under there and tape it down till it dries, then remove the tape.
 
No I don't. I specifically tried holding the surrounds down in the area where it is cracked to see if the noise stopped and it did to an extent. Obviously because I wasn't exerting pressure down evenly around the whole area. Songs that were not heavy on bass I could barely even here the noise.

So you think I could apply some glue in the cracks, tape it down, wait for it to dry, then remove tape? What kind of glue would you recommend? Epoxy?
 
You would want to try and lift up the surround to get the glue under there good.

A lot of people here use Aleanes glue from Walmart or craft stores, but you have rubber surrounds so I'm not really positive on the aleanes. But i did just use some on a rubber surround and it seems to be holding, but there just small bookshelf speakers that I'm not putting much power too.

Rubber cement might work, don't think you need epoxy. Might start a thread on what type of glue for rubber surrounds to be safe.
 
I used Aileen's Tacky Glue to fix exactly the same issue on an ADS L400 woofer with butyl surround. Worked fine.
 
The frame isn't rusted. I think I'm going to use the Weldwood Contact Cement. That should do the job.
 
Good call jdurbin1. I didn't realize there is cardboard between the rubber surround and the metal basket. Has the glue separated between the cardboard and the metal? If so you don't need a glue for rubber then. Maybe if you can get under there with a exacto knife and scrap off as much of the rust as possible and just hope that your glue holds. If not you may want to completely separate the cardboard, clean up the metal and recenter the vc and reglue.
 
What's the brown crusty stuff showing around the edge of the surround in your pic?

That's the classic appearance of ADS frame rust... takes place where the cardboard ring underneath the rubber edge was glued to the painted steel surface.

Could be wrong but from that one pic it certainly matches the typical appearance of what that looks like.

John
 
Yea you're right. It is rust.

What would be the best material/process to clean that up?
 
I have plenty of sandpaper. Here is a question though. What is the best method for ensuring it doesn't get all inside the speaker? Think it'll be necessary to lift up the entire surround from the frame than reglue the whole woofer?
 
Good question, I've seen plenty like that but was never in a position where I had to repair the driver - ended up selling them as-is, though in my case they weren't separated yet.

GordonW's post didn't specify what he used, I don't think - but you need to get down to bare steel and you don't want to wreck the rubber to ring glue joint so I'd probably try very careful scraping with maybe a sharp wood chisel slipped under the ring, and work your way around the edge to remove the scale. After that it'll need something to stabilize the surface so it doesn't rust again, and there are paints made for that. It's a fairly thin area that'll be affected.

Could also just punt and buy replacements or send these out to Richard So for repair - think he offers that service.

John
 
Well the drivers themselves are fine. Nothing is torn or broken, just unglued from the frame. I'm going to start by trying to remove as much of the rest with some fine sandpaper as possible.
 
Well after much debate I think I've come to the conclusion that this is beyond my repair ability. I just don't have the tools nor time to fix them up.

Anyone have any recommendations of speaker repair shops in Massachusetts? Qaudio and The AudioLab are out, both said no.
 
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