ADS-910's

[Goggle1824]

I physically scraped the finish off a pair of L420 and L520 since they were slightly dinged (the finish). Easy enough to do outside with a good scraping knife. Then I gave them a quick sand and now those speakers are enjoying life in the nude covered only by Watco Danish Oil Finish and looking great. The way walnut speakers back then were normally finished, oiled not hard coating finished.

You are right, lotta lumber in the 1590. Do yours have the parking place for the PA-1 amp on the back?

Blue Shadow - did you document your work? I have a pair of ADS towers that could use a cabinet finish refresh.

Thanks!

PS - No intent to thread jack, since refinishing is being discussed here and wouldn't be model specific for ADS.

 

[GD70]

Another set of 910s on CL in Raleigh, NC. $500, original owner, no stands (boo). On CL for almost a month. Time for someone to grab them.....

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/ele/5850840767.html

Great deal, but no pics, or I couldn't see any. You couldn't build these yourself for that cost.

 

[Blue Shadow]

Blue Shadow - did you document your work? I have a pair of ADS towers that could use a cabinet finish refresh.

Thanks!

PS - No intent to thread jack, since refinishing is being discussed here and wouldn't be model specific for ADS.

No thread jacking is happening. This is Glenn's Epic ADS top speakers thread, stretched from the 910 to include a few other top models. As to the finish removal on the smaller speakers, it was a thick clear finish that once scratched or rubbed off in one area could easily be scraped with a fingernail which gave me the idea to remove it completely with a better tool for the job. The finish on the L1590 is much thinner and would not come off the same way, I don't think. I'm happy with the condition of the finish of my towers and won't be picking at it to see if it will flake off. A complete refinish is more work than these need at this point as they are in overall very nice condition with just a few bumps and bruises in the finish and no apparent wood damage. I can't recommend a way to go forward on tower refinish.

 

[GD70]

I think any refinish job should start by removing the current finish, what ever it is, so you start fresh on the veneer, blank canvas so to speak. Thanks for commenting on the original lacquer finish, good to know if I ever decide to refinish the 910's

 

[2chman]

1590 have a lacquer finish but the 810 and 910 are oil I believe.

 

[Blue Shadow]

1590 have a lacquer finish but the 810 and 910 are oil I believe.

My 710s responded well to a serious cleaning and reoiling with Watco. My 810 veneer was not good, water soaked on the bottom of one speaker and these got rebuilt and became 810M (monitor) since I painted them a nice satin black. Sounded good. Both these were an oiled walnut finish.

 

[Aptone]

Wooot! Got my 910s working again. AKer Chasix fixed a roasted SAE 2300 amp for me, and it is now powering the low end in a biamp config with a SAE 2200 for the high end. Unfortunately I can't crank them too loud right now as the rest of the family is trying to sleep. They still sound sweet (got some Van Morrison wailing on the sax)!

Now that they are working again, does anyone have any advice on how to get the LEDs in the speakers working again? They have not worked since the biamp conversion. There must be a way to get them working again, eh? Any suggestions much appreciated.

 

[Drugolf]

Odd the LED's aren't working. You said you have not cranked them up yet. They do need some power for them to come on it seems.

 

[Johnny_Law]

Definitely darker than the walnut I have and it has some character in the grain. That one looks good. I'm just glad that mine are not black for what I paid.

Has anyone figured out a way to even out the color of the fronts so the sun faded section isn't so noticeable? This is the only speaker I have ever owned that needs to play with the grilles off. Too much air moving out the sides of the grilles.

I believe a made a thread on my M9/90 refinish, in which I did so by stripping sanding and staining.

 

[GD70]

Congrats to you too! Good condition?

My A-X9 is in the shop getting the phono section fixed and that's probably what will be driving the 910's, but first the LK-72 will be used. Really curious to see how that little amp will drive these.

Glenn

Wooot! Got my 910s working again. AKer Chasix fixed a roasted SAE 2300 amp for me, and it is now powering the low end in a biam config with a SAE 2200 for the high end. Unfortunately I can't crank them too loud right now as the rest of the family is trying to sleep. They still sound sweet (got some Van Morrison wailing on the sax)!

Now that they are working again, does anyone have any advice on how to get the LEDs in the speakers working again? They have not worked since the biamp conversion. There must be a way to get them working again, eh? Any suggestions much appreciated.

I believe they get their signal from the woofer. I've seen a few pics of them hooked up. Drugolf posted a pic over on CSP showing the connections.

 

[Aptone]

They do need some power for them to come on it seems.

I believe they get their signal from the woofer.

I cranked them up such that the amp feeding the woofers was peaking at 16 watts. Still no sign of life from the LEDs on the 910s. Are the connections different when biamped? The speaker LEDs were working with a single amp, and I did not change the LED wiring connections. I sent an e-mail to the guy I bought the LEDs and biamp cards from. Maybe he will have an answer.

 

[GD70]

I cranked them up such that the amp feeding the woofers was peaking at 16 watts. Still no sign of life from the LEDs on the 910s. Are the connections different when biamped? The speaker LEDs were working with a single amp, and I did not change the LED wiring connections. I sent an e-mail to the guy I bought the LEDs and biamp cards from. Maybe he will have an answer.

Bummer, but I cannot answer that question. Hopefully you'll get your answer from the gent you contacted.

 

[Curtwheeler]

I cranked them up such that the amp feeding the woofers was peaking at 16 watts. Still no sign of life from the LEDs on the 910s. Are the connections different when biamped? The speaker LEDs were working with a single amp, and I did not change the LED wiring connections. I sent an e-mail to the guy I bought the LEDs and biamp cards from. Maybe he will have an answer.

You probably did this already, but did you change the connections on the crossover terminal strip from single amplifier to bi amplifiers? Sorry if that's already been covered.

 

[liteagilis]

There's a beautiful pair of 910's in westchester county on fleabay. Cabs restored with badges, but no stands.
A great opportunity for an AKer in the area.

I bought these. Going to pick them up next Monday. A little more than FMV but hopefully well worth it. I've had quite a few ADS sets but these have been the illusive ones. Thus far, my preferred ADS were 710, 1290 780 in that order. Didnt love the 810's so much. Still have the 780's if anyone wants/needs them. If so PM me.

 

[nerdorama]

I bought these. Going to pick them up next Monday. A little more than FMV but hopefully well worth it.

Nice snag. I hope you enjoy them.
John

 

[GD70]

I bought these. Going to pick them up next Monday. A little more than FMV but hopefully well worth it. I've had quite a few ADS sets but these have been the illusive ones. Thus far, my preferred ADS were 710, 1290 780 in that order. Didnt love the 810's so much. Still have the 780's if anyone wants/needs them. If so PM me.

Excellent! Glad an AKer got them. I think you will be extremely happy with them.
Congrats!
Glenn

 

[OverLoad]

.......does anyone have any advice on how to get the LEDs in the speakers working again? They have not worked since the biamp conversion. There must be a way to get them working again, eh? Any suggestions much appreciated.

I believe they get their signal from the woofer. I've seen a few pics of them hooked up. Drugolf posted a pic over on CSP showing the connections.

I cranked them up such that the amp feeding the woofers was peaking at 16 watts. Still no sign of life from the LEDs on the 910s. Are the connections different when biamped? The speaker LEDs were working with a single amp, and I did not change the LED wiring connections. I sent an e-mail to the guy I bought the LEDs and biamp cards from. Maybe he will have an answer.

RE: The ADS 900 LPM Power Meters.

Note, they are called power meters and thus measure power. Where does the power come from? I'll give you a hint, the same place the speakers are getting power
The fact that the meters worked with the passive card installed and now don't bi-amped should be a very big clue.

Nothing odd or mysterious here. I shall explain.....

The LED boards were only intended to be used when the passive cards were installed. They essentially measure the power from the single amplifier being supplied to the entire speaker. The two pins provided on the crossover board are for connecting the LED board. These pin connections are the same connections electrically that the single amplifier gets connected to on the screw terminals. One is the +pos terminal and the other the -neg. You should note that when bi-amping, you no longer have one amplifier supplying power to the entire speaker and thus unable to measure overall power. You now have two separate nodes being supplied by two separate amps.

If you want the LED boards to work without the passive cards then you would need to hook the LED card wires directly to the screw terminals that either the woofer amplifier is connected to or the terminals the mid-range/tweeter amplifier is connected to. It should be obvious that you can only measure the power of either the woofer amp or the mid/tweeter amp.

 

[2chman]

Overload is exactly correct.

 

[Blue Shadow]

Interesting adaptation for the LEDs. In the biamp mode, one could be wired for the woofers, say left channel and the other could be wired to the mid/tweets so one would know the power on either set of drivers. Of course, the woofer LEDs would probably be higher most of the time but it would be interesting to view this.

Alternately, a switch could be installed to select either the woofer terminals or the mid/tweet terminals, user discretion. This switch needs to break before make the connection to keep the amp channels for seeing each other. When amp channels see each other electrically, smoke comes out. That isn't good at all.

 

[Blue Shadow]

I bought these. Going to pick them up next Monday. A little more than FMV but hopefully well worth it. I've had quite a few ADS sets but these have been the illusive ones. Thus far, my preferred ADS were 710, 1290 780 in that order. Didnt love the 810's so much. Still have the 780's if anyone wants/needs them. If so PM me.

Looking forward to your impressions. You say you liked the 710 then the 1290 and finally the 780 but still have the 780. I'm thinking you have had better speakers to allow you to move the 710 and 1290 on if they were better, not that you owned them at the same times. Just curious why the best you have heard would move on and having something better would allow this. So would other reasons.