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ADS speakers, the BIG!!! ones

SoundsAlike said:
I personally would've just had the Altec horn repaired ...thanks for posting the pics and if you enjoy them that's all that matters
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I was headed in that direction, then these showed up. I sure would like to A-B these monsters against the Altecs. The comparison might be apples to oranges but it would be fun. And since my Altecs have won the pole position thus far, I'd like to see how well the challenger does. One thing's for sure. I only have room for one big set.
 
I've personally had 2 sets of Valencia's; I think you made a good choice. Those are great speakers and actually have high frequency.
 
The ADS Mid's and Hi Frequency drivers look very much like the same build as the mid's used on the QLS-1's. Those little tinsel wires have an insulation that with time gets hard and makes the wire get brittle and break. That one hi frequency driver looks, a bit like it might have suffered that same problem. Can't say for sure but it just looks that way. Those are quite difficult to repair but I have done quite a number of them on my Infinity's. The problem lies in getting enough of the insolation material off so you can get a good solder on that tiny wire, and then make a jumper wire to the terminal. I read quite a bit about that model ADS and I am not sure that the hi frequency drivers are the same as other ADS, I recall reading something about a very close tolerance in the motor where the voice coil lies. They made a very big point about that in their sales material. But if they use the same drivers it shouldn't be hard to find some replacement.
 
Right, that wire does look very questionable. The sales brochure says the HF drivers were used only in the 1530 and 2030.
 
The good news is that it is boogered at the terminal end rather than the dome end. I think that can be fixed if needed.
 
SoundsAlike said:
I personally would've just had the Altec horn repaired ...thanks for posting the pics and if you enjoy them that's all that matters
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Me too, and then sold the Valencia's ASAP. They're simply not in the same league as the big ADS. The 2030's enjoy 2 decades of engineering and technology advancement. While it is a fine speaker in it's own rite, 846B is a marginally refined antique design in contrast.

OP needs to audition some proper amplification if he wants to hear what the ADS are all about.
 
Crap. Today I had a little time to check these big boys out. One tower is okay and one has some issues. First, that suspect looking tweeter wire is okay. It does have continuity and the tweeter works well. Its the other tweeter not playing.

There are other issues with that tower too. Some mids are out and the point/source switch is not working well, hard to move and not producing good results. Moving that switch around some also produces static from the woofers. I'm thinking all of these problems could be associated with that switch/circuit.

I'll check on removing the panel next to see what can be done. Good thing there's RSE.
 
Richard So Electronics, has parts and rebuilds ADS speakers. This may in fact require some de-oxit and if that's all it takes that would be great.
I love easy fixes...not sure how easy it is to get at the innards yet though.
 
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DonutHands said:
lol
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It's no laughing matter, to blow speakers with underpowered amps. Happens all too often. I found out the hard way.

Once an amp starts to clip, it's distorted energy is randomized across frequencies, so that a high frequency driver that might normally be driven at one watt using a 100 watt amp, might be receiving 10 times that when the amp is clipping. This is what kills high frequency drivers.

In the example above, an amp delivering 250 watts without clipping, would be sending 2.5 watts to the high frequency driver.
 
What a mean set of speakers.

Enjoy yourself!

I'm still enjoying my Vandersteen 2C's and know yours are far better. Congrats, man.
 
For the record, you cannot blow a speaker from under powering it.. I have no idea where anyone gets that idea from! It's overpowering that causes a problem. A speaker like that can likely take quite a bit of power.

Also I agree that what you have on hand may not bring out the best in them but who cares? They'll be better than any other speaker you can hook up to it (most likely). Experiment and forget about recommendations from folks unless they have personal experience with the speaker. I have speakers that I have been told need certain amps - I tried amps way outside the recommendation and it sounded great. You never know until you try.

Awesome grab by the way!


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OH and also - big speakers like that need more distance between them and the listening spot to "gel" (as in, the drivers becoming seamless). Put as much distance between you and the speakers as you can without having them too close to the walls. This will be a good starting point - big speakers won't sound proper without the right amount of distance (and as a result they become poorly thought of).


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Thanks for tips. I think what they mean by under powering is to use a small powered amp and drive it too hard to get the desired volume which runs the amp into clipping thus causing the problem. These speakers will handle a lot of watts but good clean watts not distorted watts is what they need.

No worries, I won't try to crank the volume all the way on my 20 watt amp to get it loud.

meanwhile I am looking for a suitable amp, but until then I will make do with what I have on hand.
 
Guys, this "underpowering = blown tweeters" topic has been beaten to death. And, it's not even particularly relevant to this thread on the L2030. Can you take that somewhere else (if you really feel the need to beat the dead horse some more), and let this one go back to discussing the big dog ADS? Please?

BTW, you can clip that 20 watt per channel amp until it's producing square waves and run it into a pair of L2030 indefinitely, and not hurt anything on the speaker. The amp will give up first, trust me. You'd have to blow the outputs and even then the tweeters won't be damaged (not going to get DC past the crossover & protection elements), and frankly I'm not sure the woofers would be damaged, either. The rail voltage in a 20 watt per channel amp could easily be within the long-term power handling limits of those pairs of big woofers.

It won't sound very good if you crank it too high, mind you, but up to the point you start clipping the amp - which should be VERY audible with these speakers, it should sound stellar unless driver & crossover issues derail things.

John
 
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Thanks for the clarification John, I do know that I won't crank it until it doesn't sound good anymore. I also won't be cranking anything until these get fixed. For what its worth These are the best sounding 1 1/2 speakers I have ever heard.
 
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