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Do tweeters slowly degrade in performance over time?

S

SamiK

New Member
I have pair of Advent Baby II, Infinity RS2001 and Boston Acoustics A40 for the bookshelf speakers.
Most people here in Audio Karma praise the Advent Baby II, but mine seem to have muddy highs. The Infinity RS2001 are not highly regarded speakers, but they sound better than the Baby IIs. Of the three sets, Boston Acoustics A40 sound the best overall. So, that's what I usually use.

So, with my experience with Baby IIs so different from other people's, I am wondering whether something is wrong with the tweeters. The tweeters in Baby IIs degrade in performance over time? I know it can't be anything else, because I not only refoamed the woofers, but I also replaced the crossover capacitors with film type.

Also, a question to people with experience with Infinity speakers. Do the Polycell tweeters degrade over time? My RS2001 have slightly muddy highs.

If they do degrade, is there anyway to recondition them?

Any comment is appreciated.
 
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Don't know about the speakers in question, but tweeters do degrade. The ones with ferrofluid can have problems after some years, and I've seen the coated fabric dome tweeters dry out and get hard. Not sure how that affects the sound and the process is slow so you don't typically notice it until you compare it with something different. Other designs are more stable over time, as evidenced by a large number of still good sounding rather old speakers.
 
How old are the speakers? The old caps, especially electrolytic can degrade the sound in older speakers. Tweeters and mids that are fluid filled can degrade as the fluid dries out and thickens. The last speakers i recapped are 30+ years old. The top end was muddy before replacing the old electrolytic caps with poly caps. It woke them right up. Conrad has a good point about some of the old coated domes as well.
 
I was given a pair of baby Advent's some time ago. Excellent shape, but needed new foam. I had never refoamed a woofer, so I thought this might be a nice intro to the process. Mechanically, it went fine. I also replaced the internal crossover cap with a nice film, and I was surprised to hear that the result was so incredibly muddy. Lots and lots of upper-bass and lower-mids, and non-existent highs. I have them connected to a mid-fi integrated, and they almost sound listenable with the bass nearly all the way down and the treble all the way up. Both speakers sound identical to each other, so if tweeter deterioration is suspect, it seems odd that they would both exhibit the exact same issue.

Really don't know what to do with them from here. They are in such nice shape, seems a shame to trash them.
 
IMO, Advents were never bright and sparkly even when new, that's why I traded mine in on a pair of Genesis when they first came out.
 
My baby advent II's sound good to me in the nearfield ap I'm using the in. Yes they have been recapped. I think there was a time that quality speakers were not to sound harsh or overly bright, so some "reasonably priced" speakers would be designed to that standard. YMMV
 
Most cone tweeter have the same basic suspension as woofers- so yes the can war out and have some spider sag if not foam roll problems. Tweeter with out these suspensions, like ribbon tweeters and the like, are not as likely to have problems....but I have seen plenty of EMIT tweeters go bad!
DC
 
When I first bought my NHT Super Zeros, the original owner had left them near sunlight, fading the cones on the woofers, and turning the coating on the domes to near dust. I replaced the tweeters with some NOS I bought here on Bartertown, but I can't really say the highs improved, or if I just expected them to. Ended up using a Sharpie on the woofers. Don't laugh, it worked great.
 
The reason I was asking is that Parts Express has the original tweeters for Baby II. I am thinking about buying two of them to see whether new tweeters would make a difference. I already did the surrounds and replaced the capacitors with polyproplene type. So, only thing I can blame are the tweeters. Honestly, I don't think new tweeters would make a significant difference, maybe just enough difference to be noticeable. When I get the new tweeters and have them installed, I will post a before and after impression.
 
Looks like the Baby II used Advent's version of the polycarbonate tweeter that you find in many speakers. I don't think there's a lot that can go wrong with these. I think I'd first try replacing the capacitors and see if that helps. If it didn't, I'd probably look into replacing with the tweeters from a higher end model of that series (I don't remember the name, but I believe there was a model above the Baby but below the Legacy that used a 3/4" soft dome tweeter (the Legacy used a 1" dome)). I don't know if it's a good fit (either physically or electrically) but it might be worth a look.
 
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