Fried Speakers

[dzkfraser]

No, not "fried" like in Bud Fried, but Fried as in fried eggs. Have a pair of PSB Image B15 speakers that I picked up at auction, unfortunately I was unable to test them before purchasing. Apparently, the previous owner decided to hook them up to his SX-1980 and crank them(or sumthin') and managed to cook ALL the drivers. The cabinets are in nice shape and I'm not sure what to do with them. I expect getting replacement drivers would cost more than the speakers are worth, what to do, what to do, any suggestions?

 

[olddude55]

I feel your pain. I had the protection circuit fail on an amplifier and it sent DC straight to the speaker. Burned up the tweeter in a large Advent to the point that I could smell it.
Did PSB us proprietary drivers, or did they buy them from a supplier like Seas? If the drivers came from a supplier, you might be able to replace them without spending a lot of dough.

 

[NeilBEN]

Pictures, and driver make and models would be helpful - replacing drivers is easy, so if the crossover survived, and the cabinets are in decent shape, then it may well be worth doing.

 

[dzkfraser]

The drivers are proprietary - sort of - as they are integral to the cabinet design. I believe the woofers at Tang band - W5-16PP4 - 5 1/4", and I think the tweeters are Tympany/Peerless(maybe Tang Band) - TW1-3AN - anyway - here's a pic


possible replacements
woof
https://www.parts-express.com/tang-band-w5-704d-5-1-4-woofer--264-850

this would probably work for tweet, but you have to buy 1000 of them and wait a year
https://www.parts-express.com/peerl...04-25mm-titanium-dome-tweeter-4-ohm--264-1470

 

[dzkfraser]

I feel your pain. I had the protection circuit fail on an amplifier and it sent DC straight to the speaker. Burned up the tweeter in a large Advent to the point that I could smell it.
Did PSB us proprietary drivers, or did they buy them from a supplier like Seas? If the drivers came from a supplier, you might be able to replace them without spending a lot of dough.

Yeah, I toasted a woofer on one of my Minimus 7 bench speakers in the same manner. This was before I found the wisdom of using a DBT when hooking up gear for the first time - live and learn

 

[Muddskipper1]

No, not "fried" like in Bud Fried, but Fried as in fried eggs. Have a pair of PSB Image B15 speakers that I picked up at auction, unfortunately I was unable to test them before purchasing. Apparently, the previous owner decided to hook them up to his SX-1980 and crank them(or sumthin') and managed to cook ALL the drivers. The cabinets are in nice shape and I'm not sure what to do with them. I expect getting replacement drivers would cost more than the speakers are worth, what to do, what to do, any suggestions?

I've had a pair of the Fried G/2 3-way model since 1981/82. They were upgraded with dual magnet 6.5" GEFCOs in 1994. I exploded the copper windings on the 10" and 6.5" and damaged one of the Hiquphons. I had a brand new copy of a remastered version of In A Gadda Da Vida and turned my Pioneer SA 9800 to max. By max, I mean Max. I'd never tried it before. It seemed like a fun idea at the time. It turned out later to have had a bad capacitor or transister or something and caused distortion like I've never personally experienced before and I've been in the manufacturer's rep side of the business working with the major tourings acts of my day. I had all the woofers and mid-ranges rebuilt here in Burbank California by a small company but the only remaining company around here so far as I know. I'm told they do such work for the major studios which surround us here. MGM, Warner, Disney, etc. I can't personally verify that, but the shop was floor to ceiling stacked with Altec horns, JBL studio monitors, etc. I'm very glad I kept the GEFCOs by having them rebuilt. I was scared to blazes they would come back sounding different from some variation in number of coils wrapped, grade of copper, gauge of wire, and all kinds of things. The owner "has a guy" right in the shop who did a great job. They came back sounding better than they had for the previous 40 years. It was hard to believe, but I even had a working pro musician who was there when they blew, come back after I reinstalled them, and we confirmed each others' opinion. Better sounding, mainly perhaps due to wiring in series at my request instead of the original 1980's parallel. Their work was slow but on time, Zero issues in 2 years since then. I could talk a lot more about details, but don't want to waste anyone's time if repairs aren't needed any longer. I'm new to Audio Karma, but will try to keep track of any replies.