Damien A
New Member
Forgive me if this is a covered subject, this is my first post here and I’m hoping someone on here has the answer I need to get these Paradigms back in order. I love this forum and have learned much from reading old threads.
So, this week I found a pair of Paradigm Model 3se’s at my local savers for $8. I cleaned them up and hooked them up to my Pioneer SX-450 in just the FM stage. At first they sounded great! Next I threw on some records. Started with a Grateful Dead record, sounded great. Then a soul/funk album in which I noticed some woofer pumping during side 2. So next I put on Funhouse by the stooges, a rather “loud” record and during the first song, the right speaker just dropped in clarity and volume. It’s very muddy sounding. There was no loud pop, buzz, or anything. Just a split second change to lesser quality sound from one speaker.
After doing some reading, I pulled out my multimeter and pulled both tweeters and drivers from the cabinets. All of which tested equally and in range.
I tried both tweeters and both drivers in each cabinet and all components worked when in the left speaker. After swapping drivers from their original cabinet, the sound actually returned to normal for about 20 minutes in both speakers, then suddenly during Bob Dylan’s Tangled Up in Blue, back to the muddy, low in volume sound in the right speaker. Swapping the tweeters produced no change in the problematic speaker or the good speaker.
As a novice, I was hoping it would be a simple tweeter replacement. But alas I’m stuck thinking it must be the “crossover”. I inspected it and there are no broken solder joints, no wires that seem damaged.
I’ve run these through my Pioneer Sx 450 & Technics sa 300. I’m also using a dual 1225 with a Pickering tl/2 moving magnet cart. I’ve also tried changing the speaker cables with no difference.
So with all this in mind, what are my options? I don’t know where to begin checking to see if the crossover or caps are the problem. I also do not have soldering equipment on hand, but have some soldering experience from when I repaired electric motors. But after swapping both drivers and tweeters into the left speaker and hearing them work properly i can only assume the right crossover is the issue. Are there replacement crossovers for this model available somewhere online? One option I see is a crossover from a Paradigm model 5se on eBay. It looks exactly like mine, same speaker connections and screw hole placements. I’m just unsure if a 5se part would be compatible in my 3se’s. There are also some Paradigm 3se MKII crossovers available on the bay, but have different speaker connections than my base model 3se’s. If anyone can give a novice some help, I’d greatly appreciate it. Thanks in advance! I added some photos I took during the process of taking it apart if that’s helpful to anyone.
So, this week I found a pair of Paradigm Model 3se’s at my local savers for $8. I cleaned them up and hooked them up to my Pioneer SX-450 in just the FM stage. At first they sounded great! Next I threw on some records. Started with a Grateful Dead record, sounded great. Then a soul/funk album in which I noticed some woofer pumping during side 2. So next I put on Funhouse by the stooges, a rather “loud” record and during the first song, the right speaker just dropped in clarity and volume. It’s very muddy sounding. There was no loud pop, buzz, or anything. Just a split second change to lesser quality sound from one speaker.
After doing some reading, I pulled out my multimeter and pulled both tweeters and drivers from the cabinets. All of which tested equally and in range.
I tried both tweeters and both drivers in each cabinet and all components worked when in the left speaker. After swapping drivers from their original cabinet, the sound actually returned to normal for about 20 minutes in both speakers, then suddenly during Bob Dylan’s Tangled Up in Blue, back to the muddy, low in volume sound in the right speaker. Swapping the tweeters produced no change in the problematic speaker or the good speaker.
As a novice, I was hoping it would be a simple tweeter replacement. But alas I’m stuck thinking it must be the “crossover”. I inspected it and there are no broken solder joints, no wires that seem damaged.
I’ve run these through my Pioneer Sx 450 & Technics sa 300. I’m also using a dual 1225 with a Pickering tl/2 moving magnet cart. I’ve also tried changing the speaker cables with no difference.
So with all this in mind, what are my options? I don’t know where to begin checking to see if the crossover or caps are the problem. I also do not have soldering equipment on hand, but have some soldering experience from when I repaired electric motors. But after swapping both drivers and tweeters into the left speaker and hearing them work properly i can only assume the right crossover is the issue. Are there replacement crossovers for this model available somewhere online? One option I see is a crossover from a Paradigm model 5se on eBay. It looks exactly like mine, same speaker connections and screw hole placements. I’m just unsure if a 5se part would be compatible in my 3se’s. There are also some Paradigm 3se MKII crossovers available on the bay, but have different speaker connections than my base model 3se’s. If anyone can give a novice some help, I’d greatly appreciate it. Thanks in advance! I added some photos I took during the process of taking it apart if that’s helpful to anyone.
