New Caps Did make Real difference

[Old Guy8]

So previously put new caps in New Large Advents as part of repair/restore. Did not hear them prior to. Acquired a pair Advent ones later, and refoamed. Ran them stacked for months. Sounded fine. Finally got aroundto news caps in them. Was sceptical that there would be a noticeable change. Was I ever wrong. Tightened up the detail. More bass also. Amazed at improvement.

 

[Johnny_Law]

Fantastic results. Which caps did you use?

 

[Freddymac2]

An nudder old guy. I too had this same experience with my speakers. I used Solen's and Axion's polypropylene on mine, when they were on sale. I did find some through Amazon that avoided the high shipping cost from Parts Express. The bottom end was, faster, tighter and better controlled, and the top was almost silky. WOW WOW! I found out that many of the 34 year old caps were toasted by high watt resistors next to them.

 

[Porkloin]

So previously put new caps in New Large Advents as part of repair/restore. Did not hear them prior to. Acquired a pair Advent ones later, and refoamed. Ran them stacked for months. Sounded fine. Finally got aroundto news caps in them. Was sceptical that there would be a noticeable change. Was I ever wrong. Tightened up the detail. More bass also. Amazed at improvement.

I was really surprised at the bass improvement from a direct OEM replacement - electrolytic for electrolytic. I didn't figure there'd be anything noticable there, but I guess I have to be wrong once in awhile.

 

[Harvey/ Ga]

I use Dayton caps in my Wharfedale W-60E's, advent 5012W's and Smaller Advents. Noted a big difference in the 60E's, and a lesser difference in the newer 5012'sand S.A.'s.
Did my W-70E's with Solens and noted a modest difference, and will use Solens in my Celestion 66's, mainly because they have single caps that are very close to the 3 cap pieces in the 66.

I really noted no differences between the Solen and Dayton caps, save that Solens are a bit costlier.

 

[Old Guy8]

I used Dayton polypropylene caps from Parts Express. I checked Amazon but did not find the values I needed.
My New Large Advents have a three position tweeter switch I always set at lowest setting. My Advent One's have same drivers but no switch. I ordered, but not yet inatalled, a one ohm resistor to One's crossover. This should be similar to NLA's lowest tweeter setting, if I decide to install. I'm hearing such an improvement without the resistor, will leave them for a while.
I have other speakers I may update caps also.

 

[spkrdtr]

"New Caps Did make Real difference".....

They usually do when your old ones have drifted in their spec properties.

Problem is, most doing their first, and probably only, recap don't know if their old ones are out of spec because they don't have the means to test them.

 

[Old Guy8]

"New Caps Did make Real difference".....

They usually do when your old ones have drifted in their spec properties.

Problem is, most doing their first, and probably only, recap don't know if their old ones are out of spec because they don't have the means to test them.

Spkrdtr,
So I once worked for Greenlee Tool Co. and have one of thier fancy self sensing multimeters. Might this be able to test caps, or is it more envolved? Can they be checked while in a circuit? Is there a sticky thread that might cover this? I've just done three sets so far. But have some ADS may want to recap.

 

[Hawkeye83]

I was really surprised at the bass improvement from a direct OEM replacement - electrolytic for electrolytic. I didn't figure there'd be anything noticable there, but I guess I have to be wrong once in awhile.

I'll be doing this myself soon...re-capping my KEF 103.2's...electrolytic for electrolytic. Thought about going with Poly or some type of more expensive cap, but Falcon Acoustics already had a kit prepared of OEM style electrolytics, specifically for my speakers, so I went with that. Going to try not to 2nd guess that decision too much.

 

[Blue Shadow]

"New Caps Did make Real difference".....

They usually do when your old ones have drifted in their spec properties.

Problem is, most doing their first, and probably only, recap don't know if their old ones are out of spec because they don't have the means to test them.

And with the cost of caps being a couple/few bucks for speakers, no reason folks can be comfortable that their newly recapped speakers are as they should be and sounding their best, ready for the next decade or two. It is a hobby for most, spend wisely and reap the rewards.

 

[Porkloin]

I'll be doing this myself soon...re-capping my KEF 103.2's...electrolytic for electrolytic. Thought about going with Poly or some type of more expensive cap, but Falcon Acoustics already had a kit prepared of OEM style electrolytics, specifically for my speakers, so I went with that. Going to try not to 2nd guess that decision too much.

Until you do an actual A/B, poly-vs-electrolytic caps with your particular model, you'll always wonder.

 

[audiomagnate]

I don't understand how a cap change in this speaker could make a difference in bass response. Did you make any measurements or is this just a gut feeling? I always do one speaker at a time when I make changes and then compare the modified to the unmodified with mono music and test tones. I've never detected a difference in bass response from a cap change, except for when I bypassed the woofer blocking caps Infinity likes to use, and even then, the difference was surprisingly small, except in woofer movement below 30 Hz.

 

[drbiggles]

I don't understand how a cap change in this speaker could make a difference in bass response. Did you make any measurements or is this just a gut feeling? I always do one speaker at a time when I make changes and then compare the modified to the unmodified with mono music and test tones. I've never detected a difference in bass response from a cap change, except for when I bypassed the woofer blocking caps Infinity likes to use, and even then, the difference was surprisingly small, except in woofer movement below 30 Hz.

And there it is. Our ears and our minds do odd and interesting things when we listen to music either passively or actively (Critical Listening). So, until we all do sonic testing before and afterwards, we don't really know. It's a far better path to replace original and very old capacitors if only to protect our drivers from leaking lower frequencies.

Biggles

 

[Porkloin]

I don't understand how a cap change in this speaker could make a difference in bass response. Did you make any measurements or is this just a gut feeling? I always do one speaker at a time when I make changes and then compare the modified to the unmodified with mono music and test tones. I've never detected a difference in bass response from a cap change, except for when I bypassed the woofer blocking caps Infinity likes to use, and even then, the difference was surprisingly small, except in woofer movement below 30 Hz.

I'm still trying to figure mine out. Removal of the cap altogether in a 2nd order low pass theoretically lowers the crossover point roughly 25 percent, but the old cap still in place eventually came out and measured within specs (ESR and capacitance). I rotated drivers between crossovers - the beefier sound followed the new cap. I can't blame psychology as I blind tested other people with the same results. No one has a theory as to why.

 

[Old Guy8]

I'll be doing this myself soon...re-capping my KEF 103.2's...electrolytic for electrolytic. Thought about going with Poly or some type of more expensive cap, but Falcon Acoustics already had a kit prepared of OEM style electrolytics, specifically for my speakers, so I went with that. Going to try not to 2nd guess that decision too much.

l found a sticky thread in this speaker section with some informative capacitor discussion. I just figure with low cost of caps, I would do some speakers that I like and see what happens.

 

[Hawkeye83]

l found a sticky thread in this speaker section with some informative capacitor discussion. I just figure with low cost of caps, I would do some speakers that I like and see what happens.

Right on. I'm doing mine mostly because one speaker quit working...I'm assuming bad cap because it had the same "symptoms" as my other speaker did before it had a few caps replaced and the board repaired. My speakers were made in 1979 so a recap definitely won't hurt!

 

[spkrdtr]

I'll be doing this myself soon...re-capping my KEF 103.2's...electrolytic for electrolytic. Thought about going with Poly or some type of more expensive cap, but Falcon Acoustics already had a kit prepared of OEM style electrolytics, specifically for my speakers, so I went with that. Going to try not to 2nd guess that decision too much.

KEF speakers are inherently voiced to the soft side. If the OEM's were lytics, then KEF will surely recommend new lytics so as not to change the voicing. MKP film types would most surely alter the voicing somewhat.

 

[spkrdtr]

Spkrdtr,
So I once worked for Greenlee Tool Co. and have one of thier fancy self sensing multimeters. Might this be able to test caps, or is it more envolved? Can they be checked while in a circuit? Is there a sticky thread that might cover this? I've just done three sets so far. But have some ADS may want to recap.

The meter would have to have a uF or MFD symbol somewhere on the meter's dial of testing choices. If it doesn't, the meter won't help you measure capacitance. Some of the better meters like Fluke for example have the ability to measure capacitance, but not ESR. That requires a specialized meter like an LCR or dedicated ESR meter.

 

[Old Guy8]

I don't understand how a cap change in this speaker could make a difference in bass response. Did you make any measurements or is this just a gut feeling? I always do one speaker at a time when I make changes and then compare the modified to the unmodified with mono music and test tones. I've never detected a difference in bass response from a cap change, except for when I bypassed the woofer blocking caps Infinity likes to use, and even then, the difference was surprisingly small, except in woofer movement below 30 Hz.

It was just a gut feeling. No measurements. I changed out one and compared to other. Did not think to do so in mono. Did not do any critical listening. I get in a hurry when doing projects. It may be some mind games making me want to hear a difference.
I'm just giving my impressions. No electrical tech here.

 

[drbiggles]

The meter would have to have a uF or MFD symbol somewhere on the meter's dial of testing choices. If it doesn't, the meter won't help you measure capacitance. Some of the better meters like Fluke for example have the ability to measure capacitance, but not ESR. That requires a specialized meter like an LCR or dedicated ESR meter.

Something to take note note of, an ESR meter should be able to test the resistance at multiple frequencies. It was only after I spent the hundred bux on a Blue ESR meter that this was brought to my attention. ESR changes at different frequencies. The Blue ESR meter only tests at one frequency, a useless toy. I have a hand-held LCR meter that tests at 5 different frequencies, and the Dayton v2 only tests at 3. But again, since I don't reuse capacitors, I don't really need to use either.

Biggles