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Pioneer HPM-100 Recapping Walkthrough

if that is the setup in your sig picture, I recommend two things...

First, with those floors, definitely some more pillows or soft sound-absorbing things in the room. Reflectivity with HPM's can be painful.

Second, try to get some stands...get them off the floor. It will tighten up the bass, and perhaps move those highs slightly above your ears. Since putting mine on old milk crates, I cannot imagine them on the floor again.

Good luck.
 
Also, don't toe them in so they face directly at you. Looking at the original frequency response graph shows them to be much flatter on the high end at 30° off axis.
 
Yes, I got very lucky! I found a freshly recapped, dead mint SX-1250 and the HPM-100s from a seller that lives less than a mile away from my home! Talk about convenient.

I do have one question though: I've read a lot of posts on AK about recapping the HPM100s, which I will definitely do, but why no mention of hooking up a quality graphic EQ and pulling back the upper mids a bit? EQs were all the rage when I was growing up, so I would think a vintage 10 band would sit nicely in my setup.
 
You could definitely use an eq. I as well as others here have done just that. I prefer to not use an eq whenever possible. If you experiment with positioning you may find a suitable position for them that gives you the magical sound you're looking for. For me, I have them 9" off the floor on sand filled oak stands and toed in just ever so slightly. I seem to get good results this way. Of course your mileage may vary.
 
Tripqzon said:
You could definitely use an eq. I as well as others here have done just that. I prefer to not use an eq whenever possible. If you experiment with positioning you may find a suitable position for them that gives you the magical sound you're looking for. For me, I have them 9" off the floor on sand filled oak stands and toed in just ever so slightly. I seem to get good results this way. Of course your mileage may vary.
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What he said +1. Couldn't agree more with Tripqzon.

And you say that 1250 had just been recapped as well?

Jeez. Some guys have all the luck..:D

Keep experimenting, and good luck.
 
Well, it didn't come cheap. I bought the SX-1250, HPM100s, and a ridiculously mint unused Kenwood KX-1060 at a package price of $1000. It was more than I wanted to spend, but the way I saw it was this: What are the odds of me getting this kind of vintage gear again in this kind of condition so close to home? I could test it, I could touch it, smell it, everything before I shelled over the C notes. That to me was worth the price of admission.
 
B4 recapping HPM-100's

1. Get them off the floor about 16"-18" so the mids are about ear level when you're seated, both speakers at the same height.
2. Set your 1250's tone and base control at zero and both mid and high 100's crossovers to zero (center point).
3. Play a good sound source, not FM or compressed CD's, and adjust the speaker toe in/out so the it comes from the middle and fills the room. It doesn't take much and one speaker may have a different angle than the other because of room acoustics. Walls, furniture, etc. Hint: You can mark a reference point with masking tape front and side of each speaker in case you went too far.
4. Then begin adjusting the crossovers ever so slightly, mid and high settings individually till you are satisfied. It should help balance the sound overall depending upon your room layout.
5. Now you can play with the 1250 controls to finite to your listening pleasure, more bass, mids or highs depending upon the music.

Enjoy your new gear, I've yet to find a modern speaker for under what you paid to beat them.
 
A little on the steep side, but then again, if it was all mint, yeah, I'd do it.

And that Kenwood should be nice as well. I think I had the baby of that lineup, and it was sweet.

Eagle1 is right. Hard to beat the sound with modern gear under that amount.

Enjoying my rebuilt 1250 as I write this.:music:
 
I originally had mine 14" off the floor and it made them sound even more forward than they already are. Certain instruments, such as piano, and frequencies in the 400Hz to 600Hz range were extremely annoying to my ears. This may not be the case with your ears. Experiment with height and toe them in to taste.
 
pognoot said:
Yes, I got very lucky! I found a freshly recapped, dead mint SX-1250 and the HPM-100s from a seller that lives less than a mile away from my home! Talk about convenient.
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Freshly recapped....hmmm. I wonder what was replaced and with what kind of caps. I'd check with seller to find out exactly what they did and with what. I'm always leery of buying someone else's work unless I know them or they provide a detailed list b4 purchase.

Also with a newly recapped unit it takes a bit of time for the 'lytic caps to form so the unit will sound high till they do. Hook up the Kenny to the 100's and see how it sounds. Kenwood and Sansui usually have a softer sound quality. It's not just about the speakers but many more pieces of the chain. Have fun with your new project :thmbsp:
 
Yes my HPM's are recapped.

Eagle1 is right about the sound not just being about the speakers. System synergy will play a part in the overall sound quality as well. Everything I've read so far though leads me to believe the SX-1250/HPM-100 combo should sound pretty sweet.
 
a nice problem to have, but still a problem;
I have so much crap I haven't combined my SX1250 and my HPM's.

Imagine that. :saywhat:

And, I have an M60 Yamaha amp, controlled by a Yamaha CA-810, and have never hooked that up to my Yamaha 690's.

Well, I know what I'm doing tomorrow on my day off......:music:
 
I have a question about this:

"Actually, the 200 watt version has a brace in the cabinet. It is very well built. I posted a pic of this somewhere on the forum. The 200 watt version also uses machine screws with the metal inserts. I don't know where this inaccurate information that the 100 watt version is better built is coming from but it is just that, inaccurate."


When I recently replaced the tweeters in my 100's I noticed a brace inside the cabinets (look in the port hole):

2d8i5g2.jpg



and my drivers also have the machine screws (except the super tweeter has wood screws) and according to the speaker terminal they are the 50 W/100W versions and also do not have the trim ring around the port.

So did certain years have the brace no matter what the wattage rating was?

Thanks.
 
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My HPM-100's 100w have the internal brace as well, one of the reasons I bought them. The very early reviews had stated that the 200w's didn't. Since I have heard from other owners of 200w models that have the bracing and other didn't, I wonder if it was a transitional period to use up existing stock. :scratch2:
 
So, after recapping the original crossovers I was unhappy. Played them for a couple of months and they still were very shiny on the high end and the bass was lower as well. I put a set of original crossovers back in and now they sound the way they did before. I still have a set of recapped crossovers.

Is it possible that the higher quality caps made the mid-range and tweeter more efficient and that changed the eq of the speaker? I'm kind of confused because everyone insists the recapping makes the speakers better and I just did not experience that.
 
When the x-overs are re-capped using the parts that are listed, are the new parts exact replacements for the originals in terms of their values? Or are they different to try and cut down on the highs? I wouldn't mind replacing the originals for the same values as to me the speakers sound fine, well I did replace the tweeters but other wise I think they sound fine, but my wife does tell me all the time she's going to get me a hearing aid!! So my hearing is probably a little shot anyway!! LOL
 
I recapped my HPM-100s with the exact parts suggested at the beginning of this thread. I couldn't be more pleased with the result. To my ears, the new caps sound much smoother and it opened up the soundstage considerably.

The next step for me was to "tune" the speakers to the room, and for this job I selected the DBX 231 graphic EQ. Having fairly good ears, my EQ settings are almost an inverse mirror image of the Frequency Response graph given in the HPM-100 user's manual. I notched out the "west coast" midrange between 2khz and 3khz, pulled the top off a bit, and boosted at 50hz and below mostly because I like deep bass.

All said and done, I did an A/B comparison to my Polk RT-800i's. The HPMs have a depth in the bass dept that the Polks simply cannot match, and with that bullshit "west coast" midrange removed, the HPMs sound very, very good. Perhaps not $10,000.00 audiophile good, but still..very good.
 
pognoot said:
I recapped my HPM-100s with the exact parts suggested at the beginning of this thread. I couldn't be more pleased with the result. To my ears, the new caps sound much smoother and it opened up the soundstage considerably.

The next step for me was to "tune" the speakers to the room, and for this job I selected the DBX 231 graphic EQ. Having fairly good ears, my EQ settings are almost an inverse mirror image of the Frequency Response graph given in the HPM-100 user's manual. I notched out the "west coast" midrange between 2khz and 3khz, pulled the top off a bit, and boosted at 50hz and below mostly because I like deep bass.

All said and done, I did an A/B comparison to my Polk RT-800i's. The HPMs have a depth in the bass dept that the Polks simply cannot match, and with that bullshit "west coast" midrange removed, the HPMs sound very, very good. Perhaps not $10,000.00 audiophile good, but still..very good.
Click to expand...

I've recently acquired the DBX 231 as well. I found that a 10 band eq just didn't give me the tweakability I needed. The DBX 231 is just what I needed to get the sound I wanted in my room.
 
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