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Rare Holy Grail Frazier Model Elevens

That square ceramic magnet may scream "CTS," but that basket is identical to some of the earlier blue-frame Fraziers. There is a current eBay listing for some 12" Mark V woofers for comparison.

Not having any luck figuring out Frazier's EIA code, though.
 
You might find this of interest from the Klipsch forum:

Posted 04 March 2010 - 12:00 PM

Here we go again. See below as to the ONLY Frazier Loudspeakers that used the EV woofers. If you ever find EV's in any other enclosures they have been replaced. I have a pair of 47 year old Monte Carlo's, and a pair of 40 year old Mark IV's, and both pair, with the OEM woofers are PERFECT! Sorry, but I was in the factory EVERY day and know what went into our speakers. I'm done with all this crap. in the future, if you want to correspond with me about Frazier, please e-mail me @ MrCsBikes@aol.com and use Frazier in the subject line.
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I was Jack Frazier's sales manager from 1970 till Jack passed away in 1983, and the company was sold.
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bentpencil said:
You might find this of interest from the Klipsch forum:
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That's why I think these woofers were late production models, since the date on the cabinet says July 1983, they had to be the last of the batch. It is possible that they were Frazier replacements, but there was no sign that these backs were ever removed, all the screws had no damage, and nothing inside looked like it was messed with. But who knows.
 
I have never seen caps in series in a crossover. I would have to look up exactly what that means electrically. Are you sure nothing is connected at the point between the two caps?
 
RS Steve said:
Anyone understand what putting two 10uf caps in series would do on this circuit?
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Putting caps in series halves the value on both caps.

If you have (2) 10uf's in series, the value would (should) be 5uf. I doubt it would be for the mids. Kinda high @4k (6db). Most likely for the tweets.

Now the (4) 12uf's would total 48uf. For a 6db x-over, they should be about 400hz.

That sorta confirms the specs. If you're going to re-cap, use (4) 12's, the same way it's set up now. Lower ESR is probably what they were shooting for with the caps paralleled. As for the (2) 10's, a 5 or a 4.7 PP should do as a replacement.

If you have money to burn, use PP for the 12's also. Might be kinda pricey, but it's a one time thing. :yes:

PE has these: http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dmpc-12-12uf-250v-polypropylene-capacitor--027-430. Price break is 10. Might be worth it to have extra for matching , and should not cost that much more.

Also for the 5uf:

(2) http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dmpc-40-40uf-250v-polypropylene-capacitor--027-421

(2) http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-pmpc-10-10uf-250v-precision-audio-capacitor--027-210


DUDE, I'm SERIOUSLY envious of you right now. :thmbsp:

GREAT Score. Enjoy them. :banana: :banana:
 
[Edit: Oops, crosspost!]

Capacitors in series are calculated by adding the reciprocals of all of them, then taking the reciprocal of the result. 1/10 + 1/10 = 2/10, flip that over and get 10/2 or 5 uF. There would be no reason at all to do this when you could use a single cheaper cap instead of two more expensive ones.

It may have some effects on phasing or voltage drop which may even change with frequency, that stuff is not in my head so I can't say. But I have never seen it in a crossover, and I've looked at quite a few.
 
Thinking about what was said above about being late production run...is it possible they had a box full of 10's and no 5's so they put them in series? What about phasing and stuff like that? Seems like you would not cheap out on a $3,800 speaker anyway. It's a mystery to me.
 
^^^^

That's what I think. Using up stock so they didn't have to purchase more.

Phase shifting wouldn't be a concern. AC current, remember? No pos or neg.

I'm sure if they knew they were not closing down, it would have been different.

Still acceptable.
 
cablephil212 said:
Putting caps in series halves the value on both caps.

If you have (2) 10uf's in series, the value would (should) be 5uf. I doubt it would be for the mids. Kinda high @4k (6db). Most likely for the tweets.

Now the (4) 12uf's would total 48uf. For a 6db x-over, they should be about 400hz.

That sorta confirms the specs. If you're going to re-cap, use (4) 12's, the same way it's set up now. Lower ESR is probably what they were shooting for with the caps paralleled. As for the (2) 10's, a 5 or a 4.7 PP should do as a replacement.

If you have money to burn, use PP for the 12's also. Might be kinda pricey, but it's a one time thing. :yes:

PE has these: http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dmpc-12-12uf-250v-polypropylene-capacitor--027-430. Price break is 10. Might be worth it to have extra for matching , and should not cost that much more.

Also for the 5uf:

(2) http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dmpc-40-40uf-250v-polypropylene-capacitor--027-421

(2) http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-pmpc-10-10uf-250v-precision-audio-capacitor--027-210


DUDE, I'm SERIOUSLY envious of you right now. :thmbsp:

GREAT Score. Enjoy them. :banana: :banana:
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Thanks! great to confirm that, I might have the caps in Dayton 5% already here.
 
toxcrusadr said:
I have never seen caps in series in a crossover. I would have to look up exactly what that means electrically. Are you sure nothing is connected at the point between the two caps?
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Have a look.

I need to find someone else with 11's to see if they always used the two in series, could of been one of Jack's little secrets. :dunno:
 

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These monsters sure don't need much to get really loud, I had some blues playing for a good part of the evening. In my opinion the mids and highs are grainy sounding, and the bass muddy, very much like other speakers I have had that needed a recap of the crossovers. So that is on the schedule for them as soon as the caps arrive. These suckers are room filling as far as sound goes, lacking in imaging somewhat, but seeing how the layout is of the drivers that's probably to be expected. It is more of a concert type sound, just a wall of music coming at you and through you. Since they are so large I have them on dollies to enable me to move them and get to the backs, I believe the bass will improve once on the ground.

The only one I have opened up was the #170, I documented what caps were used, and vacuumed the spider webs, and dust out of them. I will open the #166 today to see if it was constructed by the same person and on the same date.

I have to admit, finding these rare Fraziers so close to home has been exciting, and it's always great to get the expert help from members of AK to assist in documenting what they are.

I have been in contact with John D. who used to work at Frazier, he says they almost always sold them with consecutive serial numbers, so these being 166 and 170 tells him that they were the last few left as the company was sold.

One of my priorities is to find other model 11 owners to see if the crossovers and drivers changed at the end of production. If other AKer's happen across more information please ad it to this thread. Since there is so little on the web about these, this thread can be a go to location for future model 11 finds. :thmbsp:
 
The only one I have opened up was the #170, I documented what caps were used, and vacuumed the spider webs, and dust out of them. I will open the #166 today to see if it was constructed by the same person and on the same date.
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I am suspicious of the black nylon cable ties and Arrow T-50 staples.

I'm inclined to believe they are not original, along with the current wiring scheme for those caps.

As for cost savings, the extra cable tie and staples cost as much as the proper cap would have at the factory level.
 
bowtie427ss said:
I am suspicious of the black nylon cable ties and Arrow T-50 staples.

I'm inclined to believe they are not original, along with the current wiring scheme for those caps.

As for cost savings, the extra cable tie and staples cost as much as the proper cap would have at the factory level.
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Everything looks original Frazier to me, I have other models to compare to, and that's consistent with how they did things. esp the way they soldered components.
 
toxcrusadr said:
Seems like you would not cheap out on a $3,800 speaker anyway. It's a mystery to me.
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Frazier had already cheaped out on the tweeters. Indeed, Frazier's schtick, like PWK's, was getting good sound from cheap components. I suspect that's why Frazierites and Klipschies stick together, circling the wagons against the high quality component Altecistas and JBLists. :-)

In any event the advertising sheet says the speaker uses series crossovers, from what I understand they work differently than the much more common parallel type. Maybe some study into the nature of series crossovers is in order.
 
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Tom Brennan said:
Frazier had already cheaped out on the tweeters. Indeed, Frazier's schtick, like PWK's, was getting good sound from cheap components. I suspect that's why Frazierites and Klipschies stick together, circling the wagons against the high quality component Altecistas and JBLists.

In any event the advertising sheet says the speaker uses series crossovers, from what I understand they work differently than the much more common parallel type. Maybe some study into the nature of series crossovers is in order.
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Thanks for chiming in Tom, I'm finding out that the two 10 uf caps in series was common for the model 11, I just have not found out if it was because no 5 uf was in stock or if it had a positive effect to the sound.
 
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