So I've had four of these since I worked for Radio Shack way back in the early '00's. One pair of actual Optimus STS-1230's (40-4089), and a pair of the exact same ones just RCA branded (40-5017). The woofers are still in great shape, surrounds aren't brittle or rotted (they appear to be made of impregnated fabric instead of foam), presumably the tweeters are fine as well. However, the "ferro-fluid cooled" midranges seem to have leaked or something as they are either seized or move very slowly, as if there were syrup in the magnet/voice coil. I've tried looking up basic a replacement for them that won't cost an arm and a leg, but had little luck trying to match them exactly. The speakers themselves say "Midrange 1023 6Ω Korea 9652Q" for the Optimus, and "Midrange 1025 6Ω Malaysia 0406" for the RCA. I've watched a few of the long list of videos this guy put together for redoing his and I'm potentially considering going a similar route, but he ended up going with a lot more expensive drivers along with some hard to get a hold of and very expensive crossovers. I'm not exactly flush with cash, I just want working speakers that sound decent for rock, metal, and some rap/hip-hop type stuff. I'm not listening to orchestral arrangements and the like. For now I'd like to just replace the sealed midranges with something that would sound about right, the Goldwood GM-85/8's he originally went with are fairly inexpensive, but I'm thoroughly unfamiliar with whether or not they'd match well at all with the existing woofer/tweeter, or if that would even matter for my use case.
Mainly I'd like some sort of jumping off point for a simple fix for now that will be appropriate for what these were made with, and down the road maybe I'll go the route he did or maybe I'll find that I'm better off buying some newer factory ones that would sound way better. Thanks in advance.
Mainly I'd like some sort of jumping off point for a simple fix for now that will be appropriate for what these were made with, and down the road maybe I'll go the route he did or maybe I'll find that I'm better off buying some newer factory ones that would sound way better. Thanks in advance.