Pacopico
El Chupacabra
I picked up a pair of Wharfedale W70D MKII in near mint condition cosmetically, reportedly stored for 50+ years as the owners wife didn't approve of the aesthetics. The owner had the original boxes, Styrofoam edge guards and paperwork, and was selling as he was now moving into the kids home and the wife in a senior care home. Sad story but life is a one-way trip for us all...
I did bring a small FM receiver to check them and everything but the upper bass 8" (combined passive radiator and driver) didn't seem to contribute much, as well the pots were "stuck" in the mid position having not been used in many years. In the end I paid too much at $300 but they print more money every day and I have been dormant in this hobby for the past several years so why not...
Upon bringing them home and hooking them up to my main system they sounded legitimately terrible. My reference point is my pair of JBL 4425's in proper working condition. I understand I am comparing apples and oranges but the W70's should at least be listenable, they weren't.
Off to the shop I went to pull the back covers and inspect:
Immediately I found as others have that the interconnect wiring from the X-over to the drivers was too short to do anything inside so they were cut in the middle and new hookup wiring was installed to make these "serviceable"
Work completed:
-Mechanically exercise each driver to ensure there was no corrosion in the voice coil inhibiting operation, all drivers were a bit crunchy at first and after several cycles were smooth. I am sure that they could all use being disassembled and mechanically cleaned, but perfection is the enemy of good enough at times, I chose this route as a starting point, and it has worked in this instance.
-One woofer remained a bit crunchy so I un-soldered and rotated it 180 degrees, (had to add a bit of hookup wire) as the distribution network is separate from the x-over and there wasn't enough slack
-Rewired the interconnections from the x-over to the drivers utilizing the original color coding.
-Cleaned the pots with deoxit and verified resistance tracing was smooth.
-Replaced caps with Jantzen @ same capacitance rating, higher voltage rating.
-Installed 3-way binding posts so I can use banana clip connections
-Re-glued the grill cloth covering to the backing board where it had come a bit loose.
Once back in place I ran them again and they sounded better, quite a bit better, but the sound was again "off". I started playing with the settings on the control pots per the description on the speakers
In the end I couldn't find a sweet spot - too "brilliant" too "muddy" too "mid forward" but nothing "right".
Sidebar:
As a reference I have no tone controls in the system: Source(s)->Cary Audio SLP30 (modified to a +80hz output and a full range output)->main amps on +80hz for the speakers, sub on full range outputs with the parametric EQ adjusted for blending. Main amps are RCA MI-1488-J with some light mods to the feedback circuit, and recapped.
Sub amp (Dayton SA1000) gain was lowered in order to correspond to the lower efficiency of the Warfdale's from the JBL's, no other adjustments made. The amp is driving an old Velodyne VA1012 "lying on its back" with the 10" driver firing upwards, and the 12" driver firing across the room in relation to the main speakers...This was the subject of MANY prior hours of work to find the best orientation in this room.
My reference point here was that the JBL's always sounded reasonably good in this room, and these Warfdale's were not anywhere near good.
I let them run for a couple days in case the caps needed some run in time...no change.
One evening I was looking at the paperwork that came with the speakers and I noted it stated that the correct way to adjust the pots was to play pink noise at a moderate level, starting with the pots all the way down (highest attenuation) and begin increasing the level on the mid pot until the sound is "level", then continue with the treble pot in the same manner. I gave this method a shot and WOW - this really made a huge difference, these things actually sound good now, as I assumed they should sound.
So, in the end are they as accurate and clear at high volumes as the JBL's, decidedly not.
Do they sound nice, yes they do.
I have felt the JBL's could be a bit too dry and clinical at the top end when on some demanding tracks at higher volumes, but they remained clear and have a high dynamic range. YMMV of course as this is all being driven by my mid-fi gear.
In comparison the Warfdale's are more well rounded and warm in the middle, not as much treble extension or pinpoint position accuracy and definitely get muddy when driven hard.
Of note is that my amps are rated at 50WPC but really are only clean to 35WPC on the bench, so I can run to about 2'oclock on the volume control on the pre-amp which is pretty loud before things start to get muddy.
Overall for a vintage speaker they sound pretty good, and do well with the tubes on both the 4-ohm and 8-ohm output taps (I've kept them on the 8-ohm tap for a while now).
I'm posting this as I have found several threads on these but none that I felt captured the salient point - the adjustment procedure on the pots are make or break for how these things can sound.
Cheers!
I did bring a small FM receiver to check them and everything but the upper bass 8" (combined passive radiator and driver) didn't seem to contribute much, as well the pots were "stuck" in the mid position having not been used in many years. In the end I paid too much at $300 but they print more money every day and I have been dormant in this hobby for the past several years so why not...
Upon bringing them home and hooking them up to my main system they sounded legitimately terrible. My reference point is my pair of JBL 4425's in proper working condition. I understand I am comparing apples and oranges but the W70's should at least be listenable, they weren't.
Off to the shop I went to pull the back covers and inspect:
Immediately I found as others have that the interconnect wiring from the X-over to the drivers was too short to do anything inside so they were cut in the middle and new hookup wiring was installed to make these "serviceable"
Work completed:
-Mechanically exercise each driver to ensure there was no corrosion in the voice coil inhibiting operation, all drivers were a bit crunchy at first and after several cycles were smooth. I am sure that they could all use being disassembled and mechanically cleaned, but perfection is the enemy of good enough at times, I chose this route as a starting point, and it has worked in this instance.
-One woofer remained a bit crunchy so I un-soldered and rotated it 180 degrees, (had to add a bit of hookup wire) as the distribution network is separate from the x-over and there wasn't enough slack
-Rewired the interconnections from the x-over to the drivers utilizing the original color coding.
-Cleaned the pots with deoxit and verified resistance tracing was smooth.
-Replaced caps with Jantzen @ same capacitance rating, higher voltage rating.
-Installed 3-way binding posts so I can use banana clip connections
-Re-glued the grill cloth covering to the backing board where it had come a bit loose.
Once back in place I ran them again and they sounded better, quite a bit better, but the sound was again "off". I started playing with the settings on the control pots per the description on the speakers
In the end I couldn't find a sweet spot - too "brilliant" too "muddy" too "mid forward" but nothing "right".
Sidebar:
As a reference I have no tone controls in the system: Source(s)->Cary Audio SLP30 (modified to a +80hz output and a full range output)->main amps on +80hz for the speakers, sub on full range outputs with the parametric EQ adjusted for blending. Main amps are RCA MI-1488-J with some light mods to the feedback circuit, and recapped.
Sub amp (Dayton SA1000) gain was lowered in order to correspond to the lower efficiency of the Warfdale's from the JBL's, no other adjustments made. The amp is driving an old Velodyne VA1012 "lying on its back" with the 10" driver firing upwards, and the 12" driver firing across the room in relation to the main speakers...This was the subject of MANY prior hours of work to find the best orientation in this room.
My reference point here was that the JBL's always sounded reasonably good in this room, and these Warfdale's were not anywhere near good.
I let them run for a couple days in case the caps needed some run in time...no change.
One evening I was looking at the paperwork that came with the speakers and I noted it stated that the correct way to adjust the pots was to play pink noise at a moderate level, starting with the pots all the way down (highest attenuation) and begin increasing the level on the mid pot until the sound is "level", then continue with the treble pot in the same manner. I gave this method a shot and WOW - this really made a huge difference, these things actually sound good now, as I assumed they should sound.
So, in the end are they as accurate and clear at high volumes as the JBL's, decidedly not.
Do they sound nice, yes they do.
I have felt the JBL's could be a bit too dry and clinical at the top end when on some demanding tracks at higher volumes, but they remained clear and have a high dynamic range. YMMV of course as this is all being driven by my mid-fi gear.
In comparison the Warfdale's are more well rounded and warm in the middle, not as much treble extension or pinpoint position accuracy and definitely get muddy when driven hard.
Of note is that my amps are rated at 50WPC but really are only clean to 35WPC on the bench, so I can run to about 2'oclock on the volume control on the pre-amp which is pretty loud before things start to get muddy.
Overall for a vintage speaker they sound pretty good, and do well with the tubes on both the 4-ohm and 8-ohm output taps (I've kept them on the 8-ohm tap for a while now).
I'm posting this as I have found several threads on these but none that I felt captured the salient point - the adjustment procedure on the pots are make or break for how these things can sound.
Cheers!
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