Mark51
-
Posts
52 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Forums
Events
Gallery
Posts posted by Mark51
-
-
I'm the OP of this sometimes ridiculous thread so I'm here to report on my results.
I re-capped both sets of my Klipsch speakers - Forte and KG4 and am very pleased with the results. I did not spend a lot of money - a total of about $30. I purchased name brand but inexpensive caps from Digikey - Illinois, Panasonic and so forth. So replacing old caps with new manufacture caps, even inexpensive ones, is worthwhile. That's what I learned.
-
3
-
1
-
-
I did the recap job and the Creek sounds much better - better highs, transparency and so forth. It was worth $20 but a real PITA to desolder all those caps. I even put one in backwards which blew a fuse but caused no other damage.
One thing I learned is that in the instructions Creek says the 4140 is designed to work only with 8 ohm speakers. It did not do well with my Fortes which are 4 ohms according to the terminal cup. I also had to turn up the volume more than I would expect to get some level. Also, when pushing the "Disc" input button, which is for a turntable, it would motorboat while hooked up to the Fortes.
However, hooked up to my pair of Klipsch KG4's, which are 6 ohms according to the terminal cup, no such problems and plenty of gain. If anyone cares to pontificate on why the amp motorboats hooked up to 4 ohm speakers when the phono premap is on I'd like to hear it. I would guess that with all that gain the amp becomes unstable when hooked up to a 4 ohm load. Mind you I don't have a turntable so nothing was plugged into the phono inputs.
Does it now sound as good as my cheap Chinese EL84 SE amp? I''d say no, Ski Bum is right, but I would say its listenable now.
-
On 10/15/2018 at 4:49 PM, K5SS said:
That little tube amp is cool, congrats!
I might have to sell my Sansui 5000a, and pick one of these amps up.
If you do I'd like to hear what you think of it.
-
For $20 in parts I can replace every electrolytic in the Creek so I'm going to do it. Shouldn't take more than a couple of hours and I'll report back on whether it comes back to life. Checked all the voltages and they seem to be right on.
-
1
-
-
14 hours ago, Schu said:
I've tried up graded power cords... they do change the sound, just not always for the better.
All the AC power filters I've tried made stuff sound worse. Plug your amp right into the wall and try reversing the polarity of the plug. One way will sound better than the other.
-
I have a Creek 4140 integrated SS amp that I hooked up for the first time to my Fortes. Compared to my cheap Tubecube tube amp it sounds dull and lifeless. Is that characteristic of this Creek amp or if I replaced the coupling caps would that wake it up? That amp must be 20 or so years old. I put this question in the Tech forum but got no response so I thought I'd try here.
-
I have a creek 4140 integrated amp that I hooked up for the first time to my Fortes. Compared to my tube amp it sounds dull and lifeless. Is that characteristic of this amp or if I replaced the coupling caps would that wake it up? That amp must be 20 or so years old.
-
Creek CAS 4140 amp with Creek CAS 3050 FM tuner. Both in very good condition. No issues. Amp does not hum. The FM tuner is known for excellent audio. The amp has 5 pin DIN jacks for inputs. (It was a British thing). I will include a 5 pin DIN to RCA adapter cable and a 5 pin DIN to 5 pin DIN cable. I will pay for shipping. I ship to only the 48 contiguous United States. Both units will be well wrapped in bubble wrap. Best offer takes the combo. I take Paypal. I've done a lot of buying and selling on eBay as congsec51. 100% rating. Trying to avoid eBay now because of high fees.
-
erik2a3 my experience mirrors yours. I have been an audiophile and electronics dabbler both professionally and as a hobby for about 40 years. I have built several tube amps from scratch and modded other gear by trying different capacitors. I've learned not to obsess over capacitors and other tweeks. Its just too time consuming and can get expensive. I'm retired now and don't have the money and energy for it anymore. I don't have the money for expensive interconnects and speaker wire either. I've found that solid core 18 AWG doorbell wire for interconnects and solid core 14 AWG wire for speakers works good enough. I can hear a clear difference between stranded wire and solid core and different AWG sizes. I also made a coax cable using 30 AWG enameled and found that it sounds better than the cheap Amazon coax cable I had for connecting my DVD player to the DAC. Thinner wire seems to sound he best for that application. I'm using a battery powered $35 Google Chromecast Audio for Tidal and Pandora and it sounds great. You can spend a lot of money if you want to but don't have to, to have great sound, if you have some idea of what you are doing. And its a lot of fun still.
-
I opened up the Forte one's I've had for a couple months to replace the caps the the crossover and there is very little damping material in the cabs. Only some foam rubber at the bottom. Is there any advantage to adding some additional damping?
-
I replaced the caps in the Forte's and it turned out to be worthwhile. Fortes are now clearer with more focus. I did not buy expensive caps. I spent a total of $10 for both speakers and ordered from Digikey. The films caps are by Illinois. They cost a couple dollars each. I'm sure more expensive caps would sound different. Photo shows examples of the film and electrolytic caps I removed. They don't appear to be anything exotic. For size comparison I included a couple of new manufacture NP electrolytic caps of about the same value of the cap removed.
-
TubeCube arrived today and my initial impression is that its a significant improvement over the NAD A/V receiver I've been using. And there is still plenty of volume and bass for the two Forte front speakers, even with movies. For music, vocals and horns now sound more balanced. With the NAD they tended to sound too loud. For $180 I don't think you can go wrong.
-
3
-
-
On 10/8/2018 at 12:44 AM, codewritinfool said:
Which 3.5W SET are you considering? Just curious.
I ordred a TubeCube from tubedepot. It has two EL84's in SE configuration. At $180 with free shipping I just have to try it.
-
4
-
-
On 10/7/2018 at 10:38 AM, Schu said:
I am wondering what sized room OP might be trying to get excited?
Not big. About 12 x 12.
-
23 hours ago, Schu said:
I am wondering what sized room OP might be trying to get excited?
Small about 10 x 10
-
I have a pair of Forte 1's driven with an NAD T-743 A/V receiver. The setup is used for home theater and also late night music listening when the wife has surrendered the room to me. I would love to hear these Fortes with a low power SET amp. I can configure the NAD so the two front speakers, the Fortes, are driven by a separate amp. The center channel would still be driven by the NAD. If a SET amp became that second amp, would that work for both home theater and music? I don't listen to loud music, only light jazz and classical. We don't listen to movies loud either but would the SET tend to poop out on movies? I have my eye on a 3.5 watt per channel SET and am tempted to give it a shot.
-
1
-
-
I thought wdecho gave the best common sense answer to my original question.
-
Well....at least my question got answered.
-
1 hour ago, Schu said:
leakage... it's not liquid.
I blew an electrolytic in a power supply once and believe me liquid came out. It made a big noise too.
-
I have two sets of old Klipsch speakers - KG4's and Forte 1. I know that electrolytic capacitors go bad with age but I have never heard that the other types go bad with age and should be replaced. Is there any real point in replacing non electrolytic type capacitors in a crossover, unless you want a higher quality, perhaps better sounding cap? What is your experience before I start this project? Its cheap to replace a few electrolytic capacitors. Not so much regarding the others.
Let's say the electrolytic is out of spec? Does replacing it really make a difference in the sound?
-
I just recently started wearing hearing aids. Now that I'm in my 60's my hearing drops like a rock after about 1 or 2K. Without aids, I have difficulty understanding conversation and it can even lead to early dementia from what I've read. (No need to make it worse than it already is)
I have been a life long audiophile, nothing too crazy, and am surprised at how different stereo music now sounds with the highs restored by the aids. Without them its like a wet blanket over my head. But now recorded music seems very bright through my Fortes unless the recording is ideal. It's something I have to get used to. I could take them off when listening to music but then it sounds dead and lifeless now without the aids. Also, once you have aids you are supposed to wear them all the time or your brain will not adjust to them.
The only reason I started wearing aids is because my son's father-in-law is a hearing aid specialist and he gave me an older pair of Phonak aids. They are probably 3 to 5 years old. The good thing is that any time I feel I need an adjustment he takes care of me. And now my son is getting licensed as a hearing aid specialist. Once he gets licensed I will get a more modern pair that can be be adjusted by a phone app according to circumstance. The technology is pretty amazing. One of the downsides is that I can now understand everything my wife says.
Anyway wanted to share that because I suspect there are Klipsch owners on this forum who also have hearing loss issues and I'd like to hear your experience.
-
13 hours ago, Chris A said:
I demastered all the Beatles albums that I own because they sounded pretty awful on the dialed-in Jubs. They sound much better now, in fact some of them sound pretty amazing considering what they were recorded with. Early Beatles albums generally sound worse than later albums.
Beatles albums in my FLAC library:
- 1962-1966 (disc 1); 1962-1966 (disc 2): DR Database ratings: 11, 12
- 1967-1970 (disc 1); 1967-1970 (disc 2): DR Database ratings 11, 11
- Past Masters - Volume One; DR Database rating 12
- Past Masters · Volume Two; DR Database rating 10
- Revolver [2009 Stereo Remaster]; DR Database rating 10
- Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band; DR Database rating 12
- White Album (disc 1); White Album (disc 2) DR Database ratings 12, 12
- Abbey Road: DR database rating 10
Generally, the higher the DR Database rating, the better they sound.
Chris
How do you demaster a recording?
-
12 minutes ago, Chris A said:
I demastered all the Beatles albums that I own because they sounded pretty awful on the dialed-in Jubs. They sound much better now, in fact some of them sound pretty amazing considering what they were recorded with. Early Beatles albums generally sound worse than later albums.
Beatles albums in my FLAC library:
- 1962-1966 (disc 1); 1962-1966 (disc 2): DR Database ratings: 11, 12
- 1967-1970 (disc 1); 1967-1970 (disc 2): DR Database ratings 11, 11
- Past Masters - Volume One; DR Database rating 12
- Past Masters · Volume Two; DR Database rating 10
- Revolver [2009 Stereo Remaster]; DR Database rating 10
- Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band; DR Database rating 12
- White Album (disc 1); White Album (disc 2) DR Database ratings 12, 12
- Abbey Road: DR database rating 10
Generally, the higher the DR Database rating, the better they sound.
Chris
Chris what do you mean by dailed in Jubs?
-
4 hours ago, garyrc said:
John Lennon did occasionally sound like his voice was coming through a telephone. Artist's prerogative.
Their first few albums sounded pretty midrange-ish.
What speakers did you have before Fortes? Did they have midrange horns? Are your current ones Forte I, II, or III?
There were plenty of records of the '60s that were well recorded. Some, like Sgt. Pepper, were fine on vinyl with a good phono cartridge (Ortofon moving coil!), but were bad on CD. I don't know what the new remastered one is like. Hopefully it is an SACD.
Klipsch speakers are very revealing. They reveal good and bad aspects of a recording. Really good recordings sound really good. This is most true of the fully horn loaded ones (Jubilee, Klipschorn, La Scala I and II, and Belle Klipsch), then Forte and Chorus a little less so.
I think it's likely that your Fortes are positioned correctly where you have them, but make sure there is at least an area rug on the floor at the point that the sound from the speaker will bounce off the floor and go to your ears. Other room treatments might help. Try manipulating the tone controls, if you have them.
The original Fortes got one of the best reviews in the history of Stereo Review, in 1986.
Been listening to Mission bookshelf speakers up till now. Never owned Klipsch. These are original Fortes.
-
1
-
Do non electrolytic crossover caps really need replacing?
in Technical/Restorations
Posted
Index Quantity Part Number Manufacturer Part Number Description Customer Reference Backorder Unit Price Extended Price
1 2 1572-1025-ND 105MWR250K CAP FILM 1UF 10% 250VDC AXIAL 0 1.07000 $2.14
2 4 1572-1072-ND 155MWR100K CAP FILM 1.5UF 10% 100VDC AXIAL 0 1.24000 $4.96
3 2 493-12731-1-ND UVP2A330MHD1TO CAP ALUM 33UF 20% 100V RADIAL 0 0.91000 $1.82
4 2 493-16147-ND UVP2A470MHD CAP ALUM 47UF 20% 100V RADIAL 0 0.95000 $1.90
Subtotal $10.82
Index Quantity Part Number Manufacturer Part Number Description Customer Reference Backorder Unit Price Extended Price
1 2 EF2825-ND ECQ-E2825KF CAP FILM 8.2UF 10% 250VDC RADIAL 0 2.02000 $4.04
2 2 EF2275-ND ECQ-E2275KF CAP FILM 2.7UF 10% 250VDC RADIAL 0 1.13000 $2.26
Subtotal $6.30
Note that the 47uf cap goes in the Forte and the 33uf goes into a KG4. The last two films in the list are for a KG4. All the other films are for Forte.
I got these from Digikey. Mouser might have a better selection but Digikey has less expensive shipping options.
Now that I look at it again I recapped four speakers for less than $20, not including shipping.