SWL Posted March 6, 2010 Share Posted March 6, 2010 I think I'm going to do the titanium tweeter diaphrams in my KLF-30's. How about the mid-range replacement? Is it really neccessary in these speakers that are 10 years old? Just as influential as the tweeter replacement? Anyone here that has done both? Thanks, -Scott Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SET12 Posted March 6, 2010 Share Posted March 6, 2010 I have, you can hear them as I'm ready for you guys to come up for a listen next weekend Saturday if you can. Please e-mail me. As to the midrange diaphragms, I don't know, I know of one person that preferred the stock midranges of his KLF20's which are the same for the KLF30's claiming that the hole size in the phase plug of the new diaphragms were the same size as his original KLF20 diaphragms but he said nothing about the coil formers which are very different from my stock Forte voice-coil formers the diaphragm materials appear to be different as well. The new midranges took about 5hrs before they started blooming with warmth and space. Otherwise I found them to have a somewhat narrower soundstage width initially and over time they eventually exceeded the stock units in every way. So after 40 some hrs they were really settled in and I find them far superior over the original stock Forte mids. The advantage of the new mids is that they have no bounce back, making them ultra smooth. One can especially hear their control with SET amps put into clipping as the new mids show even better recovery time from clipping, its as though the hang time during the clip is substantially shorter. Another area is the piano where they really show their stuff being substantially less harsh, allowing one to hear more of the piano's sound board sort of the meat and potatoes of piano key strokes. I couldn't do without them as they are truly a world class performer in my system. I have written substantially about them here for a few pages. http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=159340&page=25SET12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 6, 2010 Author Share Posted March 6, 2010 Dan, Great to hear from you. We intend on getting up to your place for a listen.....everyone has been busy the last couple of weeks. I'll send you an email tomorrow after talking to the other guys. I've heard plenty of good things about the titanium tweeter replacement but nothing about the midrange reguarding the KLF-30. I'm leaning towards just going for it and doing both......unless I'm told that it really isn't worth it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SET12 Posted March 7, 2010 Share Posted March 7, 2010 Scott, IMO the whole network can use improving as well as the mid and tweeters which you'll be able to hear for yourself. I have stock speakers for a comparison which is not a subtle difference. When the window opens up and the system is in Hyper-drive I doubt there will be any questions as to is it really worth it [] SET12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toolguym Posted March 7, 2010 Share Posted March 7, 2010 I plan on doing mine this morning.(Chorus II's).Is there a break in time? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badassbob Posted March 7, 2010 Share Posted March 7, 2010 I have the new mids and Ti tweets in my Fortes along with BEC XOs. The mids IMO were a more noticeable upgrade than the Ti tweets, but both are very worthwhile. SET12 is right, the mids do sound cramped on the first listen, but once youre 10 hours into them, youll fall in love. Ive noticed quite a bit of bounceback and cranking guitar solos and the likewith the stock mids, but now its non-existent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 8, 2010 Author Share Posted March 8, 2010 I plan on doing mine this morning.(Chorus II's).Is there a break in time?So, how does it sound?I talked to Bob Crites on the phone today and I should be receiving the tweeter and midrange replacements for all four KLF-30's by the end of the week. Can't wait! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willland Posted March 8, 2010 Share Posted March 8, 2010 I plan on doing mine this morning.(Chorus II's).Is there a break in time? Changed my diaphrams out this morning in my Forte's. There is a discernable difference in sound. I changed one and then did an A-B comparison moving the balance knob in my Denon preamp back and forth. Crisper and clearer without a doubt. Well worth the price. Very little $$$ for the gains in performance. If there is a break in period, I look forward to them sounding even better. Bill Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 8, 2010 Author Share Posted March 8, 2010 Very little $$$ for the gains in performanceMusic to my ears. [] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormin Posted March 9, 2010 Share Posted March 9, 2010 Very little $$$ for the gains in performance Music to my ears. It seems to me like alot of the folks who are noticing a dramatic change in the mids are with the exponential horns and folks with tractrix aren't noticing the change. It also appears that everyone is experiencing a dramatic change with the titanium tweeter. This is all from the reviews I've read here and over at Audiokarma. I guess time will tell once you get them installed. Make sure to do one speaker at a time to help notice the change. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toolguym Posted March 9, 2010 Share Posted March 9, 2010 I did replace the diaphrams,quick easy job.They sound smoother to me.I have not done any real wattage through them yet though I can hardly wait!If all goes as planned I would like to do the crossovers as well,then perhaps the mid diaphrams. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 9, 2010 Author Share Posted March 9, 2010 Very little $$$ for the gains in performance Music to my ears. It seems to me like alot of the folks who are noticing a dramatic change in the mids are with the exponential horns and folks with tractrix aren't noticing the change. It also appears that everyone is experiencing a dramatic change with the titanium tweeter. This is all from the reviews I've read here and over at Audiokarma. I guess time will tell once you get them installed. Make sure to do one speaker at a time to help notice the change. Yeah, it seems this is the case. I was only gonna do the tweeters but thought instead of buying another amp.....I'll take a chance on the mids as well.At a recent get together in our area, forum member Southern was telling me that the upgrade in his Fortes was pretty dramatic. The nasty, forward midrange was eliminated after the new mid-diaphram was installed. Very cool.....especially for the price. [Y] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SET12 Posted March 10, 2010 Share Posted March 10, 2010 That it is, Dramatic, The mids took about 5-10hrs to bloom, initially they sound somewhat compressed and a smaller sound stage, then things start happening like a larger increase in stage size and more warmth with eventually far exceeding the originals performance.These things literally open up like a flower. The main thing heard initially that you can notice is the smoothness from the lack of high frequency bounce back of the originals But couple these new mids and Titanium diaphragms to Bobs Larger Autotransformers (better bandwidth) and large Air Core Inductors and caps, resistors that are substantially better sounding subjectively and you'd have something competitive with a product 5-10 times its cost IMO. All these things working together leave me at a lost for words to describe the sheer musicalness of them. SWL and a friend "Jim" that owns Cornwalls will be be here in my home Friday guess we will have to see what they have to say. The Jim is interested in doing what I did with my Fortes to his Cornwall's. He's thinking of dropping a $1000 into his Cornwalls or more. What will be interesting is I have pair of stock Fortes to do a comparison with. So one might think it would be better to just upgrade within the Klipsch line instead of pouring funds into networks as I have. But there is one thing! Your still left with networks that don't approach the subjective quality of this kind of upgrade IMO. I want to say that the stock Fortes are pleasant sounding speaker but they have limitations. The comparison won't be subtle by any means. One immediate that will be noticed is how compressed sounding the stock units are and just how much smaller they sound.These Fortes are just effortless and very explosive dynamically from top to bottom they defy their physical size by producing a sound-stage size that rival IMO any other Klipsch Heritage model and more over, so smooth most people tell me they wouldn't even know they were listening to Horns had they not seen the Klipsch Logo's on the Fortes. These are tall words of course but the proof is in the listening. I welcome anyone to give them a listen. SET12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormin Posted March 10, 2010 Share Posted March 10, 2010 I still don't feel SWL will get the full picture. Fortes are exponential horns and KLF's are tractrix. Completely different animal. I feel a much improved horn but that is my opinion. The only folks I see jumping through hoops about the mid change are the folks with the exponential horns. It does appear everyone is gaga over the titanium tweeters though. As far as updating and upgrading caps I think every speaker would benefit to a degree. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 10, 2010 Author Share Posted March 10, 2010 I expect them to arrive tomorrow. Hopefully I'll have time to hook them up. Otherwise, it'll have to wait until Saturday because Friday I'm taking a two-hour drive up north to hear SET12's rig. [Y] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 10, 2010 Author Share Posted March 10, 2010 It does appear everyone is gaga over the titanium tweeters though.Have you had a chance to upgrade your Chorus ll's in any way? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 10, 2010 Author Share Posted March 10, 2010 The only folks I see jumping through hoops about the mid change are the folks with the exponential horns. Could it be that these horns in the Fortes are 10 years older than the KLF's? Twenty year old speakers in "need" of new diaphrams due to age hence the more noticable improvement? Or is it just a fact that tractrix are better than exponential? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormin Posted March 10, 2010 Share Posted March 10, 2010 The only folks I see jumping through hoops about the mid change are the folks with the exponential horns. Or is it just a fact that tractrix are better than exponential? Thats exactly how I see it. I'm not saying the exponential horn isn't a descent horn, I just feel Klipsch hit a home run with the tractrix. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SET12 Posted March 10, 2010 Share Posted March 10, 2010 I still don't feel SWL will get the full picture. Fortes are exponential horns and KLF's are tractrix. Completely different animal. I feel a much improved horn but that is my opinion. The only folks I see jumping through hoops about the mid change are the folks with the exponential horns. It does appear everyone is gaga over the titanium tweeters though. As far as updating and upgrading caps I think every speaker would benefit to a degree. Its more than that stormin, the stock networks are just so compressed. I think the combination of large core Inductors, the larger Autotransformers, superior caps and resistors make the mids and tweeters just make these Forte's leap out and the bass is unquestionably superior as well. As I said this nothing subtle. Your always welcome for a listen. SET12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWL Posted March 10, 2010 Author Share Posted March 10, 2010 Your always welcome for a listen.Yeah Stormin......Take off from work on Friday, meet us at the WI-IL border and you can ride with us up to SET12's pad! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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