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Epic CF4 Needs overhaul


wvu80

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Also you can get watco in oak or medium walnut or dark walnut and not have to stain per se but still get nice color with an application of oil. I did my corns with a coat of oak watco followed by dark walnut to get the brown I wanted. I would bet the oak would work fine for you.

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good points by ryan... agree you dont need the conditioner,its usually for soft woods like pine etc. the golden oak stain will make them look great, but be carefull on the 2 coats, its only required if you want it darker, the longer you let each coat sit the more it absorbs & darker the wood gets. i would do one light-med coat & let it sit for a few minutes them wipe off. reapply a 2nd coat if you want it darker. apply with an old cotton rag, shirt or towel & wipe off with a clean spot of the rag. if you were just doing the tops the spray is pretty good in that it self levels & avoids brush marks, if you are good at spraying paint then you could do the entire speaker, but a foam brush is nice too & eliminates most of the streak marks. work in a dust & debris free room & keep a wet edge & follow the directions on the can of stain & poly. & dont shake them, always stir or you will get air bubbles. also dont use the oil if you are using the stain & poly, surface needs to be as clean & oil free as possible to get good penetration of the stain & good adhesion of the poly. & i feel that since these were laquered originally you want to stay with a stain/poly finsih, the oil wont penetrate if there is residual laquer in the grain. the poly is the sealer/protector & will keep the finish as nice as it can be, will even protect from future water stains.

as with auto painting... 90% of the finished product is in the prep, make sure you sand them evenly & get the stains out as much as you can but be carefull & try to think of how far into the veneer you are sanding... lots of sawdust means you have removed a lot of the veneer. but if you focus on one area like the stain, you will start to feel a valley in that area, so try to keep it even or "feather" out the edges of an area you sanded more of. same with the gouge, only sand enough to allow for a flush smooth area with the rest of the wood.

i prefer the satin finish for oak & other woods, semi can look too glossy & be uneven if not mixed up well or as you work it can settle in the can & create uneven results, the satin is the best all around sheen & is very close to the original klipsch finish.

maybe practice on the bottoms if you arent comfortable to attack the tops or sides right away? practice makes perfect!

Edited by klipschfancf4
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What a ton of good advice, thanks!

Ryan: I think I might have done the Watco if my finish wasn't so bad.

+++

One question; do I sand the entire speaker, or just where the stains are? My instincts say lightly sand the bad spots and try to feather into the rest of the finish.

Here's the plan, probably for tomorrow:

  • Minwax Golden Oak stain it is, one coat. I don't want the finish darker, but as close to factory as possible.
  • Just the opposite of a James Bond 007 martini, the stain will be stirred, not shaken
  • Light sand with 220
  • Apply stain with rag, wait 2-3 minutes, wipe excess with a clean dry rag
  • Practice on bottoms first. (I really like that idea)
  • After it dries, no more sanding

Wait 24 hours, although I think 4-6 hours is the minium for the stain to dry before applying a second coat. I'm not in any hurry.

Minwax (or whatever brand) Satin poly, apply with foam brush.

Does that sound like a plan? Any other suggestions or comments?

This is great stuff. Thanks.

+++

I did get one speaker hooked up. It sounds pretty good, but now I know what "beaming" is coming from that horn! That speaker really has a distinctive, characteristic sound. I ran into a small, fixable problem with the other speaker, but I'll address that later.

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I would probably sand the entire speaker. You could probably sand just the stained area and then slightly larger for feathering, but I would worry about uneven finish on a sanded surface and one that still has the old finish and whatever might be on the surface. If you are trying the bottom first, try sanding part and leaving the other alone. If you don't like what you get you can sand lightly again and even it up.

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if you use minwax stain i would stay with minwax poly, they are pretty cheap at home stores.

yes you can try doing half & half on the bottom just to see how close it matches, but unless its to your liking i would lightly sand the entire speakers to get a fresh surface to lightly restain & then a coat of poly. but i have had good luck doing just the top on a speaker, the golden oak stain was very close match to the rest of the cabinet. if the sides are in good shape, aside form the gouge, maybe just clean em up real good & see how they look. no need to do them if they are good & you can get the tops to match.

also, sometimes the stain will raise the grain just a bit, so after its dries good you may want to do a very light sanding to smooth it out, as long as it doesnt change the color too much. once you test the bottoms you will see its really pretty simple to do staining.

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OK, which one of you guys forgot to tell me this was going to be a lot of work! :lol:

My attitude was pretty much "OK, I'll start at noon and sand, stain and apply the poly. Then by about 1:00 I'll have the rest of the day to rest." I've been wrestling with sanding just the TOP of ONE speaker for about two hours! That's because I am being very deliberate, and I am trying to cleanly sand out a gouge with 220 sandpaper and I am trying hard not to take too much off. (Dave pauses for hysterical laughter)

On the positive side, I am figuring out how to sand, and how to get cramps out of my forearms. I have taken out some deep scratches on the worst top which I think might look pretty decent when I'm done. I'm hoping now to get done by the end of the week... :wacko:

In my own defense, I did practice first by sanding and staining on one of my wife's end tables which had a couple of nicks on top.

She'll never notice. B)

Edited by wvu80
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It's definitely a labor of love. You might consider some soft sanding blocks. I like them a lot because you've got something to grip instead of just pressing down with paper. You will probably need some sort of filler for the deeper gouges. If the substrate is mdf it will definitely not stain the same as the oak. Just get the stainable kind.

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post-58280-0-89900000-1396826079_thumb.j

The original gouge looked horrible and I just figured it was not going to go away. It is gouged all the way to the substrate, but only in a couple of places, so the veneer grain will not be contiguous. What I didn't know is that all the sanding I did close to the bad part really helped to minimize the size of the scratch. Those water marks (top) are now totally gone. :)

I've only worked on the worst spot of the worst speaker, knowing I couldn't make it any worse. The other finishing will be MUCH easier. For reference, the 5" wide sanding block is above the gouge spot. The other light spots is where I sanded to take out smaller scratches. My next step will be using the recommended 220 sandpaper all over, then I can stain. (this picture is upside down and backwards to the other pic, so the drivers on are the left of the pic, and the speaker top, is bottom of the pic.)

post-58280-0-33260000-1396837041_thumb.j

I'm not going to try filling in the spots with wood putty, because I think simply staining the cab might hide much of what is very visible right now. I'll have to try it and see.

+++

Ryan, I did pick up a rubber sanding block. That cheap rubber made in China was still curing, and stinks.

+++

I've got a binding post stud on missing, so there is nothing for the knurled knob to screw in to. I was told both speakers worked, but there is NO WAY this speaker worked. The outside knob was shoved in the hole and it didn't attach to anything, but I didn't know that until I looked at closely and saw that it was missing.

Does anybody have a recommendation for a replacement? The stock parts have a nice gold knurled knob and have a nice heft to them, although they are probably smaller than some others I've seen.

No $75 binding posts, please. :)

Edited by wvu80
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Can't wait to see pics of the refurb.

Parts express is popular for replacement parts.

I like PE as well. I buy my DIY speaker stuff from there. They have good posts, but they don't have a good match for what I have.

Believe it or not, Ebay has something similiar to the stock posts, for about $6.

$_12.JPG

I don't mind paying a little more, but I really want one replacement that will match, I don't want to replace all the stock parts. The binding posts I have have a nice pitina to them, so I doubt I'll be able to exactly match them. I think I'll get something for now, then upgrade in the future if I want.

+++

Edited: Here are the binding posts, including my amazing re-engineering of Klipsh's original equipment:

post-58280-0-23460000-1396836683_thumb.j

Edited by wvu80
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An error occurred

You have reached your quota of positive votes for the day

LOL! I "+1'd" you right back, buddy! In your honor:

post-58280-0-40020000-1396836482_thumb.j

Edited: Be sure to go back upstream and check the pic I added of my binding post problem.

Edited by wvu80
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lookin good! i would have skipped the filler for the gouge too if it sanded out to look better, restaining it will improve it alot & not be so obvious.

i should have mentioned the sanding block too if you decided to do the whole speaker, thats a lot of area to sand. & im sure you know but be sure to sand with the grain. cross sanding will create scratches that will show up in the stain & look like crap.

forearm cramps? try sanding an entire 70's firebird (or any car) for repainting prep. then color-sanding (wet-sanding) after the paint for buffing. then swirl remover & waxing the car. that causes complete body aches & numb forearms & hands. then do that all week as your job! its not my job but i feel for teh guys that do that. ive repainted 2 firebirds & did most the prep work.

p/e posts should be fine, do one speaker & keep the other original. get some good wire for the jumpers, untill you can get another amp to bi-amp them! ;)

Edited by klipschfancf4
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p/e posts should be fine, do one speaker & keep the other original. get some good wire for the jumpers, untill you can get another amp to bi-amp them! ;)

I'm pretty anxious to get some listening, but when I saw how badly this beauty was treated, I really wanted to restore her as best I could to her full glory!

+++

And what do you suggest for jumpers? I pieced some old speaker wire together just to get the one speaker to play.

+++

How did you have your CF4's set up in terms of equipment and power? And how were the CF4's for non-critical listening, ie, TV, low power or low volume listening? I managed to get one speaker hooked up with a 20 year-old cheap 100 wpc receiver, and the louder it got, the better the speaker sounded. The sound was pretty subdued until the power got turned up.

Edited by wvu80
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for jumpers, since they are so short, any 16ga OFC wire would be fine & easy to connect. you dont need big fat wire for that.

my cf-4's went through many gear changes while i had them. at first they were just hooked to an onkyo 105wpc receiver & used for 2ch music & some occasional 5ch movie. then as i got other speakers to dedicate to home theater use, they were moved to 2ch only duty hooked to adcom seperates. the adcom at 200wpc made them really come alive. like you said the more power (clean) they get the better they sound. they are rated at 1200 peak & a very high continuous power. due to the high efficiency they sounded good down lower too on both my onkyo & adcom gear. i would increase the bass a bit at lower levels or use "loudness."

i felt they were a little large for casual TV listening, ive never been one to use a stereo for "normal TV viewing like news or sitcoms etc... & never got the whole "crank up a football game thing" why would anyone want to listen to a cheering crowd & announcers calling plays through their stereo?!? the tv speakers have alwys been fine for me on that kind of stuff.

your 100wpc receiver should be fine for the time being, but after you get them refinished they really do deserve some "better" gear, look into a better brand receiver if you want both music & movies ability, or get some nicer used seperates if new isnt in the budget. you can fine good deals on used amps & preamps on ebay CL or even on this forum.

Edited by klipschfancf4
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I do more music listening than my wife does, as she does 99% TV and she likes it soft. :)

 

I have a year-old Onk 717 AVR with about 110 wpc and all the newer codecs and bells and whistles ready for the CL4's. I knew the 110 wpc would not be enough for more demanding mains, so I got an AVR with pre-outs if/when I needed an upgrade in power.

 

I prefer the one-stop shops of the modern AVR's even with their shortcomings, even though BITD I had pre-amp, EQ's, and Magnapan MG1's for my 2-channel listening (known back then as "listening" :rolleyes: ). I upgraded to 5.1 in the last year so all my stuff is up-to-date, and I'm trying to resist upgrade-itis! I would say with the purchase of the CF4's, I've already failed at that.

 

But I got a "deal" on them. What real man could resist that? :P

+++

 

The general sanding with 220 is going very well since I don't have to take care of major scrapes now. In fact, just the light sanding cleaned up the appearance a lot.

 

The staining did NOT go well on that heavily damaged panel, as the stain was aborbed unevenly. I am thinking I can clean that up now with some light sanding to even out the appearance of the grain. The grain looks real nice, if I can get my act together with the staining.

 

This is the gouged speaker, with heavy sanding in the damaged area, no light sanding anywhere else. Then stain was put on in the heavily sanded areas only, hoping to get the finish to blend before light sanding. The stain did not aborb into the sanded area, and the little feathering of stain around it turned those areas very dark.

 

post-58280-0-82300000-1396896073_thumb.j

post-58280-0-27980000-1396896237_thumb.j

 

Here is the other speaker, light sanded only, no stain yet. The light sanding really brought that grain out, and the sanding was easy, if that makes any sense.

 

post-58280-0-00300000-1396896332_thumb.j

Edited by wvu80
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yeah that didnt blend too well. sorry i should have clarified, you cant just sand one or 2 spots & stain just them, after sanding the stains & scratches etc, you need to sand the entire surface to get it to look as light as the spots you concentrated on. its almost impossible to match a spot in the middle of the surface. maybe if you did the entire top it could match an untouched side, but not just a spot in the middle. if the stainisnt penetrating it needs to sit longer, the suggested 2-5 minutes was just a starting point so it didnt get too dark the first time around. also since they are laquered, the stain wont absord evenly if you have random spots heavily sanded. are we sure they are laquered? is there an "O" in the oak letters on the tag?

my apologies again for not completely explaining every aspect of this, i assumed some of it was self explanitory. try to resand the entre surface to match the spots you sanded, then do another coat of stain & let it sit for 10-15 minutes, apply a little heavier on the heavy sanded spots & even let sit a little longer in those areas if needed.

do you have an electric sander? that might make sanding the large areas a little easier, you can get one from harbor freight for very cheap, $15-$20.

Edited by klipschfancf4
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(from Mr. CR4:)

 

yeah that didnt blend too well. sorry i should have clarified,

 

You are still good with your advice, the blending is yet to come with more sanding, but I knew that. I just didn't expect the extreme high and low spots, and that's what I took the pics of. After sanding the rest of the speaker, it will be fine. This is my first ever re-finish project, and I am still in learning mode.

 

you cant just sand one or 2 spots & stain just them, after sanding the stains & scratches etc, you need to sand the entire surface to get it to look as light as the spots you concentrated on. its almost impossible to match a spot in the middle of the surface. maybe if you did the entire top it could match an untouched side, but not just a spot in the middle.

 

We are still good here. I know the speaker looks awful in those pics, but I am probably posting in between mid-steps. I fully expected to sand the entire speaker, and I expect it to clean up.

 

if the stain isnt penetrating it needs to sit longer, the suggested 2-5 minutes was just a starting point so it didnt get too dark the first time around.

 

The stain dried almost instantly in the sanded portions, there was no excess stain to wipe up, though I tried. Remember I did NOT sand the entire speaker at this point. It's possible I didn't use enough stain, but I was deliberately going "light" using a rag, to see what would happen.

 

also since they are laquered, the stain wont absorb evenly if you have random spots heavily sanded. are we sure they are laquered? is there an "O" in the oak letters on the tag?

 

There was no "O" so these are certainly lacquered. What I didn't explain very well because I didn't know what I was looking at, is that the wood surface is 18 years old and has had not been taken care of, so it is in lots worse shape than I initially described. That's why the light and dark spots, the surface has not yet been prepared properly, yet.

 

my apologies again for not completely explaining every aspect of this, i assumed some of it was self explanitory. try to resand the entre surface to match the spots you sanded, then do another coat of stain & let it sit for 10-15 minutes, apply a little heavier on the heavy sanded spots & even let sit a little longer in those areas if needed.

 

I'm on it! :) I initially decided NOT to use a second coat, but now I see I may have to so the surface can be evened out. I don't mind doing it either way, I just thought one coat would be the best way because there is already a coating on there. I now have the opinion that the entire old surface needs to be removed, and I will stain and then re-stain as needed.

 

One reason I am figuring things out is because I moved from the gouged speaker, which had some dry rot and fading from sun, to working on the other speaker which is cleaning up MUCH easier, because it is in so much better shape. In the end, I will use the same refinish technique (two coats of stain, etc) on both speakers.

 

do you have an electric sander? that might make sanding the large areas a little easier, you can get one from harbor freight for very cheap, $15-$20.

 

No, I don't have a belt sander, but I have an oribital sander. I'm guessing the orbital is not the right tool for this job, as I bought it to buff out the finish on the car. Looking back on how much material I had to sand off the speakers, the belt sander might have been a better idea, but then again, putting a power tool in the hands of a total novice can screw things up MUCH faster than working by hand. I could have ruined those speakers, so working by hand is tedious, but probably a better method for me right now.

 

Edit:  A 5" orbital sander is the tool to get.

 

The one thing I am now doing different is I'm using 120 grit to remove the old finish, then doing a final finish with 220, the 220 being the recommendation on the Minwax can. The 220 just didn't take the old finish off very well.

 

Now that I have done some sanding, I can feel how smooth the finish is compared with how I started. I thought maybe the textured wood was characteristic of the Klipsch veneer. I can tell now that the wood was just in bad shape, and it is going to clean up very nicely. That Golden Oak stain is a VERY close match for the stock finish, and looks really nice, judging from the bottom of the one speaker I experimented on, and is now finished except for poly.

 

I don't mind taking longer than expected, and I don't mind the extra elbow grease. It will give those speakers character. :)

+++

This should make you feel better, ;)

 

BEFORE whole speaker sanding:

post-58280-0-73420000-1396906015_thumb.j

 

And, AFTER some preliminary whole speaker sanding (more with some more sanding to do). That gouge spot is MUCH less conspicuous, and it actually looks better in person than in these pics. :)

post-58280-0-48980000-1396906041_thumb.j

Edited by wvu80
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ok, glad its working out better for you. i also neglected to consider how the finsh could have been treated over the years, it probably has lots of cheap "polish" on it like pledge etc. that can act as an oil or wax & prevent the stain from penetrating somewhat. ideally i should have said to get a good cleaner & wipe them down real good before starting.

also i didntmean a belt sander, that would probably eat through the veneer in seconds! i meant one of the ones shaped liek a belt sander, rectangular pad, but is more of a random motion action, kind of like a DA sander. if you can use the DA sander right, it would be fine for this job.

going to 120 grit paper, just use light pressure, that is pretty coarse stuff, would hate to have you break through the veneer.

& the gouge does look much better.

at any rate, sounds like you are getting more comfortable with the process, i will stop bombarding you with suggestions, im sure you will get them to a point you are happy with.

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