KD-17 passive woofer in Chorus II’s?

[Dave A]

12 hours ago, jason str said:

Passives eliminate unwanted port noise but need to be positioned properly.

I have heard of port chuffing but to be honest I can't say I have ever heard it unless it was there and I did not know what I was hearing. My KPT 456's have four front ports and I can't say I have heard anything bad from them.

[001]

@jason str  thanks for the info, i dont doubt you have far more speaker building & tuning knowledge than me.  however, saying the SS recone kits are "bad" or people shouldn't use them is your opinion, especially if you've never seen or tried them.  klipsch had most of their drivers (& passives) made by other companies, theres a good chance SS uses the same company or materials for their cones, or very similar.  passives aren't really a critical part in that a very similar material/design wouldn't work as good as oem... afterall, the new rubber surrounds klipsch says are "ok" to use in forte & chorus 2's are different than the originals in the cone & surround materials, so how is that any different than the possibility SS materials are different?

 

the passive design in general may have its limits & the chorus 2 passive ideally should have been bigger, but for the intended purpose & output level they are fine for 99.9% of home use, these aren't pro speakers being constantly driven to their absolute peaks.  i have never heard of a passive failing due to over extension, as in physically ripping the surrounds off the cone or tearing the spider assembly etc, like DAVE A mentioned, damage is usually due to cats or rips/holes from other objects.

 

im sure the SS recones for passives or the actual drivers are perfectly fine to use in these speakers & have no audible difference or loss vs oem.  epsecially if there isnt a correct looking replacement available or a replacement at all, which was the case untill just recently when klipsch came out with the forte 3 passive.  

 

   

 

 

[jason str]

15 minutes ago, EpicKlipschFan said:

@jason str  thanks for the info, i dont doubt you have far more speaker building & tuning knowledge that me.  however, saying the SS recone kits are "bad" or people shouldn't use them is your opinion, especially if you've never seen or tried them.  klipsch had most of their drivers (& passives) made by other companies, theres a good chance SS uses the same company or materials for their cones, or very similar.  passives aren't really a critical part in that a very similar material/design wouldn't work as good as oem... afterall, the new rubber surrounds klipsch says are "ok" to use in forte & chorus 2's are different than the originals in the cone & surround materials, so how is that any different than the possibility SS materials are different?

 

the passive design in general may have its limits & the chorus 2 passive ideally should have been bigger, but for the intended purpose & output level they are fine for 99.9% of home use, these aren't pro speakers being constantly driven to their absolute peaks.  i have never heard of a passive failing due to over extension, as in physically ripping the surrounds off the cone or tearing the spider assembly etc, like DAVE A mentioned, damage is usually due to cats or rips/holes from other objects.

 

im sure the SS recones for passives or the actual drivers are perfectly fine to use in these speakers & have no audible difference or loss vs oem.  epsecially if there isnt a correct looking replacement available or a replacement at all, which was the case untill just recently when klipsch came out with the forte 3 passive.  

 

   

 

 

 

I have personally ripped out a passive on a set of Chorus II in home usage, so have others on the forum in the past.

 

I have had bad experiences with aftermarket recone products not living up to the originals so i no longer consider wasting any of my time with them but you are welcome to use whatever you choose in your personal property, don't let me dissuade you.

[jason str]

8 hours ago, moray james said:

it matters not if the speaker has a passive radiator or a reflex vent(s) both are variants of the exact same method of damping the loudspeakers fundamental system resonance and both can be re tuned to a slightly lower frequency if desired. With a passive you simply add weight no measurement equipment is required all you need is a CD with tones or you can find test tones on line to use. To lower the tuning of a reflex vent you only need to lengthen it. Lowering the tuning frequency 3 - 4 Hz will have a dramatic effect.

 

I would not attempt this on the Forte or the Chorus II, even if you are running a low powered amplifier if you ever sell them you may be screwing the next owner.

[jason str]

2 hours ago, Dave A said:

I have heard of port chuffing but to be honest I can't say I have ever heard it unless it was there and I did not know what I was hearing. My KPT 456's have four front ports and I can't say I have heard anything bad from them.

 

Port noise is quite common, its caused by too small of a port(s). Worse is these multi port subs where they tell you to block a port or two for lower tuning, yes it lowers the tuning but exponentially increases port chuffing.

[001]

thats fine if you have a bias against SS recones or an over critical opinion of an aftermarket part you've never used, but having a bad experience with aftermarket recone products doesn't mean they are all bad...  klipsch used other companies to build these, why can't SS have them made to the same oem standards?  just trying to understand your dislike for these.  lots of companies out there reproduce things to factory specs or better.  i restore older muscle cars & while the china made repro stuff is indeed crap, there are places that use factory molds or materials to reproduce excellent quality parts. 

 

you must have been severely over driving them if you actually damaged a passive, or had the bass turned up too high for the speakers capabilities... or they were dry & brittle due to sun damage or age or defective in some way.. or you were wearing ear muffs.  LOL.  you said you use horn loaded subs & bass extension isn't a concern? 

 

that's the first i've ever heard of damage to a chorus/forte passive due to power or volume levels.  doesn't mean it cant happen but, i have driven my chorus & fortes to rock concert levels with high power s/s amps countless times over many years of use, to the point your ears hurt & they no longer sounded good & the bass was breaking up... the passives were & still are fine.  can't imagine the decibel levels required to damage a passive radiator!

 

regardless, the SS recone kits are more than acceptable replacements for 99% of members here using these in their homes.   

[jason str]

26 minutes ago, EpicKlipschFan said:

am i sensing some bias against SS recones?  or an over critical opinion of an aftermarket part you've never used?  having a bad experience with aftermarket recone products doesn't mean they are all bad...  klipsch used other companies to build these, why can't SS have them made to the same oem standards?  just trying to understand your dislike for these.  lots of companies out there reproduce things to factory specs or better.  i restore older muscle cars & while the china made repro stuff is indeed crap, there are places that use factory molds or materials to reproduce excellent quality parts. 

 

you must have been severely over driving them if you actually damaged a passive, or had the bass turned up too high for the speakers capabilities... or they were dry & brittle due to sun damage or age or defective in some way.. or you were wearing ear muffs.  LOL.  you said you use horn loaded subs & bass extension isn't a concern? 

 

that's the first i've ever heard of damage to a chorus/forte passive due to power or volume levels.  doesn't mean it cant happen but, i have driven my chorus & fortes to rock concert levels with high power s/s amps countless times over many years of use, to the point your ears hurt & they no longer sounded good & the bass was breaking up... the passives were & still are fine.  can't imagine the decibel levels required to damage a passive radiator!

 

regardless, the SS recone kits are more than acceptable replacements for 99% of members here using these in their homes.   

 

If you have measurements to prove me wrong post them, i am speaking from my experience on the subject and have no bias against SS.

 

Even factory drivers can be 10% or more off T/S parameters or 2-3 dB off from one another.

 

I have had no issues besides the passive on the Chorus II, its not like a over driving a driver where you can hear the strain enough to back off the volume. There is no warning when the passive gives out.

 

My audio components are well taken care of, thank you for asking.

[moray james]

1 hour ago, jason str said:

 

I would not attempt this on the Forte or the Chorus II, even if you are running a low powered amplifier if you ever sell them you may be screwing the next owner.

nobody is getting screwed and this is a very simple modification to make and it can easily be reverted to original should that be required. I don't know what damage you this this may do but I get the impression that you have never tried this. I have modified a good number of loudspeakers this way and it works very well. The shift which I ususlly do and recommennd is only one of 3 - 4 Hz this is because most speaker systems are most often close to their usable range when they come from the factory. I added 2.5 ounces to the 12 inch passive on my modified Quarter which also had KLF20 woofer installed and the bass response was the best that I have ever achieved from any Klipsch I have owned. I ran those with a very solid 100x2 amp and played them loud and long with never a sign of any problem. 

   Re tuning like this is so easy as fast to do it is a great modification to experiment with it costs almost nothing to do and you can play with the tuning in minutes and be listening  at any time you can switch back to stock and compare. You are projection some fear about this which does not exist and I am sure that if you were to experience this first you would not be so hasty to speak out against it. 

[jason str]

25 minutes ago, moray james said:

nobody is getting screwed and this is a very simple modification to make and it can easily be reverted to original should that be required. I don't know what damage you this this may do but I get the impression that you have never tried this. I have modified a good number of loudspeakers this way and it works very well. The shift which I ususlly do and recommennd is only one of 3 - 4 Hz this is because most speaker systems are most often close to their usable range when they come from the factory. I added 2.5 ounces to the 12 inch passive on my modified Quarter which also had KLF20 woofer installed and the bass response was the best that I have ever achieved from any Klipsch I have owned. I ran those with a very solid 100x2 amp and played them loud and long with never a sign of any problem. 

   Re tuning like this is so easy as fast to do it is a great modification to experiment with it costs almost nothing to do and you can play with the tuning in minutes and be listening  at any time you can switch back to stock and compare. You are projection some fear about this which does not exist and I am sure that if you were to experience this first you would not be so hasty to speak out against it. 

 

You are still increasing the chance of a torn passive, will it happen to you ? Maybe not but why pour fuel on the fire when you can just run a proper subwoofer and eliminate the chances of this happening.

 

Will adding weight to a cone or passive alter the tuning ? Yes i agree with you.

 

The cheap way is not the best way in my opinion but people are free to do whatever they like to their own equipment.

 

I would not say I'm projecting fear just stating what could happen even without increasing the odds with modifications. If you say there is nothing to worry about i beg to differ.

 

 

[Sam S.]

My experience - yours may differ of course --- The previous owner of my chorus II's added two washers (guessing pursuant to Moray's instructions) to the passive. When I took possession, maybe with the moving around, the weight/washers had fallen off. I listened to them for a few weeks before opening them up to send the crossovers to Crites for recap. During the quick turnaround time on the crossovers, I re-epoxied the fallen washers back onto the passive. It may be anecdotal, but my experience was an improvement in the bass response when the washers/weights were on, versus when they were off. The previous owner had carefully weighed the washers, to achieve the 2.5 ounce sweet spot. If one wanted to conduct more of an a/b test before permanently epoxying them on, I suppose you could use duct tape or something less permanent to test first.

 

[jason str]

You are lucky a washer did not fall onto the crossover and short something out or land in the basket and destroy the cone.

[Dave A]

2 hours ago, jason str said:

Port noise is quite common, its caused by too small of a port(s). Worse is these multi port subs where they tell you to block a port or two for lower tuning, yes it lowers the tuning but exponentially increases port chuffing.

Well I guess it happens but I can't say I have heard it.

[kink56]

I put grilles over my Forte I passives.  Worth the little trouble it took to protect them.  I can't imagine what it would take to rip out these passives.  Someone must of had a block party sitting the speakers on the front porch playing them at 115-125 dB.     I doubt mine have ever seen anything over 90 dB. 

[moray james]

12 hours ago, jason str said:

 

You are still increasing the chance of a torn passive, will it happen to you ? Maybe not but why pour fuel on the fire when you can just run a proper subwoofer and eliminate the chances of this happening.

 

Will adding weight to a cone or passive alter the tuning ? Yes i agree with you.

 

The cheap way is not the best way in my opinion but people are free to do whatever they like to their own equipment.

 

I would not say I'm projecting fear just stating what could happen even without increasing the odds with modifications. If you say there is nothing to worry about i beg to differ.

 

 

Hey no problem, you are entitled to your opinion. I asked again though just to know if you had any first hand experience with this type of modification and if that had any impact upon your conclusion? I think that's ok one way or the other but I am curious as to how you came to your conclusion.       

   The way the manufacturer adjusts a passive to their desired purpose is to adjust the weight of the passive, heavier to lower and lighter to raise the tuning frequency each unit having a functional range. A 3 - 4 Hz adjustment is as I said as much as I would normally make sometimes I only shift it by 2 - 3 Hz and only after experimenting to see how the system responds. I have never had a passive self destruct nor seen one that has but anything is possible. I suppose that you could lower the tuning frequency and that you could also drive the system to the point where the passive was not happy but I can assure you that long before you did any damage that you will have a noticeable warning that the system was being pushed past its comfort zone.

   This is not unlike people claiming that to remove the poly switch in a KG speaker puts the tweeter at risk. Yes it does but not in the way that is generally implied. Remove the poly switch and you gain clarity and detail the trade off is that you do need to be aware of your playback level (you simply cannot turn up the wick as far as you like with impunity) and that your available playback level will be a little bit lower after the poly switch is removed than it was before but a similar situation arises in that before you blow up a tweeter VC in  KG which has had its poly switch removed you will have pushed the speaker to the point where audible distress has been reached and then sustained or passed in order to fry your tweeter. So if a person were not sure of where that point is then I would suggest they not make that modification. I think that is just good common sense. Not everyone knows where this is I have worked with a professional sound engineer who frequently push banks of tweeters until they died even after I pulled them down he would push them back up. That said most people can learn where that point is and then back off the volume control. Yes I have blown up a component up and I learned much from that experience that is how we learn our best lessons. So you kind of need to self regulate whenever you modify something or design something on your own and I agree that is not for everyone. Most all of the modifications I do are reversible and are generally safe but they will void your warranty. I don't have a problem with that even with new gear but that is my choice and each of us need to make those decisions based upon their own experience and good judgement. We learn where our limits lie and work with our own abilities.

[jason str]

3 hours ago, moray james said:

Hey no problem, you are entitled to your opinion. I asked again though just to know if you had any first hand experience with this type of modification and if that had any impact upon your conclusion? I think that's ok one way or the other but I am curious as to how you came to your conclusion.       

   The way the manufacturer adjusts a passive to their desired purpose is to adjust the weight of the passive, heavier to lower and lighter to raise the tuning frequency each unit having a functional range. A 3 - 4 Hz adjustment is as I said as much as I would normally make sometimes I only shift it by 2 - 3 Hz and only after experimenting to see how the system responds. I have never had a passive self destruct nor seen one that has but anything is possible. I suppose that you could lower the tuning frequency and that you could also drive the system to the point where the passive was not happy but I can assure you that long before you did any damage that you will have a noticeable warning that the system was being pushed past its comfort zone.

   This is not unlike people claiming that to remove the poly switch in a KG speaker puts the tweeter at risk. Yes it does but not in the way that is generally implied. Remove the poly switch and you gain clarity and detail the trade off is that you do need to be aware of your playback level (you simply cannot turn up the wick as far as you like with impunity) and that your available playback level will be a little bit lower after the poly switch is removed than it was before but a similar situation arises in that before you blow up a tweeter VC in  KG which has had its poly switch removed you will have pushed the speaker to the point where audible distress has been reached and then sustained or passed in order to fry your tweeter. So if a person were not sure of where that point is then I would suggest they not make that modification. I think that is just good common sense. Not everyone knows where this is I have worked with a professional sound engineer who frequently push banks of tweeters until they died even after I pulled them down he would push them back up. That said most people can learn where that point is and then back off the volume control. Yes I have blown up a component up and I learned much from that experience that is how we learn our best lessons. So you kind of need to self regulate whenever you modify something or design something on your own and I agree that is not for everyone. Most all of the modifications I do are reversible and are generally safe but they will void your warranty. I don't have a problem with that even with new gear but that is my choice and each of us need to make those decisions based upon their own experience and good judgement. We learn where our limits lie and work with our own abilities.

 

For every action there is a reaction, how about explaining not only what you gain but what you lose by doing modifications such as this.

 

Positive-

a few Hz on the bottom end

 

Negatives-

Less power handling

Reduced midbass/midrange definition

Accelerated cone sag

And of course Voiding warranty

 

I do not perform jobs such as this because there is a better way to get the job done, its called a subwoofer. Not only that i warranty my work and its not worth the liability.

 

 

 

 

[jjptkd]

20 hours ago, EpicKlipschFan said:

they are fine for 99.9% of home use, these aren't pro speakers being constantly driven to their absolute peaks.  i have never heard of a passive failing due to over extension, as in physically ripping the surrounds off the cone or tearing the spider assembly etc, like DAVE A mentioned, damage is usually due to cats or rips/holes from other objects.

 

I have had several sets of Chorus II's over the years and have thrown everything at them for hours on end even had them pointed outside for big parties playing at or near full volume for hours even had many drunken nights playing heavy bass tracks trying to knock things off the counters downstairs and never had any issues with a passive-- had a couple tweeters burn out but that was it. Really can't imagine what it would take to take out a passive in those things, wondering if there wasn't a bad batch that went out with glue issues or something if people really had issues with them blowing out? 

[MEH Synergy]

even had many drunken nights playing heavy bass tracks trying to knock things off the counters downstairs 

 

YES!   Haha classic. 

[001]

22 hours ago, jason str said:

 

If you have measurements to prove me wrong post them, i am speaking from my experience on the subject and have no bias against SS.

 

Even factory drivers can be 10% or more off T/S parameters or 2-3 dB off from one another.

 

I have had no issues besides the passive on the Chorus II, its not like a over driving a driver where you can hear the strain enough to back off the volume. There is no warning when the passive gives out.

 

My audio components are well taken care of, thank you for asking.

 

measurements of what?  not trying to prove you wrong on anytying, just replying to your statement/opinion that SS recone kits are bad for some reason, yet you've never seen or tried them... that sounds like a negative bias, you are telling people not to use them because at some point in time you had a bad experience with a different brand of recones, then you doubted SS statement that they are made to meet or exceed oem specs .  same applies to morays mod of the passive, you've never tried it but claim it will cause damage... 

 

i dont doubt you had a problem with your passive, but its unclear why & far from a common thing...  still waiting for another person to say they ripped a passive soley due to overdriving them or due to adding a couple ounces of weight.  so far on here & every other comment i've heard or read in 10+ years about the chorus2 is they love power & they take anything you can throw at them etc etc.  i've also owned a few pairs of these over the years & driven them harder than they were designed... the passives & woofers are fine.  a friend i sold a pair to drives them with bridged adcom 555's running at 600 watts per channel & plays them louder than i can stand almost daily,  still doing fine.

 

i simply mentioned an option for a correct looking & functioning replacement, but like you said, "you are welcome to use whatever you choose in your personal property, don't let me dissuade you."  yet your comments are an attempt to dissuade me or anyone reading this thread...

[jason str]

18 minutes ago, EpicKlipschFan said:

 

measurements of what?  not trying to prove you wrong on anytying, just replying to your statement/opinion that SS recone kits are bad for some reason, yet you've never seen or tried them... that sounds like a negative bias, you are telling people not to use them because at some point in time you had a bad experience with a different brand of recones, then you doubted SS statement that they are made to meet or exceed oem specs .  same applies to morays mod of the passive, you've never tried it but claim it will cause damage... 

 

i dont doubt you had a problem with your passive, but its unclear why & far from a common thing...  still waiting for another person to say they ripped a passive soley due to overdriving them or due to adding a couple ounces of weight.  so far on here & every other comment i've heard or read in 10+ years about the chorus2 is they love power & they take anything you can throw at them etc etc.  i've also owned a few pairs of these over the years & driven them harder than they were designed... the passives & woofers are fine.  a friend i sold a pair to drives them with bridged adcom 555's running at 600 watts per channel & plays them louder than i can stand almost daily,  still doing fine.

 

i simply mentioned an option for a correct looking & functioning replacement, but like you said, "you are welcome to use whatever you choose in your personal property, don't let me dissuade you."  yet your comments are an attempt to dissuade me or anyone reading this thread...

 

A before and after measurement from REW or similar.

 

I have answered every other question you asked in this same thread.

[001]

before & after what?  i mentioned i've never used the recones so i can't meaure anything... do you have measurements to indicate they are inferior to OEM?  have you heard them to know they sound or perform different?

 

those are the only questions i've asked.. so far the only "answers" have been subjective & unverified opinion, which you are entitled to.

 

i will bow out of this debate,  i was only mentioning the re-cone kit as an option to the OP incase he wasn't aware of them.  carry on.