Pistol Pete Posted March 7, 2004 Share Posted March 7, 2004 This morning I was making some adjustments to my subwoofer and parametric EQ , I was setting it up @ 16Hz and the dB level was about 75dB when I realized my speakers were still set to large...I heard nothing out of the ordinary while this was happening , no driver bottoming or anything. Anyways I get home from work tonight and popped in a movie and I noticed the center channel sounded bad, sort of crackely and thin sounding..upon further inspection I found that the tweeter seems to sound ok but both mids are crappy sounding....I pulled them both and both stink of burnt voice coils and when the cone is pushed a scratching noise can be heard. I am surprised both blew though because the RC-3II is supposed to be a tapered X-over...I guess its not all that tapered. This is a bummer, I have never blown a midbass driver before ..I almost feel like selling off all my Klipsch speakers and making my own again. My last speakers were a Kit and in 5 years of very nasty abuse I never blew a driver. Are Klipsch drivers easy to ruin or what? Its seems the driver could handle the mechanical part but not the electrical. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frzninvt Posted March 7, 2004 Share Posted March 7, 2004 Don't blame the speaker, blame the person behind the volume control knob. Maybe now is the time to upgrade to some real Klipsch speakers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 7, 2004 Author Share Posted March 7, 2004 If I do get rid of these I will go back to building my own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 7, 2004 Author Share Posted March 7, 2004 Does anyone know what Klipsch charges for these drivers?....also I wonder if there is not some issue with the crossover or something? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted March 7, 2004 Share Posted March 7, 2004 how long were you playing the low tones for? I have a hard time believing it caused any damage, especially considering none of your speakers were moving. do you have any warranty or anything? you might try giving klipsch a call and ask them what's going on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael hurd Posted March 7, 2004 Share Posted March 7, 2004 "Are Klipsch drivers easy to ruin or what? Its seems the driver could handle the mechanical part but not the electrical." Sorry, but a center channel can't do 16 hz, unless your center channel is a serious subwoofer. I feel for your loss, but you can get replacement woofers from 1-800-klipsch. Ask for the parts dept. As you halve the frequency, for the same spl, the transducer diapragm must move 4 times as much. If you could reproduce 60 hz @ __ spl with .125" excusion, then to do the same at 30 hz, would require .5" of excursion, and at 16 hz, 1". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 8, 2004 Author Share Posted March 8, 2004 Mike, I am well aware that the center was not designed for 16hz duty...my use of wording sounded abit acusatory...sorry. Some further investigation has shown me the problem...I had the rx-V3300 in DTS Neo mode from the last use, center was set to large. The receiver saw the 16Hz tone and sent all of it to the center and the center alone because it thought that was the dialogue since it was only a single sound it did not know what to do with it....I reconnected everything back up and confirmed it. I talked with tech support today and we both agreed that I over drove the speaker... a few hundred clean watts at a 16Hz tone for a good 20 seconds was more than it could bear electrically. The drivers probably did bottom out but I did not notice because they dont make the loud clack that a subwoofer makes when they bottom plus since its a sealed design they wont bottom as easily. The center would never run into this situation in a real world movie or CD playback ...It might have taken 10 seconds of this but not much more than that and even 10 seconds of 16Hz will never happen. Anyways I wont be making that mistake again! The drivers were only $37.50 each , which is quite reasonable. This is about what a DIY Vifa driver of this quality would run. I asked about the tweeter and that was closer to $60 so my error is only abit more expensive than a tweeter blowout. Its nice to know that Klipsch is not gouging on their parts sales, i'll be keeping the set after this...Klipsch made my mistake quite painless. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 8, 2004 Author Share Posted March 8, 2004 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 8, 2004 Author Share Posted March 8, 2004 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 8, 2004 Author Share Posted March 8, 2004 Its a shame they dont just offer a reconing kit because the basket and motor are still good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 8, 2004 Author Share Posted March 8, 2004 double post Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornEd Posted March 8, 2004 Share Posted March 8, 2004 Hey, with photos like that, a double post is most understandable! You mentioned a tapered array... to me that means that one of two woofers will be "turned off" in vocal ranges as an attempt to preserve the clarity of the spoken word. At 16 Hz, the tapered array should not have been a factor in smoking the voice coil. Remember, the replacements are too young to smoke! -HornEd PS: You may have coined a new Forum Phrase, "Hotter than a 16Hz Pistol on the Fourth (voice coil) of July!" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Pete Posted March 8, 2004 Author Share Posted March 8, 2004 ---------------- On 3/8/2004 10:55:55 AM HornEd wrote: Hey, with photos like that, a double post is most understandable! You mentioned a tapered array... to me that means that one of two woofers will be "turned off" in vocal ranges as an attempt to preserve the clarity of the spoken word. At 16 Hz, the tapered array should not have been a factor in smoking the voice coil. Remember, the replacements are too young to smoke! -HornEd ---------------- I thought that too but tech support explained to me that a tapered array is not like a 3 way or 2.5 way design...the 16hz tone went to both drivers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornEd Posted March 8, 2004 Share Posted March 8, 2004 Agreed, Pistol Pete. As I understand it, only frequencies in the human voice range are affected by the switch, and at 16 Hz, both woofers would therefore be affected... err fried. But your smokin' efforts have earned you this Forum's bass admiration. -HornEd Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael hurd Posted March 8, 2004 Share Posted March 8, 2004 OUCH! That looked like it really hurt! At least it didn't hurt your pocketbook too badly, not like smoking a dynaudio/focal/audax. Good to hear that you are going to be up and running again soon. I hope that I didn't come across as beligerant in the first post, but sometimes it happens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skonopa Posted March 8, 2004 Share Posted March 8, 2004 ---------------- On 3/8/2004 10:30:52 AM Pistol Pete wrote: I talked with tech support today and we both agreed that I over drove the speaker... a few hundred clean watts at a 16Hz tone for a good 20 seconds was more than it could bear electrically. The drivers probably did bottom out but I did not notice because they dont make the loud clack that a subwoofer makes when they bottom plus since its a sealed design they wont bottom as easily. The center would never run into this situation in a real world movie or CD playback ...It might have taken 10 seconds of this but not much more than that and even 10 seconds of 16Hz will never happen. ---------------- Hey, that gives me an idea for a little fun. Anybody got any Bose cubes or even the "bass module" they would like to donate in the name of science? Would like to see how that would handle 200 watts of 16hz signal for 20 seconds - probably could get that bad-boy to catch fire! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael hurd Posted March 9, 2004 Share Posted March 9, 2004 Fwiw, the owner of an electronics store here once plugged a center speaker from a Yamaha gx-70 mini system we own into the wall socket. The grill cloth had a mark from a cat's claw, and was non-removable. We found that the grill was not a servicable item, and he gave us another from stock. It took almost a minute before the nasty acrid smell was pouring out of the speaker. I guess 60 hz at a 115v drive level had something to do with that. I was amazed that it lasted as long as it did before self destructing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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