Crossover questions - and NEW to Klipsch (O:

[GWSmith]

Hello there.

I am new here, and have been willed by a late friend of mine his Klipschorns. I wrote tech support with the consecutive serial numbers to get an idea of their age. A note back indicated that they were made in 1968. They are walnut with a white cloth grill. The crossover is marked `A'

Here is the rest of the story, I just moved into my new home about 5 months ago, still setting the place up with paint and such and the K'horns are still stored and covered out in the garage (attached to house). The KICKER is.......... I have NEVER HEARD these speakers!, so I am kind of winging it here with my questions.

I wrote again just today to the tech dept. with a question about upgrading that crossover... There is the newer AK-5 for $638 ea. that he suggested. The tech asked me if I was happy with the sound of the speakers the way they are, and I really don't have an answer for him, and won't until later this spring when the room is setup.

Does anyone have an opinion on this? I really want to leave these speakers in their UN-altered form and only hope they sound good in my 24x18' space I am preparing for them. Is the "A" xover (if mine are still in good condition) the best choice for these older models - leave them alone?

Last one.... I noticed on the back that there is a rubber matting stapled to the rear panel. From what I have gathered, this helps couple the woofer to the wall and have seen it on others.. Is this ORIGINAL to this year speaker?, or did my friend add this along the way as an 'improvement' ??

Thanks SO much for your time and I look forward to reading replies and writing my findings once I the K'Horns going......But, I think I will need a tube amp from what I have been reading.

Regards,

Tigerman

[BEC]

Tigerman,

Welcome to the Klipsch forum.  The orginal type A crossovers are a good match in your Klipschorns.  Lots of people choose the type A after trying others.  Now, your Type A crossovers at the age of almost 40 years certainly have bad capacitors in them by now and I would replace them.

Bob Crites

[DrWho]

I noticed you joined on 9/2/2006...that's a long time to be reading before your first post!

welcome to the forum.

[WMcD]

Welcome to the forum.

The rubber gasket material shows up in the "instructions" which came with the K Horn, at least at one point. So it is quite possible your friend received them with the original unit. OTOH, I believe it was not always provided and people do add such things.

It is very similar in function to a popular tweek. The tweek is to use pipe insulation which can be found at Home Depot. The insulation is a tube which is slit. As you can imaging this too is used to get a good seal up against the wall.

It is generally thought around here that the old caps go off spec. I can say one way or the other. People report very good results with this type of replacement. But there are various replacements available out there. Some are new units of the original type oil caps. Other people use more modern replacements. Generally, replacing the caps is a first, low cost "upgrade."

The A type crossover is one of the older type. But apparently this was a favorite of Paul W. Klipsch. It is a minimalist approach.

I would not jump onto the upgrade path until you have installed the K Horns in your room and hear what you've got. It is well recognized that some rooms work well and some don't. People have opinions about tube amps, etc.

BTW, the AK-5 is the current, best thinking of the engineering department at Klipsch. It is far more sophisticated than the A. Hence the cost.

Let me suggest you do put the speakers to use and listen for a while. Everyone here would love to see pictures and read your impressions.

Maybe someone here can post a link to the VTV article I posted long ago on the K-Horn.

Best,

Gil

[JohnA]

Welcome!

Oh, you don't realize what you've done! Get ready.

The
Type A crossover is an excellent one. Place the speakers and
listen to them for months (6+?) before you change anything. Try
different corners during that time. make sure you are not hearing
the room more than a failing in the speaker.

There are
myriad tweaks for the big, old Klipsch and some are even
improvements. At times I've even lead the charge. Once you
can identify a problem you think meeds fixing, we'll give you all the
help you can stand. LOL!

Your old crossovers will
certainly work properly, as is. However, the paper and foil in
oil capacitors have surely changed over the years and might have to be
replaced to get them singing at their peak. then again, they
might sound grreat and you won't need to do a thing.

I like the old speakers. Yours are from the hay days of Klipsch.

Gil, here it is!

[Deang]

I agree with Bob and disagree with John. 40 year old capacitors need pulled and replaced. People also often forget that a lot of those cans were WWII surplus, it's possible they were over 20 years old before they were put into the speakers. I've seen plenty of those caps used in the networks from the middle 70's that are leaking oil on the board. There are only four caps total on two Type A networks, and a small investment brings the speakers back to the proper performance level. It sounds a heck of a lot better too -- which is a good thing.

[BEC]

Dean, 

Over time rebuilding these things, I want to get all the old oil filled cans out.  I have found so many leaking oil now, that regardess of the sound, they need to be out of there.

Now when in the early 80s when Klipsch went to the little rectangular black caps, they may have taken a step back in how long those things last.  I have been finding so many of those so bad that a signal won't even go through them that I think all those need to be replaced also regardless of age.

Bob

[Deang]

Now when in the early 80s when Klipsch went to the little rectangular black caps, they may have taken a step back in how long those things last.

My theory on that one is damage caused by excessive heat from soldering 10AWG wire to them.

[BEC]

Now when in the early 80s when Klipsch went to the little rectangular black caps, they may have taken a step back in how long those things last.

My theory on that one is damage caused by excessive heat from soldering 10AWG wire to them.

Good theory, but the worst ones I have found came out of the AL series crossovers that did not use the 10 AWG wire.

Here is one I took out of a 1987 type AL crossover last week.

Bob

[HarryO]

Nice of your friend to leave you such a gift. You might want to post pics of the crossovers. They may have already been freshened up.

HarryO

[p.dow]

congrats on now owning your friends khorns. you have been blessed.

when you slowly turn up the volume on your 68"s for the first time i hope you hear wonderful music.

have fun.

paul

[GWSmith]

I would like to say THANK YOU!, to all that have posted and wished me well with these classics! I have one of the 'A' crossover shots which has been requested and you should have a look at.. I send that shortly for you all..

I know there was a question on my being so quiet as a member since last year. For some reason, I was never sent an email letting me know that my account was ready. When I tried to log in, the message box kept saying my account was not active or the P word was incorrect. I gave up, but took a stab at it last night and was able to get a temp P word, and now I am here.

Feeling very welcomed by this group. I will keep you posted and send photos asap, or, when I figure how to get attachments.

Again, thanks everyone )

Regards,

Gary

[GWSmith]

Hello friends.

I hope this photo gets attached. I just ran out into the garage and took this with a little point and shoot Pentax s7. Please, don't look at the dirt, I am VERY fussy with my gear and these have only been dropped off by the movers and then covered, so, this is my late friend's house dirt I'm afraid[:$]

Let me know if these are all original components on this one, the left K'Horn matches perfectly ..

......Gary

[nannerneck]

I don't have Khorns but listen to these guys talk about them and the other Hert. stuff. If your late friend is like these guys he thought very highly of you and knew you wood enjoy them very much. Just With the stuff I got my friends wouldn't realise what they had.[]

[km5gn]

I'm also new to the forums and Klipschorns - I've had mine a bit over a week. I too contacted Customer support about upgrading the crossovers. While I think mine sound awesome right now, If there's something more I can get out of them without spending a fortune, I'm interested. Mine are 78s with the AA Crossover. Is there a way to test the Caps using simple tools? I have a decent multi-meter, and that's about it, and checking continuity or DC voltage is about as sophisticated a use as it's normally put to.

Seems like it makes sense to replace them anyway. If I wanted to do that, how would I go about finding a source for appropriate replacements? This seems like the logical first upgrade step. If I later decided to buy new crossovers, I could always send these upgraded AAs to my brother who has a stock set of 66s.

FWIW, I'm driving mine with a Scott LK-72 B which I'm very pleased with...

Steve

[HarryO]

Gary,

It's time to get rid of the old cans and upgrade. Easy DYI job or very reasonably priced upgrade from BEC or others here on the forum. BEC sells the cap kits and they're easy to install. They really bring back the sound on the old Gentlemen K's. I'm sure he will pop back in on these.

HarryO

[BEC]

Steve,

Welcome to the Klipsch forum.  About the minimum insturment for really telling anything about caps is the meter you can see in the picture I posted above.  That meter costs around $550.00.  You can read capacitance on lots of meters, but the old caps are most of the time in good shape as far as capacitance is concerned.  ESR (Equivalent Series Resistance) is the main problem in old caps and that takes an expensive meter to measure. 

But, no real reason to measure them.  I have done hundreds of the Type AA and have never found a good capacitor in one yet. 

You can replace the caps with most any good polypropylene caps and have a nice improvement.  Your Type AA would need one 13uF and two 2uf caps for each crossover.  I make up kits for these if you are interested.

Bob Crites

bobcrites@mac.com

[DrWho]

Bob,

What's wrong with the square capacitors? Those look like the ones in my E-2 heresy networks...[]

[ben.]

Gary,

Those are certainly the original components.

Sounds like you have a very nice size room in the works for the old horns. Where are you located? There are lots of forum members all over the place that are happy to help with auditions. I have a few tube amps and a nice preamp as well as a set of very nice type A networks. I'd be pleased to have you hear them if it would help and you are in my area (western NY state). I'm sure there are other members who would be glad to help in a similar fashion.

When you get a chance and some decent light, snap some photos of the exterior and post them as well. Consider posting in the 2-channel forum too, as it gets a lot more traffic than this section. There will be plenty of input on the amplifier choice there. A decent vintage tube integrated is a great place to begin if you are new to tubes. NOSValves is a member here and often has pieces available that are already gone through and come with post-sale support, taking some risk out of the equation.

[p.dow]

go with bob on these caps.

it has been recommended by others here that when you do something like this... for fun do one network first , install it and do a mono speaker to speaker listening test to compare with your original old caps in the other speaker. so you might be able to see (hear) the change brought about by the new caps.

something to ponder.

paul

(just ordered replacement caps for my 85's)