Finally - My SRS 2's are TL'd!! (sorta)

stubby

Well, the title pretty much sums it up. After much procrastination and a heaping helping of hesitation, I finally upgraded my x-overs. If I only knew how easy this was............

I went with Sonicaps on the top half (their big sale helped) and Solens on the bottom. One nice thing about the Solens is they offer a 180uF (!) stand-alone cap. Big SOB. Since I was broke after buying all the caps and resistors, I will half to wait for a full set of RDO 198's. I happened to have 1 198 and 4 SL2500's so I am using 3 and 1 for now:o.

So let it be known, if an idiot like me can do it, ANYONE can. So get those de-soldering guns heated up and have some fun.

stubby

stubby

I have to give all the praise and the glory to Greg (inspiredsports) and Drew (NJPOLKER) for all their help and advice during this project. Thanks for everything!!

stubby

cincycat13

That is a huge cap! My sonicap order is due to deliver 8/11. Should prove interesting...

stubby

cincycat13 wrote: »

That is a huge cap! My sonicap order is due to deliver 8/11. Should prove interesting...

Yeah, it's a real fatty.

What speakers are you working on? If you have ever operated a soldering gun, you'll be fine.

stubby

agfrost

Good work, stubby. Get some hours into your crossovers and start making some $$ so you can swing the 198's!

Happy Listening,

Jay

cincycat13

stubby wrote: »

Yeah, it's a real fatty.

What speakers are you working on? If you have ever operated a soldering gun, you'll be fine.

stubby

I was gonna practice by TL modding some 2B's but money is short so I followed Bikerboy's thread into upgrading my SDA 2.3s and ordered during the sale. I think my room size and amp will make these the better choice of the SDAs I have. I'll probably just sell the 2Bs to fund some 194s. I'm gonna try to hold out 'cause I really want to hear the "4.1TL" with 198's.

I'll take my time and I have done some circuit board work so it will just be slow...capacitors in parallel...resistors in series...but I will double check before soldering.

hearingimpared

Good job Stubby! Now get your hands on the 198s and you'll be in SDA heaven.

stubby

hearingimpared wrote: »

Good job Stubby! Now get your hands on the 198s and you'll be in SDA heaven.

I have fond memories of my 3.1TL's with the 198's. They sound sweet!!

stubby

xsmi

stubby wrote: »

I went with Sonicaps on the top half (their big sale helped) and Solens on the bottom. One nice thing about the Solens is they offer a 180uF (!) stand-alone cap. Big SOB.



stubby

Which Solen series did you get?

stubby

xsmi wrote: »

Which Solen series did you get?

They are in the PB series. Part # PB18000 About 50 bucks each.

stubby

xsmi

Thanks! Nice updates btw.

inspiredsports

Nice!

I did originally listen to mine with RDO198-1's in just the top two spots (had RDO194-1's in the bottom two spots at the time) for over 100 hours and the sound quality was fine. Replacing all 4 with RDO198-1's made just a subtle improvement in overall sound quality.

The point being that just 2 RDO198-1's in the top two spots gives you probably 90% of the improvement, and the tweeter replacement can be done incrementally with no ill effects.

mmadden28

That's great Stubby!!
Did you already have the RD0-198 and SL2500s in the SRS2's or did you have them on the side. I would have expected either SL2000 or RD0-194s in there before the mod.

I am still in the process of buying my parts (just received my Sonic Craft order today) and am not sure when I'm getting the tweets (I have SL2000s right now) so I bought both the 4.4µF and the 5.8µF.

I wonder what effect using the 5.8µF with the SL2000/RD0-194 (all-around) would have? I'm sure it affects the XO freq somehow, but how much so.

stubby

It had 2000's when I started and I have sooo been looking forward to losing them!! I had recently acquired 2 pairs of Series 2 Monitors, 4.6 and 5's. There was a 198 in one of them from the previous owner. The 198 is supposed to be good for 2500 and 3000 tweets, so I figured I could mix them, at least temporarily.

Truth be told, I was wanting to clean up the bass on these SRS2's as much as anything. They weren't quick and snappy like my 3.1's were.

Personal opinion of course, but I would go with the 198 tweeter if I were you. It seems to have better detail.

stubby

inspiredsports

stubby wrote: »

It had 2000's when I started and I have sooo been looking forward to losing them!! I had recently acquired 2 pairs of Series 2 Monitors, 4.6 and 5's. There was a 198 in one of them from the previous owner. The 198 is supposed to be good for 2500 and 3000 tweets, so I figured I could mix them, at least temporarily.

Truth be told, I was wanting to clean up the bass on these SRS2's as much as anything. They weren't quick and snappy like my 3.1's were.

Personal opinion of course, but I would go with the 198 tweeter if I were you. It seems to have better detail.

stubby

I don't believe you will hurt anything electronically when you mix and match. It's a frequency response issue so the the sound quality will suffer a bit until you have at least the top two spots outfitted with 198's (or equivalent).

mmadden28 wrote: »

I wonder what effect using the 5.8µF with the SL2000/RD0-194 (all-around) would have? I'm sure it affects the XO freq somehow, but how much so.

I never had 194's in the top two spots after the 5.8uf caps were added so I can't speak to that, but I'd guess the sound quality would be tolerable. I just wouldn't drive them to high db levels until 198's were in place.

What's your timeframe for buying at least two 198's?

Big Dawg

I'm close to buying the low end caps (already bought the rest from Sonic Craft).

Does it matter if I buy 1 180uF 250V Solen PA18000 (about $33 each) versus 2 AXON 91uF 250VDC True Caps (about $15 each) per speaker? Which is preferred? Or, should I get the 180uF 400V Solen PB18000 (around $50 each)?

inspiredsports

When I did mine a couple of years ago 2 Aeon 100uf were $18.76 each = $ 37.52 and 2 Aeon 82uf were $16.28 each = $ 32.56. It was as close to 50/50 as I could get as I don't believe they made 91's at the time.

I was told at the time that a single large cap is "slower" to fire than multiple smaller caps and would yield tighter bass, and sonically the quality in the high pass circuit is much more important than in the low pass.

george daniel

I'm confused.Do you have/mod SDA SRS 2's or SDA 2B's?

stubby

I believe he (inspiredsports) has modded both.

stubby

mmadden28

Big Dawg wrote: »

I'm close to buying the low end caps (already bought the rest from Sonic Craft).

Does it matter if I buy 1 180uF 250V Solen PA18000 (about $33 each) versus 2 AXON 91uF 250VDC True Caps (about $15 each) per speaker? Which is preferred? Or, should I get the 180uF 400V Solen PB18000 (around $50 each)?

I asked this same thing (sort of) in a separate thread here

Where are you seeing the Solen PA18000 for $33

inspiredsports

george daniel wrote: »

I'm confused.Do you have/mod SDA SRS 2's or SDA 2B's?

Both. I bought the 2B's brand new on the last day of 1987 and the SRS 2's in early November of 2009. That's what brought me to CP.

I modded them with the help of Ben and about 100 of you guys here who were willing to chime in and steer me in the right direction

SDA 2B's: http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=74945
SDA SRS 2's: http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=74946

Greg

george daniel

ok--thanks--congrats--:)

heiney9

inspiredsports wrote: »

I was told at the time that a single large cap is "slower" to fire than multiple smaller caps and would yield tighter bass, and sonically the quality in the high pass circuit is much more important than in the low pass.

That's true for some unregulated power supply designs but negligable in a speaker x-over, but I would keep what ever multiples you have to use as close to the same value as possible.

What we want to avoid here is filling 100uF caps with a 10uF and 90uF if you can source, for example, (2) 48uF's.

I would never use mutiple caps for a single value in a passive speaker crossover if it wasn't necessary. That's why Sonicaps make custom vaules.

H9

inspiredsports

heiney9 wrote: »

That's true for some unregulated power supply designs but negligible in a speaker x-over, but I would keep what ever multiples you have to use as close to the same value as possible.

What we want to avoid here is filling 100uF caps with a 10uF and 90uF if you can source, for example, (2) 48uF's.

I would never use mutiple caps for a single value in a passive speaker crossover if it wasn't necessary. That's why Sonicaps make custom vaules.

H9

I'm confused but learning . So would 55uf + 130uf like the original Polk schematic have been better for us than multiples close to 185uf, or would a modern, single, beer-can-sized 185uf be ideal?

Greg

heiney9

Truth be told on x-overs it probably doesn't matter much, I guess my whole point was try to avoid the 5uF + 180uF to make a 185uF. The closer the split the better, but it's not world shattering and I doubt you'd even hear a difference. Go with whatever you desire.

People are starting to overthink some of this stuff and it's not necessary.

H9

Big Dawg

mmadden28 wrote: »

I asked this same thing (sort of) in a separate thread here

Where are you seeing the Solen PA18000 for $33

I ended up buying 2 Axon 91uFs for each speaker from Parts Connextion, but found these:

http://richartlabs.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=23

Never heard of the vendor, and saved a few bucks with Parts Connextion anyway.

johnsonlwu

I bought a pair of 180uFs from their webstore on the 25th, asked for email confirmation, no response.
EMailed them, no response, emailed their paypal account, no response.
Called the registered owner of the account, BOTH phone numbers disconnected.
Just opened a Paypal dispute...

Face

Thanks for the heads up.

johnsonlwu

Finally seller at www.richartlabs.com contacted me and initially said items will ship today.
Later on she realized they are out of stock.
Got my refund but bummed by the delay in response.

mmadden28

Wow, 2-3 days after your order you filed a PP dispute? You are a very patient person :rolleyes:

Face

I would be concerned too if both contact numbers were disconnected.