Rescued SDA SRS 2 (back in the SDA saddle!)

waxman

Well, I'm thrilled to be back in the SDA SRS owners' world. Last night I found a very minimal mention of polk speakers at an estate sale on craigslist, so I went through pictures and, to my surpise, saw a pair of what I though were 3.1 SRSs. No price on the ad, so headed down there this morning.

Long story short, they were actually SDA SRS 2 series. I had the newer SDA SRS 2.3 TLs that I had sold a while back and regretted ever since, so I casually asked the estate sale company person the price, she said $300 but we're doing 25% off... so I bought the pair for $225, and felt like a thief in the night. I'm still smiling Speakers themselves appear to be in great shape, box is fine, but I haven't hooked them up the carver tfm 35 yet to hear them. The prior owner was a 70 year old musician with a lot of quality gear who took care of his stuff, so I have high hopes that they are functioning well.

These aren't mint though like my old 2.3 tls were, and that is where I hope you folks can point me at the best information. The worst areas are:
1) very bottom of the grill fabric and grill frames to have gotten sprayed by a cat, well below the passive radiator. I'm not going to try to salvage the fabric, but the grill frames appear to be salvageable. If I find too much damage on the grill frame, will need to find a way to replace them.
2) one bottom end cap is splitting along the seam of the where the wood strips were laminated together. Basically exactly what DarqueKnight called out in the post below about the SRS 2 wood choice.
http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?26036-SDA-SRS-1.2TL-Side-Panel-Removal
If I replace one end cap, I will likely replace all 4, and looking for recommendations on anyone who does quality work or god forbid even stocks these.
3) side grill material needs to be replaced- not sure how these come off on this particular series since I don't think they are like the TL series, so looking for prior owner advice on this sort of thing.



Anyway, happy to be back in the game. I've attached a few pics, including the grainy pic where I saw them hiding behind a bunch of brass

thanks for your recommendations, good to be back!

gdb

Hunt down that cat, kill it ! :cheesygrin: I hope the stench in the frame is mild enough that you won't have to toss it and fabricate new ones ! You could try several coats of polyurethane or shellac to try and seal in the stink. The glue-up can be easily reglued as either a temporary or permanent fix. IIRC, the side panels are glued on and pry off without too much effort. Good luck !

stubby

Nice score!! I bet they will sound just fine.


BTW, how much were they asking for the deer?

nhhiep

this has the same # of drivers as the 1C. how are they different?

waxman

gdb wrote: »

Hunt down that cat, kill it !

Yeah from what I can put together this happened after the gentleman got sick and the cat was left unattended for a while.

gdb wrote: »

The glue-up can be easily reglued as either a temporary or permanent fix.

I'm not familiar with the 'glue up' terminology- is this referencing the grill frame or the split end cap?

Oh and btw, thank you for your help! -- and sorry Stubby, can't recall the price of the deer. I did check the CL post and did see that tomorrow they are 50% off of asking price. Could have stolen these speakers for $150 if no one else had picked them up


Chris

Tony M

nhhiep wrote: »

this has the same # of drivers as the 1C. how are they different?

Passive radiator is 15" and the 2's have a larger interior volume to augment the passive to produce awsome low end output. that's about all and also, tweeters aren't between the mids, they're above them. The SRS2's have better low end. that's about it unless you're very acute in hearing the high frequency desrepencies from the tweeters being seperated from the mids output. I didn't do an a/b but wanted to. Craig J. could probably tell more on their differences than I can now.

gdb

The end caps are "glue ups" of several pieces of wood, the failed glue joint can be carefully cleaned up and re-glued without a lot of time expended.

waxman

gdb wrote: »

The end caps are "glue ups" of several pieces of wood, the failed glue joint can be carefully cleaned up and re-glued without a lot of time expended.

So you think I can just remove the end cap, squeeze it in bench vise and reglue it?

Also, I was thinking that because the end caps are actual real wood and not veneer, I *could* sand them and restain without worry. My only concern is the side wood strips-- does anyone happen to know if the SDA SRS 2 side strips are solid wood like the end caps?

Schurkey

nhhiep wrote: »

this has the same # of drivers as the 1C. how are they different?

Tony M wrote: »

Passive radiator is 15" and the 2's have a larger interior volume to augment the passive to produce awsome low end output. that's about all and also, tweeters aren't between the mids, they're above them. The SRS2's have better low end. that's about it unless you're very acute in hearing the high frequency desrepencies from the tweeters being seperated from the mids output. I didn't do an a/b but wanted to. Craig J. could probably tell more on their differences than I can now.

Depends on whether they're blade/blade or pin/blade.

Blade/blade SRS2 is like an SDA 1B on steroids. Larger cabinet, larger passive, same active components (with different spacing/layout) except for a single resistor in the HF crossover.

Pin/Blade SRS2 is like an SDA 1C on steroids. Larger cabinet, larger passive, same active components (with different spacing/layout) except for the polyswitch and the big SDA inductor.

waxman

Just in case there are other differences worth mentioning, these speakers are the blade blade variety of SRS 2

gdb

AFAIK, those blade/blades can be TLed ! The vertical side strips on my 2's are solid but..........as with most of the vintage Polks, there are inconsistencies in the manufacturing quite often so, what's true on any given pair, is not necessarily true of the next ! Good luck and enjoy the RDO-198s, if you decide to go that route.

Schurkey

gdb wrote: »

AFAIK, those blade/blades can be TLed !

Yes. Requires changing the value of one capacitor in each HF crossover. 5.8uF instead of the 4.4uF originally installed. (5.6uF seems to be close enough, and is easier to source.)

Will probably also want to reduce the value of the primary resistor for the HF circuit down to 1.5--2 ohms instead of 3.3 ohms.

waxman

GDB- looking for details on the TL mod- don't seem to see it listed under the sticky http://vr3mods.com/LCSDAUpgrade.html
I assume it's more work than swapping out the tweeters and a few caps? Also, wouldn't it be the RDO 194 and not the RDO 198 for my speakers?

Schurkey- thank you for the capacitor details.

gdb

I'm not tech savvy so I can't give you specifics but........sounds to me like Shurkey "knows the way".:cheesygrin:

Schurkey

gdb wrote: »

I'm not tech savvy so I can't give you specifics but........sounds to me like Shurkey "knows the way".:cheesygrin:

Schurkey let someone else do all the heavy lifting. I read about it on this forum. Work largely pioneered by member "inspiredsports" with some help from Matthew Himself, and others, described in this thread:

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?74946-SDA-SRS-2-Crossover-Parts-list

Beware that the first few pages are largely useless in regard to the TL mod. Lots of back-and-forth, incorrect assumptions, etc. It doesn't get "good" until half-way through. Other info early in the thread is worthwhile.

As I said, the blade/blade SRS2 is a 1B on steroids...and my 1Bs have been "TL" modified to use the RD0-198 tweeter. What I didn't know to do at the time was to slightly reduce the value of the main tweeter resistor to bring the tweeter volume up just a bit. SRS2 uses 3.3 ohm resistor, 1B uses 2 ohm resistor, both probably should have a 1.8 ohm resistor.

Polkie2009

Waxman, congrats on the speakers, I'm taking it that you weren't able to hear how they sounded at the estate sale? Hopefully all drivers are working and the PR is still sealed etc. Let us know how these bad boys sound with the 35 .

Schurkey

Ooops. SRS2 uses 3.5 ohm resistor, not 3.3. Either way, there isn't enough treble even with the 1B at 2 ohms, and lowering the value of that resistor to < 2 ohms--like maybe 1.8 ohms--should solve that imbalance.

waxman

Many thanks Schurkey.

waxman

So a confession. I'm a mechanical engineer, and like most of my brethren, clawed my way through the 2 EE courses I had to take, and frankly wouldn't take another if you paid me. I'd rather talk torque than capacitance, and while I remember the basic formulas, get that damn bread board away from me. So I'm going to asks lots of seemingly dumb questions. Just take pity on the gearhead.

Next question is- how do I test tweeters? I followed the advice I could find on the forum and used a AA battery to check phase and stickyness of the 4 MWs. Thankfully all 4 moved the same amount, in the same direction (OUT , on each speaker. Yeah! I listened to a ~ 30 minutes of music and verified all is well with the passive radiators, but have one concern. One of the disks I listened to was the remastered Star Wars Episode 4, disk 1 from the 1997 2-disk release. The trumpets and their corresponding high notes were all completely stage left. French horns/trumbones/tubas all sounded balanced to right channel. I couldn't find another trumpet heavy classical disk but the rest of the music I listened to, while not high note intensive, seemed to have a more central sound stage. I'd like to put my mind at ease- What is the best way to test the tweeters in my right channel?

Polkersince85

Take tissue paper tube and listen to each individual one. Make sure your blade-blade cable is making good contact, could be dirty after all this time.

Dawgfish

nhhiep wrote: »

this has the same # of drivers as the 1C. how are they different?

Besides the better bass of the SRS 2s as others have described some folks believe the SRS 2s have a wider SDA effect due to the stereo and dimensional drivers bieng further apart on the SRS 2s than the 1Cs. I used to own a set of 1Cs and now own a set of SRS 2s. Unfortunately I didn't own both at the same time for true side by side comparisons, but my gut feeling is telling me the SRS 2s do indeed have a wider SDA effect than the 1Cs I owned. I have the pin/blade version of the SRS 2s btw and the description of the SRS 2s as 1Cs on steriods is an accurate one.

helipilotdoug

Congrats on a great score there Waxman!! Another Austinite I have a set of SRS II speakers in my main set up. The Ti mod has been done, and all the tweaks too. These SRS II's have a soundstage that, depending on what you are listening to, makes you feel like you are sitting front row center. sometimes you hear such a wide sound stage that you hear things almost 90 degrees to the right and left. And the bass is awesome! No need for a sub when listening to them. Only time I use a sub is for the LFE channel when watching movies. Enjoy!!

PolkieMan

Yea that's the why I made certain one was out on mine I used a empty paper towel roll, your ears won't lie.
Good deal on the speakers I found the grille cloth to be very chemical tolerant except for carb cleaner then the black dye will come off

Polkersince85 wrote: »

Take tissue paper tube and listen to each individual one. Make sure your blade-blade cable is making good contact, could be dirty after all this time.

waxman

Thanks Polkieman, I am soaking the grille cloth right now in soap, water, and a natural pet/enyzme cleaning solution, may be able to reuse them. Contacted a retired carpenter to cut some new speaker grille frames from mdf sheet and reglue the end cap.

Helipilotdoug- howdy. Who did your srs conversion? May want some local advice Also, what surrounds are closely timbre matched to the SRS IIs in your setup?

stubby

Hearing the trumpets and other high frequency notes to the far left may have been due to the recording/mixing - OR- the polyswitch may be on the fritz. Do a search on them, not many care for them here.

stubby