Monitor 5B's given a refurb & upgrade w/pics

geoff727

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Big Dawg

DON73 wrote: »

What do you charge to do a Monitor 7 crossover. I have Monitor 7s no suffix with the crossovers still installed and 2 crossovers that are supposed to be from Monitor 7Bs. Are these the same? The ones for the 7Bs came with a Peerless tweeter. I will be replacing the tweeters with RDOs. Confusing?
Then ignore all but your charge for 2 crossovers. Thanks.

You shouldn't swap out peerless for RDOs, first because peerless sound damn fine, and second, because they aren't the same size. If you want to get M7s with RDOs, sell the one's you've got (plenty of people hear will be interested) and buy yourself a later set of M7s.

TNHNDYMAN

beautiful work on the speakers Geoff

Conradicles

What a great looking set of 5's!!! Bump for all who may be thinking of doing something along these lines.

masonsmitty

Yes, i may pm him to do some work on my SDA-2A's...I also live in Seattle, hopefully he still does

TNHNDYMAN

Geoff- Just looking over this thread again and still am very impressed with the quality of your work. It inspires me to try to put the same effort into my older monitors and maybe even a pair of M70's I got yesterday. I noticed in the later pics w/ the drivers removed that there is some type of woven fabric inside the cabs? Is this a sound deadining layer or what? Also could you recommend any particular websites or books, video's for pointers on working w/ veneer. I'd love to see your 10's done up in a nice exotic dark veneer. Again awesome work!

geoff727

masonsmitty wrote: »

Yes, i may pm him to do some work on my SDA-2A's...I also live in Seattle, hopefully he still does

Yep, I do. Holler anytime.

geoff727

TNHNDYMAN wrote: »

Geoff- Just looking over this thread again and still am very impressed with the quality of your work. It inspires me to try to put the same effort into my older monitors and maybe even a pair of M70's I got yesterday. I noticed in the later pics w/ the drivers removed that there is some type of woven fabric inside the cabs? Is this a sound deadining layer or what? Also could you recommend any particular websites or books, video's for pointers on working w/ veneer. I'd love to see your 10's done up in a nice exotic dark veneer. Again awesome work!

I'm amazed - and very gratified - that my threads still periodically get views, and responses. The LSi7 upgrade thread will be along in a couple more months.

The stuff on the inside is Sonic Barrier, available at PartsExpress. Put simply, it reduces internal reflections inside the cabinets, which would otherwise bounce around and may get re-radiated through the drivers as an out-of-phase signal. This typically has a benefit on the cleanliness of the midrange and mid-bass.

For the veneering, I've poked around in a couple books here and there, but i think where most of it came from is just watching various videos on sites like youtube, and reading what others do. I don't really have anything specific to recommend. Maybe a good woodworker on the forum knows of some definitive reference (which I'd like to read, too). For what it's worth, I use the iron-on veneering process (I don't have a vacuum press). This obviously involves a lot of heat, and for woods like the maple on these speakers, it's quite helpful to tape across the grain in multiple places when ironing on the veneer. This helps it keep from separating and making large splits when it cools.

I do have a tentative idea for the Monitor 10's.....the enclosures will be quite modified inside and out, and will include a stout stand of the correct height. I'd like to reach the point of building either a fully-optimized passive network (requiring many measurements and a computer program to do it), or an active crossover for them. The finish I've been thinking about doing on them is either a silver or champagne-ey color done in a piano gloss, matching for the speakers and the stands. This is all a ways away, of course.

G~

cwsmith68

And another big "WOW" to this renew/upgrade project! Great work geoff727!

chriscrawford

I'm both inspired and intimidated. That is amazing!!

Mystery

geoff727 wrote: »

Two more...

You'll probably notice that many of the holes on The PCB are re-drilled to move things around enough to enable a nice, strong, stable, mounting to the new components.

Is it just me or actually lot of cable in the tweeter crossover?
Doesn't it rattle if there is excess length of the cable?

geoff727

Mystery wrote: »

Is it just me or actually lot of cable in the tweeter crossover?

Those aren't just the tweeter crossovers, they're the crossover for the tweeter and mid-bass driver. So, you're looking at a bundle of 4 speaker wires on each board, not 2. Maybe that's why they look excessively long to you.

Mystery wrote: »

Doesn't it rattle if there is excess length of the cable?

No, not normally. Unless the wire is in a really wierd place, like tucked in behind a driver, such that the driver's excursion is large enough to actually touch the wire.

geoff727

chriscrawford wrote: »

I'm both inspired and intimidated. That is amazing!!

In a recent issue of The Absolute Sound, there was an interview with Andy Payor of Rockport Technologies. He made a comment about seeing Matt Polk in that white lab jacket in the '80's magazine ads and thought, if this guy can do it then I can too! Now Rockport builds some of the finest speakers in the world. So forget the intimidated part; inspired will do!