Help needed in Nepal

[Don McRitchie]

I'm continually amazed by the reach of our website. When we started this four years ago, it was initially thrilling to get visitors from Europe and Japan. Over time the locales became more distant - former Soviet republics, African countries etc. Today I received a question from someone in Kathamandu, Nepal asking for help in repairing speakers. I thought I would post it here to let our forum members take a crack at helping him. I'll point out this thread to him in an email reply.

The approach he is looking at (winding his own coils) is problematic at best. Obviously getting JBL parts to Nepal is difficult and expensive and he is trying to be as resourceful as possible in getting vintage systems to work. Some pointers on where he could try to get recone kits and help in installing them would be useful. If someone wants to post the tech sheet from the L-45, that would also help. I am writing this from work so I don't have access to my tech sheets at the moment.

Regards
Don


hi,

I am from the capital of Nepal Kathamandu. I am the great fan of JBL speakers. Iam pro technician of speakers in Kathmandu. specially JBL. I have visited your website many times. The information that you have given in it is too good but i didnt get any information about coils. I have many pairs of JBL speakers likewise L-26,L-40,L-45, L65 and many more. My two pairs are in good condition but two pairs are not.when i repair jbl high frequency radiator or recoil it, it doesn't sound like original.

IN L26 THE BOTH HIGH FREQUENCU RADIATOR HAS GONE OFF.SO HOW CAN I RECOIL IT IN ORDER TO SOUND LIKE ORIGINAL.CAN YOU TELL ABOUT THE PROCESS OF WINDING THE COIL?OR CAN YOU SEND ME THE DIAGRAM OF IT?

IN L45 THE BOTH HIGH FREQUENCY RADIATOR AND ONE MIDRANGE HAS GONE OFF.I MEAN ITS TOTALLY BURNT.SO IN THIS TWO HOW CAN I RECOIL IT?AND HOW CAN I RECOIL EDGEWOUND COPPER RIBBON COIL FOR MIDRANGE?CAN YOU SEND THE PICTURE OF CROSSOVER OF L45 CAUSE SOME PARTS ARE BURNT?HOPE YOU WILL REPLY ME SOON.

THANKING YOU
BYE

[4313B]

L45 Flair

[4313B]

L45A Flair

[4313B]

L45B Flair

I didn't bother looking at any of these to see if they were the same. I couldn't find anything on the L45C.

[Don McRitchie]

Thanks Giskard

To Manish

It is not surprising that speakers you have recoiled sound different from the factory original. Building your own voice coils to repair broken speakers is next to impossible to do on your own. JBL uses over two dozen types of wire for voice coils that are different in dimensions and materials. Each driver also has a different specification for the number of turns of wire. If you do any of this yourself without knowing the exact construction of the original, you will likely have changed the mass of the moving diaphragm and the electrical properties. Therefore, it will sound different and wrong.

Even if you had access to the proper materials and knew the lenght of wire, you would still have problems in making sure the coil is exactly placed on the former so that it sits perfectly centred in the voice coil gap. There are then the problems of attaching the coil to the former so that it will stay in place under high stress and temperature. For all of the above reasons, I don't know anyone that has ever attempted, let alone succeeded, in replacing a voice coil on a JBL driver.

The only exception where you might be able to fix a broken driver on you own is if the problem is due to a broken lead. In otherwords, the coil is stiill OK, but the wires going into or coming out of the coil have broken. In this case, you can attempt to solder the broken wires. If this is the case, let us know and others can offer advice on how to do this.

The only real solution is to get the drivers reconed. You can still get replacement diaphragms for the vast majority of JBL speakers ever made. Unfortunately, you have to let an authorized JBL service center do the repair work since they are not allowed to just sell the parts. I know that this will be expensive from Nepal, but if you want to try this, we can make suggestions on who you can contact either in the US, Europe or Asia.

[subwoof]

Namaste!

I have family freinds that visit there often from cornell university's nepal program....:)

If you can come up with a list of the damaged components, I *might* be able to convince someone to bring them over. They usual stay in Thamel or Patan when in KTH.

I have a freind who owns a JBL service center and he can order any kit as long as it's still made ( MANY are not anymore...:(

sub

ps - I still remember eating chili chiken in durbar marg during the (old) kings 50th birthday celebration