D130 Recone Kit (Simply Speakers)

[THD+N]

Hello All,
I just reconed a D130 and have Klippel results which I thought would be interesting to share. I have not come across a very detailed recone procedure on the D130, so I thought I would begin one if there is a need. I realize there is a ton of info out there (and here).

I took some pictures while reconing this one, but I only had my smartphone camera. When I recone the next one, I will take better pix (Nikon) and post them in stages as the recone progresses if anyone is interested.

The instructions that come with the recone kit are "OK", but not great. There is no guidance on setting the voice coil height other than "refer to the original cone for reference". I'll get into my procedure more when I recone the second D130.

[Horn Fanatic]

Hello All,
I just reconed a D130 and have Klippel results which I thought would be interesting to share. I have not come across a very detailed recone procedure on the D130, so I thought I would begin one if there is a need. I realize there is a ton of info out there (and here).

I took some pictures while reconing this one, but I only had my smartphone camera. When I recone the next one, I will take better pix (Nikon) and post them in stages as the recone progresses if anyone is interested.

The instructions that come with the recone kit are "OK", but not great. There is no guidance on setting the voice coil height other than "refer to the original cone for reference". I'll get into my procedure more when I recone the second D130.

The graphs are a fine and good, but a few of the parameters are not a match to the D130. Also, there was the D130, and the D130F. Two completely different animals. As I suspected with after market cone kits, with respect to the Simply Speakers "D130" kit, it is not a direct replacement. Thanks for providing the data, it's more than I have seen offered up. A more comprehensive set of Thele-Small parameters would be nice, though. Qts, Qes, Qms, Vas, BL product. etc...

[grumpy]

A more comprehensive set of Thele-Small parameters would be nice, though. Qts, Qes, Qms, Vas, BL product. etc...

Did you open the pdf?

[THD+N]

The graphs are a fine and good, but a few of the parameters are not a match to the D130.

The D130 that I reconed looked like it had the original factory cone, or if it was reconed at some earlier time in its life, it was reconed with a factory kit. The cone I cut out was stamped paper (All paper, no cloth surround) and the edge was treated with some type of emulsion.

Although the aftermarket Simply Speakers recone kit does have different T/S parameters, I punched the numbers into a box program and it pretty much matches what JBL has published for recommended enclosure sizes for the D130;

D130 Recone
Volume = 6.5 ft^3
Tuning = 44Hz
Group Delay - 10Hz = 11mS, then gently rising to 13mS at 42Hz, then smoothly dipping to 2mS at 100Hz and vanishing thereafter.

I compared the quality of the Simply Speakers (No affiliation with this company) recone kit to the cone that I cut out... I must say that the quality is fairly good. Better than I expected, I should say.

It would be interesting to have an original D130 in good working condition to compare against a recone. I wonder if anybody has Klippel (or other) extensive data on an original D130?

I don't know what kind of life the 2 D130's that I have have had, but with a BL product of 18 (On the one I reconed), I would say the magnet is just as powerful now as it was when it left the factory. I look forward to reconing the other D130 and building some enclosures (3-way system) to see how they sound.

[THD+N]

While reconing the second D130, I discovered a step in which to pay special attention to. (Which is not called out in the "instructions", if you can actually call them that. The one page "guide book" reminds me of a Chiltons Automotive Manual. If you are familiar with those, I'll leave it at that)

Step in recone procedure - Gluing aluminum dust cap to the cone/voice coil
When routing the flat ribbon wires up and around the top of the voice coil and onto the cone (Prior to soldering the VC wires to the lead wires) care should be taken to bend the flat ribbon wire carefully around the top of the VC former with your finger nail or similar small flat object (Wood or plastic). At this point, I used a very small amount of black adhesive (Came in a separate "adhesive kit" which I purchased with the recone kit) to dress the flat ribbon wire to insulate the ribbon leads from the aluminum dust cap which of course could/would short out the VC when the dust cap is secured in place later.

After the adhesive on the ribbon wires dried a bit, I proceeded to secure the aluminum dust cap to the cone/voice coil. After the dust cap dried awhile, I happen to bump the cone and it sounded like I had developed a VC rub. I was very surprised because all during the recone procedure, I was very careful about the alignment of each piece/part as it was assembled. Thinking more about what was going on, I connected the speaker to an amp and signal generator and fed a small signal into the woofer. I could hear distortion and the speaker was not moving too much. I pressed on the inside of the cone, in an outward direction, near the lead wires and the speaker instantly sound "normal". The dust cap was shorting out the ribbon wires that I thought I had insulated.

Since the black adhesive was well on it way to being dry and pulling the dust cap off was not an option, I thought of alternatives to correct the issue. I knew it would not take much clearance to "break the short" on the ribbon wires to dust cap. Plus, the aluminum dust cap is very thin, almost fragile. So I took a straight metal "dental type" pick and placed it slightly above the cone/ribbon wire and pushed it into the side of the dust cap until I could feel the dust cap "bend away from the ribbon wire" inward toward the VC former. I did the same to the other ribbon wire too. I bumped the cone and the "rub" was gone. I connected the amp and signal generator and confirmed that everything was good.

Since I had disturbed the bead of black adhesive to fix the shorted VC wires, I ran another thin bead of black adhesive around the dust cap for aesthetic purposes.

Klippel results soon for the second recone.

[THD+N]

Pictures of the D130 recone. More to come...

The crusty D130 is the original.

[THD+N]

More pictures and a document on how to set the VC height.

[THD+N]

One last picture.

One item of mention about this kit is that the VC is wound "backward". When I connect a 1.5 volt battery to the respective positive and negative D130 terminals, the cone moves inward. Not a big deal, but something you need to be aware of so you can wire the speaker properly to the crossover.

[4343]

...

One item of mention about this kit is that the VC is wound "backward". When I connect a 1.5 volt battery to the respective positive and negative D130 terminals, the cone moves inward. Not a big deal, but something you need to be aware of so you can wire the speaker properly to the crossover.

If you mean the positive went to the red terminal, and that caused inward motion, that is as expected for that vintage JBL. Outward cone movement with positive to the red terminal is a later convention...

[THD+N]

I knew there was a logical explanation. I take back all those things I said under my breath about items made in China...

[ivica]

I knew there was a logical explanation. I take back all those things I said under my breath about items made in China...
Hi Thd+n,

As I can see the parts are frmo MWA company, I have goog experience with their products, so do not worry about the country of the production, if QC has been done in the proper procedure.

regards
ivica

[THD+N]

As I mentioned previously, the instructions that came with this particular D130 kit were not very detailed as far as setting the VC height. This height is somewhat critical and it is not something you want to "eyeball" as a lot of videos on YouTube will have you believe. In the PDF I posted, there are notes, but I will highlight the re-cone steps here briefly;


Use the old cone for reference, if possible (If it is an original cone) If the speaker you have has been re-coned, then it may not be a good reference.
Dry fit the spider and voice coil assembly together and establish the correct height using a caliper or small ruler (in millimeters). Measure the height in 4 equidistant places around the VC/spider assembly. Be patient with this step because the entire performance of the speaker is based off of this critical step.
Once the height of the VC/spider assembly is set, use super glue to "tack" the spider to the VC. Place the glue from the top of the assembly, not the bottom.
Use 8 small drops around the perimeter of the assembly. Let dry for 10 minutes.
Clean out the magnetic gap.
Dry fit the VC/spider assembly onto the frame and make sure it fits properly. Remove assembly and apply adhesive on frame for spider. (Next steps 7 and 8 should be done very quickly after applying adhesive)
Place VC/spider assembly onto the frame and turn back and forth slightly to distribute the adhesive. Make sure lead wires line up with the push terminals on the speaker frame.
Install shim into gap to center the VC/spider assembly.
Using a coffee stir stick, finger or similar press the outer spider material against the frame to ensure a good adhesive seal. Clean up any excess adhesive.
Let this dry for about a hour.


Now that this step is complete, you can use the instructions that came with the kit to complete the re-cone. I just felt that this one critical step needed clarification.