L100T crossover Capacitor Upgrade

[L100t Owner]

I just typed a very long post and lost it

OK, here we go again. This is my first post here. I heard about this forum over at the Klipsch forums. My first real speakers were JBL L60T's that I bought new in 1989 and just sold last year. I really wanted L100T's but could not afford them back then. As luck would have it, I just picked up a mint set of them about a week ago.

When I grew up, L250's and K Horns were the Holy Grail of speakers (and the L100's and various studio monitors when I was a kid). K Horns appeared for sale locally several years ago and I bought them and went in that direction. I now have K Horns, Belles, and Heresys for horns, as well as some small Maggies and the JBL's.

I am a 2 channel guy and have my K Horns tri-amped using an active crossover. I am finalizing a deal to sell the K Horns and I am getting ready to assemble my lasest project, consisting of factory built Speakerlab K Horn bass bin clones, JBL 2470 compression drivers monted on Altec 511B's and JBL 2404 "Baby Cheeks." Its funny how us Klipsch guys eventualy seem to all use JBL and Altec drivers and horns (and Edgar designed horns too).

Anyway, I have built ALK crossovers for my K Horns using Solen and Hovland caps before. Klipsch speakers always see a major improvement when the old caps are replaced or the old crossovers are replaced with a new design using fresh caps.

I am having my woofers re-foamed and took the speakers apart to put on a fresh coat of linseed oil. While I have them apart I want to rebuild the crossovers.

My L100T's crossovers have what look like large value (14, 17 and 40 uF) electrolytics bypassed with very small tear drop caps (0.1 uF) and anemic looking inductors. Typical stuff for production crossovers. Solen makes some very nice solid core and Litz inductors but I don't want to spend that much here.

I do think that replacing the caps with some new Solens should help the speakers. Because they are poly caps they should not need to be bypassed.

Solen makes 3.0 uF, 13 uF, 16 uF and 39 uF caps so it looks like I will need to bypass everything but the 3.0 with 1.0 uF's. The Solen's are going to be much larger, but I can just mount them on another board with jumper wires if necesary.

I know that the Solen's are good caps for the price and they are rather forward too. This is not a problem with horns because if set up properly, everyhting in the signal path has been picked with horns in mind so no harshness is present.

My concern here is that I am using the L100T's in an exercise room with an old Denon receiver (same one I bougth in 1989 and drove the L60T's with). Not exactly a great source, but the JBL's are much more forgiving than horns and have a nice mellow sound.

Has anyone here used Solens with these speakers? How are the results? I want to see an improvement if I do this.

Are their any new DIY crossover designs that I should be considering. This is for an exercise room so I do not need the ultimate, just good sound.

What do you guys think?

Thanks,

Chris

[rek50]

This link will give you the low down on some X/O specs. http://www.audioheritage.org/vbullet...&highlight=L88

My ears have been happy with Dayton caps bypassed with .01 uF AudioCap Thetas from "Parts Express"

Some think Solens are "Bright" others like them. A search on Capacitors, Bypass Capacitors, Biased Networks, L100T... will yeild more information in one hour, than you could forget in a week. Sometimes the "Answer" isn't as "Easy" as it seems .

[JuniorJBL]

http://www.audioheritage.org/vbullet...ighlight=l100t

[duaneage]

This link will give you the low down on some X/O specs. http://www.audioheritage.org/vbullet...&highlight=L88

My ears have been happy with Dayton caps bypassed with .01 uF AudioCap Thetas from "Parts Express"

Some think Solens are "Bright" others like them. A search on Capacitors, Bypass Capacitors, Biased Networks, L100T... will yeild more information in one hour, than you could forget in a week. Sometimes the "Answer" isn't as "Easy" as it seems .

That is a good thread. I spent some time saving most of that on my drive. I can't tell you how many times I refer to it to see what went into what.

[rek50]

"That is a good thread"...ABBASOLUTELY, I'm so sick, I've made copies of some NetWorks and study them while on the crapper.

[4313B]

Biased Solens.

[L100t Owner]

Biased Solens? Not sure what you mean.

My question is should I just use Solen caps? It seems to be a matter of taste.

I also cannot see a reason to bypass poly caps (unless I am using a much higher quality cap to bypass with).

Am I missing somehting here?

By the way, thanks for the schematics.

Chris

[Zilch]

http://audioheritage.org/vbulletin/s...ead.php?t=3555

[doodlebug]

My question is should I just use Solen caps? It seems to be a matter of taste.

I also cannot see a reason to bypass poly caps (unless I am using a much higher quality cap to bypass with).

Am I missing somehting here?

Chris

I just went down this same road with a set of JBL 4425s. I ended up using Dayton caps along with .01mf bypass caps on each large cap - the original way that JBL did it. Do a search on my name and you'll see the discussion here.

I've used Solens in the past with good success on a set of UREI 809s, as well. All nice caps. There are as many opinions on the boutique-ness of caps by brand name, so I'll not go there. Suffice it to say, though, that I've observed the same effect on both speaker systems with different brands of caps: The high frequency output went up so that I had to readjust the output levels. Also, the quality of the amplification you are using will have an effect on what/how you hear the changes.

Just my experiences.....

Cheers,

David

[L100t Owner]

I just went down this same road with a set of JBL 4425s. I ended up using Dayton caps along with .01mf bypass caps on each large cap - the original way that JBL did it. Do a search on my name and you'll see the discussion here.

I've used Solens in the past with good success on a set of UREI 809s, as well. All nice caps. There are as many opinions on the boutique-ness of caps by brand name, so I'll not go there. Suffice it to say, though, that I've observed the same effect on both speaker systems with different brands of caps: The high frequency output went up so that I had to readjust the output levels. Also, the quality of the amplification you are using will have an effect on what/how you hear the changes.

Just my experiences.....

Cheers,

David

What brand of 0.01 mF caps do you use to bypass, where can you get them and how much are they?

The ones that are currently in my crossovers are worn out and need to be replaced, right?

0.01 uF seems like an awefully low value. What voltage value do you use (it must be high)?

Thanks,

Chris

[L100t Owner]

These Dayton caps are cheap! I'm used to looking at Auricaps and Hovlands for use with horns where Solens are considered the cheap caps.

Are the Dayton's similar to the Solens, or do they work better with bass reflex drivers?

I may decide to go very cheap and use electrolytics for the hiogher values and bypass with poly's. What electrolytics have been use dwith sucess around here?

Thanks,

Chris

[4313B]

Biased Solens.

[Uncle Paul]

I'm detecting a subtle pattern...

[L100t Owner]

Biased Solens.

Please let me know what you mean by Biased Solens.

I have used their poly Fast Caps before with horns with great sucess.

Are you refering to Bennic electrolytics availabel on teh Solen site (because they have a + and a - so they are "biased"

Are you telling me to get Solen Polys and no bypass caps? I will need to use a parallel cap to reach the 14, 17 and 40 uF values.

Please respond with more than two words

Thanks,

Chris

[L100t Owner]

Gizzard,

I looked at a network that you built that you referred to as a biased network. Nice job on the construction. Can you explain the concept of a biased network? How about a wiring diagram for the L100T.

Here is a set of ALK networks that I built for my K Horns (I am going to use them with my Belles ass I now use a Yamaha D2040 dividing network and have teh K Horns Tri-amped.

OK - I cant load teh image from my hard drive. I built them out of marble and brass on a CNC machine. They sit outside of the speakers and look pretty cool. I used Solen Fast Caps, Hovlands and Solen inductors (Litz for the high end and solid core for the woofer).
Chris