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DIY installation of caps to speakers - advice sought

foxwelljsly

foxwelljsly

Me too, I ate one sour too.
Hi,

I have just taken delivery of a pair of Hovland Musicaps as replacements for the 20+ year old electrolytics in my EPOS ES14 Speakers. I haven't done any soldering for a very long time and having had a look at the inside of the speakers, I have a couple of Q's about their fitting:

1, Looking at the size of the cables, I'm figuring a 50w/480c iron and some lead free solder will be required. Am i right?

2, The caps have a plain wire and one with a blue stripe on. Caps aren't usually directional IME, but are these extortionately expensive ones different?

3, I can see no rating on the existing cap on the speaker, however I have assumed 3.0/100v and ordered accordingly. Anyone know if this is correct?

very grateful if anyone can advise on the above.

thanks
 
A 50W is more than adequate.

The caps are clearly directional; you'll need to find out what the stripe indicates.

From memory i think the stock cap is 3.3 uF. you should be able to read the value when you've removed it.

If i were doing this, I'd cut up a little plate from MDF or whatever, mount the cap on that, and clamp it inside the rear panel with the input terminals, and upgrade the wiring while I was at it. I'd use a ring terminal secured to the board with a brass screw to link the cap to the tweeter wire.
 
foxwell,

I'm interested in replacing the caps in my EPOS14s. Did you have any difficultly getting into the boxes? I've read horror stories of black mastic and sticky stuff with these speakers.
 
chiily said:
foxwell,

I'm interested in replacing the caps in my EPOS14s. Did you have any difficultly getting into the boxes? I've read horror stories of black mastic and sticky stuff with these speakers.
Click to expand...
Garf,

No, it was a total synch. Undid the bolts and the plastic facing popped straight off. There was a foam gasket underneath, but no glue. These are the single wired, no phase plug model, so I can't vouch for the later incarnations.

Simon

PS The Musicaps go blue wire to tweeter. Checked with Wilmslow Audio on this.
 
RustyB said:
A 50W is more than adequate.

The caps are clearly directional; you'll need to find out what the stripe indicates.

From memory i think the stock cap is 3.3 uF. you should be able to read the value when you've removed it.

If i were doing this, I'd cut up a little plate from MDF or whatever, mount the cap on that, and clamp it inside the rear panel with the input terminals, and upgrade the wiring while I was at it. I'd use a ring terminal secured to the board with a brass screw to link the cap to the tweeter wire.
Click to expand...
Rusty B,

Not planning on re-wiring until the new cap's burnt in, but, for when I do, what cable would you recommend?

cheers

Simon
 
You are wrong about the solder, the leads are silver coated copper and therefore you should use silver loaded solder.
Also if you take the crossover out of the cabinet huge gains will be made in sound quality.

Clive
 
OK, I just plan to put the Hovland Musicaps in at the moment. May do all the other mods if this one pays off.

I will use silver solder and a 50w iron and link the internal wiring to the cap wiring using a silver soldered joint. Will do. Cheers all. Will report back on results.
 
Also if you take the crossover out of the cabinet huge gains will be made in sound quality.

Bollox.
 
After trimming, tinning and soldering all the cables with bog standard solder the job is complete. And the difference is night and day. The replacement of the diddy electrolytic caps with Hovland Musicaps is a mod that I can unreservedly recommend to all owners of the earliest EPOS ES14s. I'm now listening to Emcee 5 Bebop 61 (A compilation of Newcastle UK Bebop from the early 60's), a pristine and previously almost unlistenably bright record. The cymbals actually sound like cymbals rather than the tizzy mess that was there before and my Simply Vinyl pressing of Grand Turismo by the Cardigans sounds just absolutely gorgeous, the breathiness of Nina Persson's pipes is immaculatly reproduced. Well worth £40 and 45 mins of work.
 
You'd have to wonder whay a manufacturer would produce a well-engineered bespoke tweeter and then cripple it with a crap cap-go figure!

Substituting a modest poly such as a Solen makes a big improvement, your Hovland should be as good as it gets.
 
You'd have to wonder whay a manufacturer would produce a well-engineered bespoke tweeter and then cripple it with a crap cap-go figure!
Click to expand...

To be fair I think the original Bennic bi-polar cap's would when new have sounded fine (almost as good as a decent film cap, and a lot smaller/cheaper). The problem is that (like all electrolytic cap's) they go downhill rapidly with age and will sound pretty dire after 10-15 years.

There must be an awful lot of 'hi-end' speakers (with some very pricey gear up-front - going to waste!) desperately in need of some new cap's by now.

Mr Tibbs
 
RustyB said:
You'd have to wonder whay a manufacturer would produce a well-engineered bespoke tweeter and then cripple it with a crap cap-go figure!

Substituting a modest poly such as a Solen makes a big improvement, your Hovland should be as good as it gets.
Click to expand...
You're not wrong. Best value upgrade I've ever got. Many of my records are in less than perfect nick, the more worn ones still sound worn, but the music on them sounds separated from the noise, instead of an unholy mess.

BTW, where can I get the Mogami wire of which you speak? I've searched on the net and not found any UK stockists.

cheers
 
To be fair I think the original Bennic bi-polar cap's would when new have sounded fine (almost as good as a decent film cap, and a lot smaller/cheaper). The problem is that (like all electrolytic cap's) they go downhill rapidly with age and will sound pretty dire after 10-15 years.

There must be an awful lot of 'hi-end' speakers (with some very pricey gear up-front - going to waste!) desperately in need of some new cap's by now.
Click to expand...

I meant to post about this a while back, I replaced the (Bennic bi-polar) caps in my 15 year old Royd Apex's with new Bennic's and the improvement wasn't that huge, better...yes but not night and day.

Worth doing before you replace your old speakers though.
 
Replacing them with Bennic XPP's would have been a better idea.

Mr T:for a cap of 3.3 uF, neither cost nor size is really an issue for a speaker in the ES14 class.
 
Rustyb......

Have you personally removed the crossover from your speakers and placed away from the cabinets ?

if yes how did you implement it to get such poor returns ...if no why you did you make such crass comment if you have not heard the effect ?

All components and cables are micro phonic......especially film caps. One the four or five sets of speakers that I have built remote cross over boxes ...the results have been very good, always well worth the effort.... but you need to have the crossovers several feet from the cabinets....

There can be a number of limiting factors these include extending the cable from the drive units to the crossovers , and adding extra connections [I used speakon connectors to build an umbilicus between crossover box and cabinet and decent speaker cable. The gains where greater than the sum of the parts and would suggest where ever practical the removal of the crossover from the cabinet.
 
All components and cables are micro phonic......especially film caps. One the four or five sets of speakers that I have built remote cross over boxes ...the results have been very good, always well worth the effort.... but you need to have the crossovers several feet from the cabinets....
Click to expand...

zanash, do you have to keep repeating this nonsense?
 
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