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Naim SBL New/Rebuilt x-overs.

2 many boxes said:
Arthur,
It is expensive, there's no doubt. Particularly because it's not like upgrading something, where you have the money from selling the old item to offset against the cost of the new item.

Using a naxo does mean that you don't have to buy a power supply. But of course you have to buy another power amp as identical as possible to your existing one...

I suspect that Naim speakers are developed as active speakers first and then they try to create a passive crossover after they've optimised them for active operation. LesW has a pretty poor opinion of the passive crossover as it uses some less than optimal components apparently.

You did say you wanted to optimize the SBLs, and anyway I don't want you competeing with me the next time some SL2s come up ;)
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I thought that naxo's needed a hi cap to run? Hope not though.

As for the SL2's I suggest pistols at dawn!! :D
 
arthur said:
I thought that naxo's needed a hi cap to run? Hope not though.

As for the SL2's I suggest pistols at dawn!! :D
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IIRC naxos don't. They were made for a while to provide a cheap way for people to go active with their Intros / Credos.

I got a snaxo 24 for £250 and an Avondale TPX1 for £300. Then I got another Avondale A260Z for £600 I think so the total cost was £1150. All second-hand of course. Which was a lot. This was all in an attempt to tame the treble.

I suggest power amps at dawn. Whoever delivers the highest peak current within 10ms wins!
 
that would be an opinion not shared by many including most dealers.

SBLs sold in their thousands, sl2's sold in thier dozens!

If they'd been any good I'd certainly have had a pair but they weren't. No bass at all.
 
colasblue said:
that would be an opinion not shared by many including most dealers.

SBLs sold in their thousands, sl2's sold in thier dozens!

If they'd been any good I'd certainly have had a pair but they weren't. No bass at all.
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You had to have some sort of setup issue going on as SBLs do have bass as long as low thirties qualify. (And yes, I know what low frequencies are as a brik and Fried M/2 owner which measured 3dB down at 17 Hz ;-)
 
MJS said:
Just to let you guys know, I haven't serviced any of these myself. I will happily resolder the inevitable dry joints on the input sockets as I had to do mine - such are the perils of using A5 cable in such a tight space. If you wanted to replace the stock capacitors I can do that for you but in situations like these I prefer the customer to specify what they'd like fitted as replacements.

Mark.
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Mark,

Silly question but would a dry joint always show up as a loose (cracked) joint from the backside of the xover? I hate to pry the PCB out of its glued setting just to find everything is OK as the joints appeared sound the last time I checked when I had the xover module off the back of the cabinet.

regards,

dave
 
colasblue said:
SBLs sold in their thousands, sl2's sold in thier dozens!

If they'd been any good I'd certainly have had a pair but they weren't. No bass at all.
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I vastly preferred the SL2 to all the SBLs I've heard. Maybe the pricing differential has something to do with sales volumes.
 
dave said:
Mark,

Silly question but would a dry joint always show up as a loose (cracked) joint from the backside of the xover? I hate to pry the PCB out of its glued setting just to find everything is OK as the joints appeared sound the last time I checked when I had the xover module off the back of the cabinet.

regards,

dave
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Yes, the input sockets feel very loose. The weight and tightness of the plug and cable are usually enough to make a mechanical contact but nonetheless it's still a dry joint.

Mark.
 
I fixed the dry joints on my IBL sockets a few moths ago (with leaded solder that I had kept back) and it was a worthwhile thing to do.
 
IIRC, my father knows of place where you can still buy 60/40 lead solder by the 100m. If anyone wants to know I could ask him?
 
It's not strictly a dry joint though is it? You can still buy 60/40 solder quite easily - RS Components sell it http://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/solders/2954836/?origin=PSF_346509|cav

The biggest problem with changing the X-over components is that more 'boutique' parts will not fit into the space available, so the vacuum formed cover has to be discarded and a new box found - at which point you may as well discard the circuit board and hard wire the components. There is nothing faulty with the components Naim have chosen to use, they are just very ordinary.

What more concerns me about the X-over is that is is very generic - I think is is clear that Naim conceived, and developed, the SBL as an active speaker and then produced a passive X-over for it. I believe that exactly the same X-over is used for the IBL. No amount of component improvement will overcome the limitations of the circuit. I wonder what they would sound like (and measure like) if the mid/bass driver was connected directly and only a high-pass filter used to the tweeter - not difficult to experiment with this.
 
colasblue said:
that would be an opinion not shared by many including most dealers.

SBLs sold in their thousands, sl2's sold in thier dozens!

If they'd been any good I'd certainly have had a pair but they weren't. No bass at all.
Click to expand...

CB,

Oh, it's there. You just need to take some time and make the effort to "discover" it, is all. Meticulous set-up, and finding the ideal spot within a decent room (solid and very well damped - think ancient cottage with 3 foot thick walls and thick pile carpet) is all it takes. And then you'll find some of the cleanest, fastest bass around, with extension that totally belies the size of the boxes or drivers. Thing is, even then, it's hard to get too fixated on the bass, mainly because the rest of the speaker is just so damned coherent right across the entire audio frequency range. More than one highly respected speaker designer has mentioned to me that they consider the SL2 as being either a work of genius or sheer (commercial) lunacy, but all agree that it's a really clever and elegant solution.

Yes, I own a pair, as you might guess, and I'm keeping them for hopefully a very long time. Try to hear a pair set up to really work.
 
SL2s didn't look like they were worth £6K. £3K or less maybe.

I have no idea why they had to sell them at that price, but it has to be something pretty damn exotic. Unfortunately you couldn't see it and they didn't seem to advertise whatever it was.

The fact that the drive units looked exactly the same as the ones in the £700 Intros didn't help either.
 
6k did look a bit extreme didn't it?

Small volume sales expected perhaps, and of course the usual Salisbury dizzying pricing.

Still want a pair though!
 
Naim's marketing department must have had a dry solder joint in their process somewhere when they priced those. Whoever it was then went on to price the Linn Keel :)

The person I'm really envious of is whoever snapped up that pair on Trade Sales for £1650 recently. Since then I've looked every day :mad:
 
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