wirralsimon wrote:

They are still 25.00 each, and soldering the new ones in is lots easier than refoaming the old ones! 😎

 

Simon

And 30 mins max and job done! None of this cups and weights and clothes pegs and leaving overnight, and messy glue and rotten foam black sh*t cobblers. Another thing I've looked at is the price that Good Hi fi charge and then plus shipping. Is it worth it?

You might as well buy new ones and 30 mins job done!

joeyboygolf wrote:

wirralsimon wrote:

They are still 25.00 each, and soldering the new ones in is lots easier than refoaming the old ones! 😎

 

Simon

 

 

And 30 mins max and job done! None of this cups and weights and clothes pegs and leaving overnight, and messy glue and rotten foam black sh*t cobblers. Another thing I've looked at is the price that Good Hi fi charge and then plus shipping. Is it worth it?

You might as well buy new ones and 30 mins job done!

 

I can see both sides to be honest. If you are restoring an otherwise mint pair for sale or if you are in any way technically bewildered (i.e. like me!) then I would say buy new drivers.

 If you are technically competent and are restoring a tatty pair to good-ish condition for sale on ebay then the price difference between refoaming and new drivers is probably the profit margin.

Simon

wirralsimon wrote:

If you are technically competent and are restoring a tatty pair to good-ish condition for sale on ebay then the price difference between refoaming and new drivers is probably the profit margin.

Most likely, yes.

However, the sound quality issue is always there. I have a bunch of C/CX series speakers and, 100% subjectively, I prefer the sound of new drivers (+ 30...50 hours of running them in) to reconed ones. The most notable difference is slightly deeper and tighter bass, which may be caused by the evolution of driver manufacturing from mid 80's to early 00's. Still, the speaker of choice of these all are C75 for me, imaging is very good and there's an overall feeling of smoothness in the sound. I had to buy yet another pair of CX100:s, only because C:s are just a bit too good to be used as "just" surround speakers. The sad thing is that once foam rot sets in, new drivers aren't available anymore so refoaming is the only option.

All in all, both C and CX are fantastic small speakers. I've even retired a pair of Dynaudio Audience 42:s in favour of them, and 42:s are among my all-time favourite bookshelf/stand speakers. Design may have something to do with it, too, but sound quality always comes first.

Thanks Henri

Do the C and CX speakers have differtent size drivers, or can you put a CX driver in a C?

Regards

Simon

Thank you for the quick response.  I hope this question is not too dense, but how to hook up the battery?  Can I leave the driver in place and hook up a 1.5 volt battery (I assume this is the same as a AA battery) to the ends of the speaker wires or can this only be done if the driver is removed.  Thanks again!

Graf wrote:

Thank you for the quick response.  I hope this question is not too dense, but how to hook up the battery?  Can I leave the driver in place and hook up a 1.5 volt battery (I assume this is the same as a AA battery) to the ends of the speaker wires or can this only be done if the driver is removed.  Thanks again!

I always remove the Drivers to refoam them, make it a lot easier.

Craig🙂

Craig wrote:

I connect a 1.5 volt battery to the speaker. This pulls the cone in squarly. Then I peg it in place and disconnect the battery. 9 times out of 10 it is in the corect place and no scraping can be heard if I bress the cone in. 

Medogsfat wrote:

Looks like we all do the same thing.

I also use a 1.5 V battery to centre the speaker before allowing the outer of the rings to set. [...] You can test for correct centering by feeling for any rubbing by simply pressing the centre of the dust cap in a straight line inwards. 

Chris.

Craig, Chris,

Thank you for sharing, that is mucj appreciated.

Just one question: can I connect the 1.5V AA battery directly to the SpeakerLink cable i.e. + to the round pin and - to the flat pin? Is there any risk for the tweeter or the cross-over?

The reason I am asking is that I don't have a soldering iron so I don't want to disconnect the drivers and not be able to reconnect after. Therefore I will just unscrew the drivers to have better access for the pegs but I will keep these wired.

Just hope it is not beyond my capabilities 🙂

Thanks and regards, js

The crossover keeps DC out of the tweeter, so there's no danger.

But... as far as I remember, the internal wiring has just enough slack for the (de)soldering job, and you'll have a very hard time doing the reconing without being able to even lay the driver flat on the table! The wiring might rip off anyway...

The first time I tried refoaming I followed a tip from another posting on here that suggested you could refoam without completely removing the drivers.

It was an unmitigated disaster and I ended up buying new drivers!

A soldering Iron and solder will cost a nominal sum on ebay and removing the drivers completely makes everything 100% easier. I have since successfully refoamed two pairs of CX100's without incident, the soldering skills you need really are minimal.

If this is your debut refoam it really isn't worth trying to save a few euros by not buying a soldering iron!

Simon

All right, thank you for the advice, I will de-solder the drivers.

But then how do I connect the 1.5V battery? Thanks.