Re: Speaker repair - frame to cone wires?

[N_Cook]

Charlie+ <cha...@xxx.net> wrote in message
news:aafm28dol2ognaupm...@4ax.com...
> Needed for a big do in about a week so quick and dirty repair required
> but be better if the repairs lasted!
> I tried a repair on these speakers about a year ago for my sisters
> family but the repair hasnt lasted... I used uncoated a fine
> multistrand copper spiral twisted wire for the tagboard to cone
> connections - industry uses a knitted wire for this , any suggestions
> for a longer lasting material? Guessing these are abot 80W ~10"
> speakers being used at high volumes, vibration stress of the wires is
> the failure not electrical.
> Anyone been down this road? Thanks


Tinsel wire is the term.

Maybe not fine/multistrand enough. I have used extra-flexible "hook-up" wire
about 60 strands, .05mm diam strands , sleeving stripped off. Then plaited
so 3 ply for the current carrying. All I can say is the speakers have not
bounced back.

[N_Cook]

If such multistrand not available then skein some .05mm wire and taking 5
strands together lightly plait 3 such bunches, plait those together , repeat
3 times and plait those together. Trying to keep the plaiting as loose as
possible.

[Phil Allison]

"Charlie+"

>
> Needed for a big do in about a week so quick and dirty repair required
> but be better if the repairs lasted!
> I tried a repair on these speakers about a year ago for my sisters
> family but the repair hasnt lasted... I used uncoated a fine
> multistrand copper spiral twisted wire for the tagboard to cone
> connections - industry uses a knitted wire for this , any suggestions
> for a longer lasting material? Guessing these are abot 80W ~10"
> speakers being used at high volumes, vibration stress of the wires is
> the failure not electrical.

** I regularly strip the " tinsel " leads from speakers that are no longer
usable - for just your purpose.

So find some old woofers, quality immaterial and do likewise.

Or, try eBay:

http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p3907.m570.l1313&_nkw=speaker+tinsel+&_sacat=See-All-Categories



.... Phil

[gregz]

Charlie+ <cha...@xxx.net> wrote:
> Needed for a big do in about a week so quick and dirty repair required
> but be better if the repairs lasted!
> I tried a repair on these speakers about a year ago for my sisters
> family but the repair hasnt lasted... I used uncoated a fine
> multistrand copper spiral twisted wire for the tagboard to cone
> connections - industry uses a knitted wire for this , any suggestions
> for a longer lasting material? Guessing these are abot 80W ~10"
> speakers being used at high volumes, vibration stress of the wires is
> the failure not electrical.

> Anyone been down this road? Thanks

Solder sucker wire ?

Greg

[Adrian Tuddenham]

Close-woven braiding from screened cable can be used, even though it is
not ideal; if you thread cotton down the centre, it can help to
distribute the flexure over a greater length and will prolong its life.
Make up a hank of many strands of carpet thread and pull it through the
centre of the braiding with a loop of tinned copper wire.

Even better than cotton is a single strand of spring steel wire, such as
piano wire. It needs to be carefully tinned before threading it through
the braiding, then it will solder to the end connections and distribute
the bending.

If you solder any kind of flexible wire, there will be a sharp bending
point where the solder finishes. Try to support it flexibly for a short
distance beyond this point, otherwise it will soon fracture. With a
little ingenuity, silicone rubber sleeving and hot-melt adhesive can be
used to achieve the desired effect.

Never use a straight connection, always allow a fair degree of slack in
the braiding - ideally take it around a 90-degree bend or even a right
angle so as to distribute the bending. If there is no alternative to
having the end connections in line with the movement, form the length of
braid into one turn of a helix so that it behaves like a compression
spring.


--
~ Adrian Tuddenham ~
(Remove the ".invalid"s and add ".co.uk" to reply)
www.poppyrecords.co.uk

[Adrian Tuddenham]

the braiding - ideally take it around a 180-degree bend or even just a

[Phil Allison]

"Charlie+"

>
> Thanks for your suggestions, my sister managed to track down a source of
> the correct silver tinsel wire in UK (speaker repairers to the pop/PA
> industry) so problem solved as long as the RoyalMail doesnt lose the
> envelope!!

** Nice.

Far better to use the correct wire - cos even that is barely good enough
sometimes.


.... Phil

[Phil Allison]

"Phil Allison"

**Anecdote:

A few years ago, I had an Alesis brand monitor speaker (6.5 inch plus 1
inch) to fix - with a customer complaint of " no sound". An ohm meter check
showed a dead short at the terminals, but strangely the woofer cone was
moving freely under finger pressure.

Unscrewed the woofer and could hardly believe what I found - the woofer's
two tinsel wires were joined in the middle, like Siamese twins !!

After separating the wires, a test with low frequency sine waves revealed
the problem - with 60Hz to 80 Hz drive both leads vibrated towards each
other and it was possible for them to meet in the middle.

I had to shorten each lead by over 2cm and give them a 1/4 turn twist in the
terminal holes to fix the issue - then did the same procedure to the other
box in the pair, which proved to be almost as bad.



... Phil

[Ron Johnson]

On 16/08/2012 07:27, Charlie+ wrote:
> On Wed, 15 Aug 2012 17:51:49 +0100, adr...@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid
> (Adrian Tuddenham) wrote as underneath my scribble :

>
>
>> Close-woven braiding from screened cable can be used, even though it is
>> not ideal; if you thread cotton down the centre, it can help to
>> distribute the flexure over a greater length and will prolong its life.
>> Make up a hank of many strands of carpet thread and pull it through the
>> centre of the braiding with a loop of tinned copper wire.
>>
>> Even better than cotton is a single strand of spring steel wire, such as
>> piano wire. It needs to be carefully tinned before threading it through
>> the braiding, then it will solder to the end connections and distribute
>> the bending.
>>
>> If you solder any kind of flexible wire, there will be a sharp bending
>> point where the solder finishes. Try to support it flexibly for a short
>> distance beyond this point, otherwise it will soon fracture. With a
>> little ingenuity, silicone rubber sleeving and hot-melt adhesive can be
>> used to achieve the desired effect.
>>
>> Never use a straight connection, always allow a fair degree of slack in
>> the braiding - ideally take it around a 90-degree bend or even a right
>> angle so as to distribute the bending. If there is no alternative to
>> having the end connections in line with the movement, form the length of
>> braid into one turn of a helix so that it behaves like a compression
>> spring.
>

> Thanks for your suggestions, my sister managed to track down a source of
> the correct silver tinsel wire in UK (speaker repairers to the pop/PA
> industry) so problem solved as long as the RoyalMail doesnt lose the
> envelope!!
>

Doh! If I'd been paying more attention and realised you are in the UK, I
would have just said "Give Paul at Wembley Loudspeakers a call"

Ron

[spamtrap1888]

On Aug 16, 12:41 am, "Phil Allison" <phi...@tpg.com.au> wrote:

> **Anecdote:
>
> A few years ago, I had an Alesis brand monitor speaker (6.5 inch plus 1
> inch) to fix - with a customer complaint of " no sound".  An ohm meter check
> showed a dead short at the terminals, but strangely the woofer cone was
> moving freely under finger pressure.
>
> Unscrewed the woofer and could hardly believe what I found  -  the woofer's
> two tinsel wires were joined in the middle, like Siamese twins !!
>
> After separating the wires, a test with low frequency sine waves revealed
> the problem -  with 60Hz to 80 Hz drive both leads vibrated towards each
> other and it was possible for them to meet in the middle.
>
> I had to shorten each lead by over 2cm and give them a 1/4 turn twist in the
> terminal holes to fix the issue  -  then did the same procedure to the other
> box in the pair, which proved to be almost as bad.
>

Shows a shocking lack of process control at the speaker driver
vendor.

Years ago, I toured all three of Rola's speaker assembly plants: two
in Pennsylvania and one in North Carolina. Even though the assembly
was all by hand, everything had fixtures, including the tinsel leads.
The fixturing would have been designed around prototypes submitted by
the development department, so that manufacturing could match the
successful prototype. Even a pencil (tongue depressor, something)
would have been better than nothing. Or if the leads had to be that
long because of the speaker excursion, the designer would have picked
a wider terminal strip to keep the leads from knocking into each
other, with the holes in the cone punched to match. (I do remember one
smallish British woofer -- perhaps from a Celestion box -- that had an
amazingly long excursion.)