Need help with speaker crossover

[Niko]

Thank you guys for support!
The Alcemist...now I see that googling the pictures on web I have seen yours pictures of crossover. Very nice work I must say!
It is not the first time for me to solder. I have the cheapest soldering iron and don't do it often but did all my interconects and power cables so I have some experience.
Have changed speakers in my car couple years ago.
But never did crossover till now.
Also I did not mix bass and tweeter units...Fountek Ribbon even has color crimp terminals so you can't mix neither + or -




This is not my field...so the thing that is not going into my head is that it is so sensitive if not really good connection.
How come that does not happened if you just twist speaker wires on terminals...and it is actually better not to solder connections like bananas and etc. ...they work like that without a problem.
Will try tomorrow last time to disconnect all the components and clean wires,terminals, solder again.

[Niko]

[fatmarley]

From what I'm reading, It looks like you may not have removed the enamel off the inductor wire properly. I use a Stanley knife to scrape the ends. Just keep turning and scraping until there's only bare copper left. Tin the end with some solder and attach It to wherever It goes.

If you have a multimeter, you could check the inductors for continuity before connecting the crossover up.

[Niko]

Hi guys!
Just to let you know...I have tried today again cleaned everything...scraped with stanley knife then with sand paper until just copper left.
Soldered again and did not have success.
So after nice week enjoying working on cabinets last 4-5 days with crossovers left bitter taste in my mouth.
I don't want to waste more time and nerves on them.
Will pack it and send back to Ivan and pay him to do it for me.
Never felt so disappointed...but that's life.
Thanks for all the tip and support!
Cheers!

[system7]

I think you must be just missing something here. Such a simple circuit and biwired makes it easier still.



I can see the bass coil here is making no contact at all at the bottom. It's still enamelled, for instance. I always leave leads long on capacitors initially since they are most easily heat damaged. Coils should be at right angles ideally, but that is minor. I don't know why the design is wiring 3R with 2.4R. A single 5.6R would do! With crimp connectors, it is a good idea to double the wire back on itself to make it fatter for a good crimp sometimes. And you do have to line a crimp up so metal meets metal.

Soldering with modern unleaded needs at least a 40W iron and clean surfaces. 5 seconds most. Otherwise let it cool down and try again.

BTW, don't assume red is positive with Fountek ribbons. Troels Gravesen found that Fountek JP3 is consistently wired unconventionally.

[Niko]

Hi systemZ!
That is first picture before soldering when I was just twisting wires.
I have tried with soldering yesterday and today again after cleaning,using sandpaper etc.

Here is one picture when I started soldering again today.
I know that maybe is not the best joint but I think is good enough.


I don't know can I damage tweeter if I try other way around for + and - just to see if that was problem.
I can't hear it at all....actually I was hearing some really low sound but somewhere about where are amplifier speaker terminals so I said:That is it....I give up!

[system7]

It's probably getting a bit late in Croatia now, but I had to do my homework here.

We have a current Hi-Vi M6N or older M6A which are almost identical:
http://www.swanspeaker.com/asp/produ...view.asp?id=79

A Fountek NeoCD3.0 93dB ribbon tweeter.
http://www.fountek.com.au/products/NeoCD30/

Here's another Paul Carmody ZX Spectrum project that uses the Hi-Vi M6A with a more efficient ribbon.
https://sites.google.com/site/undefinition/zx-spectrum

And here's the IPL S2TLM page:
http://www.iplacoustics.co.uk/S2tlm%20Ribbon.htm

It's all a bit short of space on the back of that connection panel shown previously, but you're looking OK.

We're really wondering where the bad connections could be. I'd suspect the crimp joints. I'd suspect the screw on connectors to the terminals and all those nuts and tags, which can loosen when you turn a speaker connector. Even the loudspeaker cables and plugs. Not much to go wrong with soldered joints really. Once you are happy with the connections, you'd cut the soldered joints shorter.

I think somebody mentioned using a multimeter on the crossover. Possibly safest and best with the drive units unconnected since ribbons are delicate.

So from the bass positive input on the back of the speaker, to the output of the coil, you should get 0.58R or whatever the resistance of the bass coil is.

From the tweeter positive to the end of the two resistors should be 5.4R.

I really can't be at all sure about this positive polarity and red thing on the tweeter, beyond looking further into Troels Gravesen's comments that he found the opposite on the JP3.

Fig. 62a. Fountek JP3 ribbon seen from the rear.
According to international standards, a driver should have the positive terminal marked in such a way that when a positive voltage is applied to this terminal, the membrane shall move outwards.
This is NOT the case for the Fountek ribbon. Initially I assumed the terminal with the red ring terminal was PLUS.

Quite confusing, isn’t it? I only know of JBL that decades ago kept using a reversed polarity policy opposite to all others.
Well, I wasn’t aware of this until I had to re-check the layout schematics for the Acapella and the TJL Loudspeaker.
All schematics in the files have been correct, and the listening tests performed have naturally been conducted with correct polarity being performed after measuring the SPL response from the various constructions.
But a number of people may have been confused and taken the red ring terminal for PLUS. I have pointed out this to the Fountek Company and I’m waiting for their response. To my knowledge all pictures of Fountek drivers show this configuration.

It's actually very hard to hear an out-of-phase tweeter. It ought to sound a bit diffuse and unlocated at crossover frequency. It does no damage wired wrong, just sounds and certainly measures wrong.

What a long post. Lastly the simple schematic as a guess, and a very rough estimate of frequency response. This really ought to work.

IPL S2TLM Guess Circuit.PNG IPL S2TLM Rough FR.jpg

[system7]

These photobucket pages usually disappear quickly when subjected to the demands of the Forums...



But I was looking closely at this one and it is a shocker. Look at the blue tag by the yellow coil. You can't twist solid wire round a speaker tag and hope for a good connection. If you did that with mains, the sparks would fly and the smoke would go up!

I try to solder EVERYTHING. Or good crimps with multi-strand speaker cable.

[Firebottle]

Good post #17 Steve

[Niko]

Thank you systemZ for putting so much effort in yours previous posts!

Some things I want to clear out again!
First I like good sound so I enjoy music every day...but...I am not expert in field of constructing crossover.
I am pretty "picky" when doing DIY things if that is a good word to chose.
So I try to do things as good as I can and I triple check everything before testing.

I know...I know and I want to repeat...Please don't judge by looking on my first try when I was just twisting wires without soldering(the one you can find on photobucket)

I did it like that just to test before soldering to see does it works...and it did not work.
I did not know that I can't do "dry" connection for testing so after that and after I got the answer from Ivan(IPL) and some people here(Thank you!) that it won't work properly without soldered joints, and that all wire ends must be scraped so there is no insulation left on the inductor wires , just twisting together is not good enough.
And I did that and again the same.
So I did it yesterday again-third time...take the solder off...cleaned everything...scraped with stanley knife then with sand paper until just copper left. Not just wires from capacitors,inductors etc... but inner side of every speaker terminal where the connection will go. Soldered again and did not have success.

I must say that you have helped very much with information about reversed polarity of Ribbons because I have tried it now other way and actually there is some sound but again so low that I suspect that is OK. So if I conncect wires how I think the + and - are no sound at all,if I do it reverse how you have suggested than really barely hearing some sound.
Considering the fact that when listening music on my old Monitor audio speakers I don't go more than 35-40 on amplifier and testing now either bass unit or tweeter here I can barely hear anything on 45 I think that something is wrong.
It is either how I have constructed and connected crossover or something else. I must say also that I am not testing drivers inside the cabinets but just out alone.

Another thing for example...if I just put speaker cable on speaker terminals on MA speakers it already works so I would leave out possibility and suspect on the screw on connectors to the terminals on this speakers. And I have screwed and twisted everything like crazy on this one.
Speaker cables are also fine...never head any problem with them loosing connectivity(I'm using "fork" type spades on them).

To answer on yours first question why the design is wiring 3R with 2.4R. Ivan have put them like that in design so that one resistor can be changed to give a bit more or a bit less treble...if is to high than you can put higher value then 3R ,and if treble to low you can put lower. The bass can be tweaked by varying the amount and position of the long haired wool.
That is why I have choose these speakers in first place for DIY.

But as I said before I was thinking that constructing crossover is not a rocket science and that I will manage to do it without a problem...but it looks it is for me
Especially when looking on people posts on building different types of IPL speakers...no one mentioned any trouble with crossover...or with Ribbon polarity.

Last...here is schematic for bass and tweeter from IPL acoustic instruction paper.

As you can see everything is how you have guessed....just in bass scheme 1.5R comes after 6.8 uF.

Since I live in a small town here I can't find anyone that is in that field to see where and what I am doing wrong,nobody heard about Ribbon tweeter and TL type of speakers so I am pretty by myself in problem.
I have send some pictures to people that know the basics and they say it should work...at least the bass unit without any problem.

So I think the best way to be 100% sure is that I send crossovers back to IPL so Ivan can construct them for me and check them on the same type of drivers.
Many thanks to you again systemZ...many thanks everybody!
It is nice to have people here on this forum that really want to help.
Cheers!