Just won these on Ebay......

[Mothman]

According to the second link they have paper cone tweeters. Not good IME

Martin I have absolutely zero expectations, but at 99p felt they were worth a look, out of curiosity if nothing else.

[Macca]

Martin I have absolutely zero expectations, but at 99p felt they were worth a look, out of curiosity if nothing else.

Yes for free effectively so what is the harm? Just recalling my own experiences with some very old Toshiba 'speakers - I never knew paper cone tweeters existed until then.

Anyway if the bass drivers and cabs are okay you could always slot in some new plastic dome tweeters for about a tenner.

[Mothman]

Picked the Bolivar's up today and and have to say they look alright. As expected the foam surrounds on the woofers have long since gone west but other than a couple of small dings in one of the cabinets they look to be in reasonably original shape, MUCH heavier than expected for cheap speakers and certainly far too good to be dumped. Now just need to decide whether to have a go at refoaming the surrounds myself or pay to get them done professionaly. I've never tried this before and apparently the voice coils need shimming which sounds tricky, however I'm loathed to spent too much on them as their relative obscurity means I am unlikely to recoup any money spent if I were to sell.

As these speakers appear fairly uncommon I'll try and take some pics when I get chance and put them in a seperate thread as a point of reference.

[Jac Hawk]

Picked the Bolivar's up today and and have to say they look alright. As expected the foam surrounds on the woofers have long since gone west but other than a couple of small dings in one of the cabinets they look to be in reasonably original shape, MUCH heavier than expected for cheap speakers and certainly far too good to be dumped. Now just need to decide whether to have a go at refoaming the surrounds myself or pay to get them done professionaly. I've never tried this before and apparently the voice coils need shimming which sounds tricky, however I'm loathed to spent too much on them as their relative obscurity means I am unlikely to recoup any money spent if I were to sell.

As these speakers appear fairly uncommon I'll try and take some pics when I get chance and put them in a seperate thread as a point of reference.

Have a look

[Beobloke]

Hmmm. I really would not recommend carrying out a re-foam without shimming the voice coil. It is only a simple matter of cutting off the dust cap and sticking some plastic shims down the gap between the coil and pole plate to hold the cone central whilst everything dries.

NewFoam in the USA (who I usually use for new surrounds) sell complete kits that include surrounds, dust caps, glue and shims and even Good Hi-Fi themselves sell dust caps, so I wouldn't ever take the risk of not shimming, personally.

[Analog Addict]

I refoamed a pair of 12" infinity bass drivers last year and decided not to cut off the dust caps but to use an alternative method of centralizing the voice coil:

Once I had cleaned off all the old surround, I bonded the new foam to the speaker cone and allowed the joints to dry. Once dry, I marked the outer circumference of the foam surround at four points 90 degrees apart. I then rocked the cone to the limit of travel in the two planes and made corresponding marks on the basket and then split the difference and made four central lines, again on the basket. It was then a simple case of aligning the marks on the surround with those four lines. The speakers work fine at all volume levels and no voice coil rub.

Incidentally I found the best way to clamp up surround to speaker cone and to basket was using modern plastic clothes pegs with flat jaws, but obviously it has to be done one joint at a time.

[MartinT]

I re-foamed a pair of JBL L100-T 12" bass drivers last year and was reluctant to cut the dust caps off because they were perfect, but it really is the best way to shim the voice coil centrally in the gap. The whole process took about three hours and was very successful. The speakers used to be mine but my friend loves them and we revitalised them in one enjoyable afternoon. Well worth the effort.

[MartinT]

I have just taken delivery of this:



It's an original direct cut. Guess what I'll be playing next?

[DSJR]

I've got the meOOOOOOsic in meh....

[MartinT]

I've got the meOOOOOOsic in meh....

LOL! But the IMPACT of this landmark hasn't diminished one bit.