Topic: magnepan IIIa

[raymonda]

I finally got around to modding the crossovers and rewiring my beloved Maggies. I used Solen fastcaps and MIT Multicaps....metalized film caps. Rewiring consisted of 14 and 18 gage teflon silver plated wire. I also put new socks and meloxained some loose wires. This is something that needs to be done every 5 to 7 years due to deteriorating chemicals......really an easy job......but coupled with everything else it took me roughly 8 to 10 hours from start to finish. Last year I replaced the ribbons......so now I have......what I consider.....a better than new IIIa's. So far everything seems to be burning in nicely. I have about 10 hours into them and I would assume more will change. At this point the most dramatic change is the low end is much tighter.....a change I welcome. Well see if that holds true moving forward. At this time I happy with the mod.

I'll post pictures later but there isn't much to see now that they're closed up.

[Gutbucket]

Cool.  I've long wanted to hear a well setup pair of Maggies do their thing.  Just never had the chance.

BTW, what is meloxained?

[raymonda]

Cool.  I've long wanted to hear a well setup pair of Maggies do their thing.  Just never had the chance.

BTW, what is meloxained?

If you are ever in and around Ithaca stop by. Maloxaine is the chemical Magnepan uses to adhere the wires to the mylar. It has a shelf life and the wires need to be re glues every so often. In this case there was only minor issues but since they were open I took care of them so I can be worry free for another 5 to 7 years when I'll need to do it again.

[Gutbucket]

Got it.  I suppose if that adhesive starts to fail the motive magnetic force applied to the wires begins to pull them from the mylar diaphram, which is inertially damped by the air on either side of it.

Thanks for the offer, if and when I find myself around Ithica again I'll drop you a line.  The relatives I used to visit in Homer on my way through to Syracuse passed away years ago.  It's been more than 20 years since I last visited the finger-lakes region.

[raymonda]

Got it.  I suppose if that adhesive starts to fail the motive magnetic force applied to the wires begins to pull them from the mylar diaphram, which is inertially damped by the air on either side of it.

Thanks for the offer, if and when I find myself around Ithica again I'll drop you a line.  The relatives I used to visit in Homer on my way through to Syracuse passed away years ago.  It's been more than 20 years since I last visited the finger-lakes region.

Actually the wires are on the other side of the mylar away from the magnets. What happens is that the ends curl up and the speakers start to buzz. It is best to avoid this. Now a days magnepan uses aluminum foil instead of round wire. It has better adhesive properties and thus less likely to delaminate.

[Gutbucket]

With foil traces it sounds akin to the 80's era Infinity EMIT drivers.  I have some '86 era RS4B speakers stored away I should restore.  One of them has a blown tweeter protection device (a small solid-state fuse-like device, probably impossible to find now, might just have to eliminate them) and the caps in the x-overs probably need replacement, but the drivers and cabinets are in good shape.  back when I was driving though Ithica I had those things boxed and stacked where the passenger seat should be in my old '73 convertible beetle.  They barely fit in there, with the passenger seat disassembled and stashed behind the driver's seat.  Funny the things we do for the love of music.  Worth it, though.  Those things treated me well for almost 20 years.

[raymonda]

Here are the final shots. Really not much to see and I wish I had taken pictures while doing the mods with everything opened up.

[Chilly Brioschi]

Beautiful!

Would you know if I should I be doing anything special to the Martin Logan hybrids?

[raymonda]

Beautiful!

Would you know if I should I be doing anything special to the Martin Logan hybrids?

Check out Audio Asylum and look in their planar section for tweaks and mods.

[raymonda]

Replaced caps for the bass section of the planar driver. The caps were too big to fit into the the Maggie's crossover box, so, I drilled a some holes into the box, placed rubber grommets into the holes, to avoid sharp edges, and mounted the caps on the top of the box by running cable through the holes. I then secured the caps to the box by, again drilling holes, adding rubber grommets and tethering them down with Zip ties. If I go the path or replacing the inductors I will need to using a larger box, which can cost extra cash. I would also replace the binding post, too. However, that would add and extra $200 to the project and I'm not ready to go there. Maybe over the next 12 months or so.

Anyway, here is a shot.

[raymonda]

Replaced caps for the bass section of the planar driver. The caps were too big to fit into the the Maggie's crossover box, so, I drilled a some holes into the box, placed rubber grommets into the holes, to avoid sharp edges, and mounted the caps on the top of the box by running cable through the holes. I then secured the caps to the box by, again drilling holes, adding rubber grommets and tethering them down with Zip ties. If I go the path or replacing the inductors I will need to use a larger box, which can cost extra cash. I would also replace the binding post, too. However, that would add and extra $200 to the project and I'm not ready to go there. Maybe over the next 12 months or so.

Anyway, here is a shot.