Exodus Audio

**bensl** · **10-14-09, 01:14 AM**

i have a tempest x driver powered by an oaudio 500w amp in a ~200l sealed box. recently i have been hearing a strange clacking noise from the driver so at lunch i pulled the driver out and found one of the 4 braids connected to the cone has come away. i have emailed the supplier (at audio marketplace) but he tells me it cannot be repaired and must be replaced. i trust what he says is true but i cant seem to get my head around how the whole drive can be written off by one little cord.

can it be repaired? what does the braid actually do?

majorly bummed out

**looneybomber** · **10-14-09, 09:50 AM**

Can you post a picture, because I don't know what you're talking about. I don't own that driver.

**bensl** · **10-14-09, 04:02 PM**

broken braid

closeup of the end

the good side

**byrne** · **10-14-09, 08:49 PM**

Ouch that is a electrical lead to one of the voice coils. I don't know if that can be fixed.

Your basically running on once voice coil right now.

**looneybomber** · **10-14-09, 09:27 PM**

Yeah when you said "braid" I thought to myself, does he mean tinsel lead? Sure enough you did. Well...are you able to resolder it without catching the cone on fire?

**bensl** · **10-14-09, 10:36 PM**

Quote:

looneybomber wrote:

Yeah when you said "braid" I thought to myself, does he mean tinsel lead? Sure enough you did. Well...are you able to resolder it without catching the cone on fire?

so can it be repaired? even buy a professional speaker repairer? the supplier said "it cannot be repared and must be replaced". surely a qualified repairer could do it???

im just getting mixed signals. some say yes, some say no.

**Kevin Haskins** · **10-14-09, 10:39 PM**

If you tore the tinsel loose, it is only running off a single voice coil. About the only way to tear one loose, is to massively overdrive the sub. I assume this was the last generation product because the we sew the tinsel into the spiders of all the current products. You cannot tear a tinsel lead out of the current ones without totally destroying a driver. The first generation Tempest-X had a traditional tinsel and under extreme excursion it might have been possible to rip one out of the coil. If you can re-solder it, you can probably salvage the driver. I'd make sure that you can move the cone through its entire range of motion without pulling on the tinsel, otherwise you will just rip it apart again.

We don't recone drivers so the reason you are getting that information from the distributor, is because that is our official policy. In order to assure quality, recones would have to be performed at our manufacturing facility. To return them there, and turn around and ship them back to you would cost more than a replacement subwoofer. It isn't so much that they are not repairable, just that it isn't cost effective.

Kevin Haskins
Exodus Audio

**bensl** · **10-14-09, 10:44 PM**

yes it is last gen. yeah i have been told i had the filter too low and to set it at 20-25hz next time. the driver still appears to work so im guessing it is ok. is there any way to know for sure. wouldnt it be better to have longer tinsel in the driver to prevent this happening? i notice on the new gen they seem alot longer.

**Kevin Haskins** · **10-14-09, 11:19 PM**

Quote:

bensl wrote:

yes it is last gen. yeah i have been told i had the filter too low and to set it at 20-25hz next time. the driver still appears to work so im guessing it is ok. is there any way to know for sure. wouldnt it be better to have longer tinsel in the driver to prevent this happening? i notice on the new gen they seem alot longer.

You straddle a fence with the tinsel length, too long and it slaps against the cone-spider and creates noise, too short and when it is overdriven you can pull it out. So it isn't as easy as it sounds using a standard tinsel.

What we do with all the current generation drivers is sew them all into the spider. They are not longer, just sewn into the fabric of the spider so they cannot slap, and it is impossible to pull them out without tearing apart the spider. Obviously before that point, the driver makes horrible noises and if you have sane amounts of power on it, and proper protection, you have plenty of time to turn it down before you damage it. I don't think it is even possible to tear apart the spider, the coil would probably self-destruct first.

With the current generation you almost have to try to kill them. I'm sure someone will prove me wrong but I've beat on them with several thousands of watts of power. The suspension will bang bang bang against its limits for a long time and you still don't get any damage. That is more than anyone should be doing in any normal setting. You can thermally kill them with continuous test tones at either high frequencies (>50-60Hz) or near the tuning frequency in a resonant build. Other than that, they are pretty bullet-proof.

If you want a newer one I'll talk to Stuart and have him give you some kind of credit for the pulled loose tinsel. Right now, running on a single voice coil you have effectively only half a coil, half the BL and you are definitely not going to get good results like that.

Kevin Haskins
Exodus Audio

**Ryan Anderson** · **10-14-09, 11:53 PM**

Quote:

Kevin Haskins wrote:

If you want a newer one I'll talk to Stuart and have him give you some kind of credit for the pulled loose tinsel. Right now, running on a single voice coil you have effectively only half a coil, half the BL and you are definitely not going to get good results like that.

Kevin Haskins
Exodus Audio

this guy is taking over the audio world. Anarchy by Exorcist Audio. huh.

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