Cigarette smoke and speakers - a bad mix??

If they are cheap... dirt cheap and the covers have been in place, why pass 'em up?

Drunks, kids and pets cause more destruction.

I wouldn't think smoke can effect sound quality. The only thing it might effect is the color of the grills maybe.

If you're a non smoker (and/or) find the smell of the speakers offensive, have the grills changed out or re-covered. You could also wipe down the speaker with Furniture cleaner.

I've got an LP I bought two years from a store where cigars are smoked regularly. The cover still smells (though the cigars smell better than cigarettes), and it was a new sealed lp with the wrapper now long gone.

Not at all a bad mix...cigarette smoke and speakers. A worse mix would be drinking and driving with your speakers.

Aside from the smell, which lasts forever and is obnoxious, the residue from the smoke can actually corrode various materials used in speakers.

Best Regards
KvE

While everyone has valid points here I believe the odds of smoke actually making its way into the internals of these speakers is very slim regardless of their heavy smoking, smoke rises up ^^. I believe wiping down with murphy's oil/furniture polish and airing out the grilles for a bit should help greatly, buy these and use them to the fullest.

Use Shout stain remover on the grills and rinse with a garden hose or in the shower.

I bought a pair of speakers that used to belong to a smoker. Besides wiping the cabinet down (which turned the paper towels a disgusting brown color), I soaked the grills in warm water with a combination of 'Woolite' and 'Zout' and rinsed thoroughly (I could do this because the grills were all plastic.. wood or particle board, and this might not be an option for you). Then, I wiped all the drivers down carefully. They still smelled a little bit, so I removed all the internal damping material and replaced. After all that, no hint of old stale smoke. If the price is right, it's worth the effort.

I might also pull out the driver from any ported cabinet and wipe out the inside and replace the batting.

^^^
I wouldn't.

If they still smelled after removing the grille I would.

Highly unlikely that the batting in the enclosure has become that stinky. The port pushes air out... not sucking air in (unless polarity had been reversed).

Points:
Removing the drivers can cause damage.
Removing the batting is easy.
Properly replacing "new" batting could be a problem if it's not the same material and/or reinstalled properly.

Personally... if residual cigarette smoke is that big of an issue, buy a bottle of Fabreeze and squirt your port daily.

So where does all the air come from that is pushed out? Heavy smoke smell is hard to get rid of and attaches to everything.

The tar from cigarette smoke makes everything sticky. Dust gets trapped in the tar and is recoated with another layer, over and over again. It has a negative effect on nearly everything it touches...

*chuckle* What!? The port is a helmholtz resonator. Wiki it.


Rebuttal points:
-You can also cause damage to people on sidewalks when driving your car. Just be careful (ie, don't let the screw driver slip and poke a hole in the surround) and everything will be fine.
-Yes it is easy to remove the batting/fill.
-Properly replacing is just as easy and can even be modified to change the low end frequency response to better match the owner's room. Many speaker builders/designers spend time tweaking the amount of fill they use for the best possible sound in their environment. It's inline with those who try different room treatments to get the best sound in their room.


If that's a joke I laughed with you.

TM1Abrams has a point. Where does the air come from?

Point again...
If you remove the speakers and dick around with the fill and it's not done properly, you've compromised the integrity of the speaker/enclosure/design.

If residual cigarette odor issue is an issue, don't buy the speakers. Also... don't buy speakers from those that fart, cook or own a pet.

No different than buying a used car. If the previous owner was a smoker, I wouldn't suggest that anyone should attempt to remove the carpet, headliner and reupholster the seats without experience.

Either way, take your best shot and do what works best to provide the best results without a large effort/expense.

Where does the new air come from? It can't continually expel air without taking in new air!

I got my Monitor 70s from a smoker - they reeked of smoke so I wiped the outside down a few times with greased lightening and a cloth which turned the cloth a nasty brown. Then wiped the drivers down which turned the cloth brown also. Took a few times but got it to where the cloth wasnt brown anymore, and now they're fresh as a daisy.

Me too, without a doubt. Insulation is cheap.

Actually air passes both ways through the ports. When the drivers have positive voltage applied they move outward as they do when your avr puts voltage to them. This makes them suck air through the ports. When voltage is removed and they return to the original position pushing air out. The driver is acting like a piston changing the volume of the enclosure as it moves, in a sealed enclosure the air acts as a spring as it can't escape and is compressed, but in vented it passes through the port.

When a woofer is being driven hard and you feel the air moving at the port, the driver is violently moving back and forth producing sound waves.

So yea they speaker will pull smoke into the enclosure.

Okay...
Personally I don't care.

Y'all win. But I will throw this out... sealed enclosures suck air also. But, they push more than they pull.

As I said, if anyone has a problem with cigarette smell residue, don't buy the speakers (or anything). I still don't recommend a novice removing drivers and replacing the innards.

Have a nice night and a good day tomorrow.

Sorry you can not push more air than you pull, that just does not make sense. Cigarette smoke is unlike most food odors in that it not only attaches to the surroundings very well but also does not dissipate very quickly. Smoke smell in carpets pretty much will never go away even with repeated washes, and no I would not buy a car from a smoker.

Super!
Where does air come from with a sealed enclosure?

As for carpets and home furnishings... have you been to a home that uses curry, garlic, onions, cumin, seafood products or oil regularly? After a few months, sweaty armpits smell better.

Odors can be offensive no matter the source. Cigarette nazis are worse.

Not sure what you mean where does the air come from? The air is pushed and pulled just like the driver is pushed and pulled.

And where did the hostility come from?

Best ignore him, rationality left the moment he used the excessively cliched ad hominem
association of Nazism and whatever he does not agree with.

Never mind some of the other nonsense used to bolster a false premise.

Best Regards
KvE

Makes perfect sense in a sealed design. Alot more air outside the cabinet to be pushed than will be drawn internally. ALOT more.