[blake18]

Hey all, looking to upgrade my crossover networks on my Klipsch RF-3 ii towers, RC-3 ii center channel, and RS-3 ii's. I know I need to keep the values of the resistors and capacitors the same, but I am not entirely sure which parts I need. I know Madisound and Parts Express have the parts I need, I'm just hoping someone knowledgeable about crossovers could link me to the parts that would be best to upgrade.

Here is a link to the crossover schematic of the RF-3 towers -https://community.klipsch.com/index.php?/topic/144465-crossover-schematic-for-rf3/

Here is a thread on it at the Klipsch forums, but I still can't seem to find an itemized list of parts, like which exact capacitors and resistors... https://community.klipsch.com/index.php?/topic/152035-newbie-looking-to-upgrade-crossovers-on-my-reference-rf-3-ii/

 

[Jay1]

Hey all, looking to upgrade my crossover networks on my Klipsch RF-3 ii towers, RC-3 ii center channel, and RS-3 ii's. I know I need to keep the values of the resistors and capacitors the same, but I am not entirely sure which parts I need. I know Madisound and Parts Express have the parts I need, I'm just hoping someone knowledgeable about crossovers could link me to the parts that would be best to upgrade.

Here is a link to the crossover schematic of the RF-3 towers -https://community.klipsch.com/index.php?/topic/144465-crossover-schematic-for-rf3/

Here is a thread on it at the Klipsch forums, but I still can't seem to find an itemized list of parts, like which exact capacitors and resistors... https://community.klipsch.com/index...o-upgrade-crossovers-on-my-reference-rf-3-ii/

Changing out the parts isnt really going to be of any benefit IMO. It would be nice to measure the drivers without a crossover and then redesign the crossover. That woofer low pass circuit is pathetic looking for a speaker with metal coned drivers. People blame listener fatigue on the klipsch horns when it is far more likely from woofer breakup.

 

[blake18]

Changing out the parts isnt really going to be of any benefit IMO. It would be nice to measure the drivers without a crossover and then redesign the crossover. That woofer low pass circuit is pathetic looking for a speaker with metal coned drivers. People blame listener fatigue on the klipsch horns when it is far more likely from woofer breakup.

Hmm, Dean from the Klipsch forums (a pro at upgrading Klipsch XO's) seems to think upgrading the caps and resistors yields a very big performance upgrade..

https://community.klipsch.com/index.php?/topic/152035-newbie-looking-to-upgrade-crossovers-on-my-reference-rf-3-ii/page-3#entry1851013

 

[Jay1]

Hmm, Dean from the Klipsch forums (a pro at upgrading Klipsch XO's) seems to think upgrading the caps and resistors yields a very big performance upgrade..

https://community.klipsch.com/index...s-on-my-reference-rf-3-ii/page-3#entry1851013

I didnt see any measurements in that post. Might as well "upgrade" your cables too

 

[notnyt]

designing or modifying XOs without measurements is silly.

 

[blake18]

designing or modifying XOs without measurements is silly.

While I agree in general, I can't say I do when it comes to simply upgrading components with ones that have better quality, but retain the same values.

 

[Tip24/96]

While I agree in general, I can't say I do when it comes to simply upgrading components with ones that have better quality, but retain the same values.

Upgrading the parts on that Klipsch crossover won't give you any noticeable difference in performance. Who ever is filling your head with that garbage is either severely misinformed or is part of that "golden eared" audiophile crowd that thinks cables make a significant difference as well. I see this a lot on KlipschForum, and honestly feel bad for the poor Joe's that waist money on things like this when they could have taken different upgrade paths that would have indeed made a big difference.

For example, while changing out the stock caps, inductors ect...will not yield any noticeable differences, what WOULD make a noticeable difference would be to have someone who is skilled in the art of designing crossovers, like Tux and MTG90, measure the raw drivers inside the cabinets of your Klipsch speakers and come up with a totally new crossover design that improves upon what Klipsch originally did, which would likely make for a pretty nice upgrade!

 

[blake18]

You must realize that Dayton 1% tolerance caps and Mills 1% purity resistors sound much MUCH better than stock... That is not "golden ear garbage"...

 

[Jay1]

You must realize that Dayton 1% tolerance caps and Mills 1% purity resistors sound much MUCH better than stock... That is not "golden ear garbage"...

Why must they sound much better? The tolerance only has to do with the value given on the component, that's it. A typical poly capacitor has a 5% tolerance, that means for example a 10 uf capacitor could be anywhere from 9.5-10.5 uf. If you've ever designed a speaker you would know that minor changes like this only result in very minor changes in the desired response. Think about this, if your speaker design required ultra precise 1% tolerance parts and any minor variance would cause the response to be severely compromised why wouldn't those parts be included in the factory crossover? You dont think the engineers at Klipsch know the tolerances on the crossover parts they are allowed to use?

The only real upgrade that should be done to a stock crossover is replacing NPE caps with poly caps. And that is because NPE caps go bad over time.

 

[blake18]

Why must they sound much better? The tolerance only has to do with the value given on the component, that's it. A typical poly capacitor has a 5% tolerance, that means for example a 10 uf capacitor could be anywhere from 9.5-10.5 uf. If you've ever designed a speaker you would know that minor changes like this only result in very minor changes in the desired response. Think about this, if your speaker design required ultra precise 1% tolerance parts and any minor variance would cause the response to be severely compromised why wouldn't those parts be included in the factory crossover? You dont think the engineers at Klipsch know the tolerances on the crossover parts they are allowed to use?

The only real upgrade that should be done to a stock crossover is replacing NPE caps with poly caps. And that is because NPE caps go bad over time.

Good point on the tolerance, and DeanG on the Klipsch site did mention that fact. He is also a VERY trusted source on the Klipsch forums and does entire Klipsch crossover rebuilds that are quite impressive. Klipsch has had him over to their HQ to have him show them how he achieves such great improvements by modding the crossovers, so I would say he is very trustworthy. He's been on there for years and never had anyone unhappy with his mods. He is guiding me on doing these mods and I definitely trust his advice. It is quite well documented that Dayton caps and Mills resistors are far better quality than stock parts, and yield quite noticeable improvement to the sound.

 

[notnyt]

Yet there are no before and after measurements

 

[Tip24/96]

Good point on the tolerance, and DeanG on the Klipsch site did mention that fact. He is also a VERY trusted source on the Klipsch forums and does entire Klipsch crossover rebuilds that are quite impressive. Klipsch has had him over to their HQ to have him show them how he achieves such great improvements by modding the crossovers, so I would say he is very trustworthy. He's been on there for years and never had anyone unhappy with his mods. He is guiding me on doing these mods and I definitely trust his advice. It is quite well documented that Dayton caps and Mills resistors are far better quality than stock parts, and yield quite noticeable improvement to the sound.

No offense to either you or Mr. DeanG, but I highly doubt that Klipsch asked him to come by their facilities and show them "how he gets such great sound". lol! I am highly certain that the engineers at Klipsch know everything that he knows, and more. I am also highly doubtful, and would be willing to bet actual cash that changing the caps and resisters in the stock crossover to Dayton and Mills would offer any noticeable, or measurable differences. I like to read on Klipsch forum every so often, but, there is a lot of utter nonsense and tons of unsubstantiated bro/science going on over there.

 

[BruceGA]

No offense to either you or Mr. DeanG, but I highly doubt that Klipsch asked him to come by their facilities and show them "how he gets such great sound". lol! I am highly certain that the engineers at Klipsch know everything that he knows, and more. I am also highly doubtful, and would be willing to bet actual cash that changing the caps and resisters in the stock crossover to Dayton and Mills would offer any noticeable, or measurable differences. I like to read on Klipsch forum every so often, but, there is a lot of utter nonsense and tons of unsubstantiated bro/science going on over there.

They have, actually. A lot of what he builds are almost a cost no object build. Klipsch is building for a cost performance ratio. Paul Klipsch, as well as most companies do the same. Measurements often don't tell the whole story. As the old story goes, amps with all the same specs will sound the same, but they don't. Speakers that sometimes measure terribly can sound wonderful. SET amps with high distortion characteristics sound magical in the right setting, driving the right speakers. Noticeable and measurable are often two different things.

There IS a lot of smoke and mirrors on the Klipsch forums on occasion, but on the whole, if you pay attention, you will get sound advice (no pun intended).

 

[18Hurts]

Interesting

I have re-capped a few old crossovers, went from electro to poly and it made a difference. Not hard to improve a crossover that has dried out 20 year old electros that were leaking. Last year a friend had some PA type speakers from 1968 with a simple coil and cap crossover AND the woofer was not stock. Did some measurements, designed a 2nd order XO for the two-way and used a rheostat for the horn--it sounded much better and he could tweak the adjustment to match his hearing damage.

If you HAVE to mess around with the passive crossover, there is a way to play around with what it will do without blowing massive amounts of money on parts that make no measurable difference--use a PA amp with crossover functions built in. We did that with the 1968 speakers since any information was long gone and it used a different woofer. After messing around with the active XO for awhile, he heard the combo that he liked and measured well.

If your speakers are around 15 years old and you want to upgrade the crossover to retain the stock sound--change the caps. If you want to improve the sound or your speakers are only a few years old--that is much, much harder. Alas, as with most things--doing it right is much harder than a simple parts swap. It goes along the lines of speaker wire and power cords--very easy to change though--a fool can do it. The downside is it does nothing to improve the sound quality but it sure is easy to do!

Have fun with the dark art of crossover building...

 

[robotc]

Hi Everyone

I just discovered this thread and joined the forum to add a bit of information to the discussion. I am in the process of redesigning the crossovers in my Klipsch RF3 speakers and have lots of measurements.

The attached graph shows the woofer fr measured at 1 meter.

The top trace is the woofers measured in the enclosure without a crossover. The cone breakup around 4.5kHz is obvious.

The middle trace is the woofers measured through the original Klipsch crossover. The cone breakup is still only a few dB below the lower frequency output. The crossover has a nominal crossover point of 2kHz according to the Klipsch data!! But still a lot of sound output above this.

The bottom trace is the woofers through the Klipsch crossover(slightly modified) with a notch filter added.

I would be interested to see similar measurements made on crossovers modified only by changing the type of coil or capacitors but keeping the original values.

Robert

 

[Jay1]

Hi Everyone

I just discovered this thread and joined the forum to add a bit of information to the discussion. I am in the process of redesigning the crossovers in my Klipsch RF3 speakers and have lots of measurements.

The attached graph shows the woofer fr measured at 1 meter.

The top trace is the woofers measured in the enclosure without a crossover. The cone breakup around 4.5kHz is obvious.

The middle trace is the woofers measured through the original Klipsch crossover. The cone breakup is still only a few dB below the lower frequency output. The crossover has a nominal crossover point of 2kHz according to the Klipsch data!! But still a lot of sound output above this.

The bottom trace is the woofers through the Klipsch crossover(slightly modified) with a notch filter added.

I would be interested to see similar measurements made on crossovers modified only by changing the type of coil or capacitors but keeping the original values.

Robert

Thank you! That backs up everything I've said in this thread. Upgrading the components without changing the values will not alter the frequency response. The cost of adding that notch was to much for the klipsch profit margin...

Reasons why commercial HiFi is broken.

 

[357]

Reasons why commercial HiFi is broken.

So exactly why is it broken?

 

[Jay1]

So exactly why is it broken?

There are more reasons then I can think of in one sitting. The reason quoted was explained was it not? Speaker manufacturers like Klipsch will rather save $10 in crossover parts instead of properly optimizing the frequency response. Or they are allowing the false detail of a metal cone breaking up to work toward a quick sell in the show room, knowing that fatigue will set in shortly after owning the speakers. Nothing wrong with any of that right