Repair your own speakers?

Twill

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Oct 6, 2007
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I've been rolling over the idea of whether or not to repair my old B&W DM601s for some time. The tweeters were both pushed in pretty hard by little hands a while back. I'm on a tight budget, and have other priorities that also need attending to elsewhere in my music-based life.

B&W can supply spare tweeter diaphragms for £50 odd the pair.

Question is, if I just get the diaphragms and replace them myself, will this solve the issue? I'm not familiar with the exact engineering of the tweeter unit, so I don't know if any other damage could have been done in the main unit, behind the tweeters, when they were pushed right in.

Speakers in general would appear to be such finely balanced boxes, I'm concerned that my trifling could cause even a slight variation in internal box conditions which might be detremental, such as not realigning the foam inside the box properly etc etc.

What do you think. £50 for new diaphragms seems a lot for £200 speakers that are 15 years old, but cheaper than a modern new replacement. It only seems worth it to me though if I can be reassured that a, my meddling won't upset the internal balance of the speaker, and b, a diaphragm replacement alone will do the trick because the rest of the tweeter should be fine.

Any thoughts?
 

MattSPL

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Sounds expensive :O
Did you get a price on a complete pair of tweeters?

Do the tweeters sound ok, but just look damaged?

The drive units are probably B&W made, so you don't have much choice unless you look for a used pair of 601's, or change the speakers for something else.

I wouldn't worry about disturbing the speaker by removing the tweeter, just take care and you'll be fine.
 

Twill

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I did, although I can't remember what it was as it was a while ago. I think it was £100+.

I agree that £50 for diaphragms only is a lot at 25% of the full original cost of some fairly old units. However, the temptation is that it's a lot cheaper than buying comparable new standmounters, and would free up cash for investing in hardware elsewhere.

I've fflip flopped on the issue a lot. I am currently thinking that £50 to have my trusty 601s sound as good as new is fine if it frees up funds, but not fine if the new diaphragms make little impact on the sound because I unintentionally mess up something somewhere else in the unit's configuration by fiddling.

thanks though.
 

bluedroog

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I’ve never replaced a tweeter but I have changed the bass / mid unit on a pair of B&W 602s, honestly it was a doddle. I’m not exactly a handy man by any stretch of the imagination but it was very straight forward. The tweeters may be a little trickier I just don’t know but I’d say go for it based on my experience. B&W spares and repairs service is first rate so if you got your self in any trouble I’m sure they’d be able to give you some guidance.
 

Sospri

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I have repaired the tweeter on a B&W CM1 speaker after it had been pushed in by tiny fingers, it was very simple I ordered the whole tweeter unit and just swapped over the wires.

Ring the service dept at B&W and I think you will find they are very helpful and will tell you how its done and what part you need......
 

moon

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Sospri said:
I have repaired the tweeter on a B&W CM1 speaker after it had been pushed in by tiny fingers, it was very simple I ordered the whole tweeter unit and just swapped over the wires.

Ring the service dept at B&W and I think you will find they are very helpful and will tell you how its done and what part you need......

Congrstulations on repairing your CM1's
 
A

Anonymous

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Twill said:
B&W can supply spare tweeter diaphragms for £50 odd the pair.

Er, just the diaphrams? I don't know much about speaker repair but it sounds like you'll need to be doing some work yourself to refit these diaphrams, they're not drop in replacements? Personally I don't think I'd have much success with this.

I googled "replace tweeter diaphragms" and saw there are one or two youtube clips showing how to do it, so you might want to have a go. £50 does seem alot for what is a chance you'll bodge the repair.
 
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Anonymous

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A little more googling showed some threads where replacement is discussed, its seems qite simple. To quote one person: "tweeter diaphram is 6 bolts and a twist."
 
A

Anonymous

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Hi, I have recently been searching for the same spares and I have noticed that some suppliers have stated that they have been requested by B&W not to sell parts directly to the end user. Without going into "cartel" conspiracy theories - this could be the reason replacement diaphragms are so expensive. I must admit that I am reluctant to pay £50 for a diaphragm. Loads available on ebay but regretably the same rip-off prices.

A real shame because they are great speakers (IMHO)
 

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