Ageing of ScanSpeak 8542 woofer?

[TroelsM]

Hi.

I have a couple of SS8542 woofer. They are approx 10 years old. Never been exposed to direct sunligt. Never abused.

I'm not using them at the moment and thinking about selling them. As the price would probably be low, I would rather like to keep them for some future project.

But, what kind of life-expancy should I expect from these units? They have foam-surrounds and post here on DIY indicate that they might go bad after 5-10 years. (Mine are still good).

If I do a re-foam at some point will the rest of the unit still be in good shape?

My current speakers are a pair of Scansyna10 (without the vent, and with alnico ScanSpeak units). They could be older than me (+30) and still in perfect condition. That puts things in a perspective...

Any ideas?

Regards TroelsM

[badman]

I dunno but I'll give ya $10 fer 'em!

Actually, depending upon treatment and other factors, foam can last a lot longer than 5 or 10 years. I've seen 25 year old foam still doing its job, but that's rare. More recent foam formulations and coatings have made it so that a 25 year lifespan should be pretty common. The ScanSpeaks probably have relatively high quality foam so you could well get another decade (or more) from them.

Depending how they were stored, suspension sag is possible. This is tougher to correct but with some care, you can bring them back into alignment with a DC bias and a heatgun.

But, they're probably fine, good for you!