Visaton 200Al as a replacement woofer

[ginetto61]

Good evening to Everyone !

I have found a couple of these speakers
http://www.musik-produktiv.it/img-00...031a-truth.jpg

with a broken woofer ... an anonimous plastic thing
Looking at it I decided to replace both
My intention would be to use a pair of Visaton 200AL

Visaton - Lautsprecher und Zubehör, Loudspeakers and Accessories

I read of electrostatic like transparency for aluminum woofer, so I am intrigued by the experiment
Anyone has experience of metallic woofers ? how do they sound ?
Thank yo very much and kind regards,

gino

[ginetto61]

Just to add the link to the above mentioned article
http://ai.kaist.ac.kr/~suh/DIY/feedback.html
A little dated nevertheless interesting, I think
Regards,
gino

[gfiandy]

Hi.

I am guessing these are active monitor speakers looking at the design.

Most plastic drive units are failry heavly damped at the top end so they often start to roll off about 2.5 - 3KHz. If you replace these without modifying the Xover with metal cone drivers with a response out to 5K (and a bit of a peak at that) it is likely that you will have too much energy in the 3K to 6Khz region, this will make the speakers very bright and probably a bit harsh sounding.

Regard,
Andrew

[ginetto61]

[QUOTE=gfiandy;1995125]
Hi. I am guessing these are active monitor speakers looking at the design

Good morning ! thank you so much for your kind reply
You are guessing right.
They have two lm3886 bridged on woofer and one other on the tweeter
Crossover is active and fixed at 2kHz and with 24dB/octave slope

Most plastic drive units are failry heavly damped at the top end so they often start to roll off about 2.5 - 3KHz.
If you replace these without modifying the Xover with metal cone drivers with a response out to 5K (and a bit of a peak at that) it is likely that you will have too much energy in the 3K to 6Khz region, this will make the speakers very bright and probably a bit harsh sounding.
Regard, Andrew

First of all I must say that I do not like plastic woofers, in general
The best ones usually come with paper cones
The plastic can't be as rigid ad paper and metal and this, on my opinion, soften the sound in a way that I do not like
I like sharp sound
I prefer to soften it at the forefront, maybe using even a tube amp or solid core cables
With the adopted crossover the woofer has very little chance above 2kHz
I hear that metal woofers can ring.
But I think that in the best type this should not happen
Unfortunately I cannot test the woofer before buying it
I have an active crossover that could give me the opportunity to power a woofer just in the 20-2000 Hz region so I could listen for myself
The main problem is this: blind buy.
So I am here to gather opinion
Thanks again and kind regards,
gino

[gfiandy]

I think these a behringer 2030 speakers, they should have come with plots for the drive unit responses. Do you have then? If so you could at least match the efficiency.

With a 24dB octave Xover at 2K hz you have a good chance of this sounding ok as the peak at 5KHz will be quite well attenuated. So long as the driver efficiencys are similar the balance shouldn't go out to badly. It is likely that the phase will be wrong in the xover region so you will probably get some amount of suck out arround 2KHz.

So long as the drivers arn't to expensive it probably worth trying. However don't expect them to have a flat frequency reponse in the xover region. ( I wouldn't use them for mixing as you could get unpredictable results)

If it was me I'd contact Behringer and see if you can get a replacement woofer. You may not like polymer drive units but it is what the system was designed and tuned for, so you will probably get a better result that way. If you plan to use them for mixing I would definately recomend getting a replacment driver.

Regards,
Andrew

[ginetto61]

Originally Posted by gfiandy

I think these a behringer 2030 speakers, they should have come with plots for the drive unit responses....
If it was me I'd contact Behringer and see if you can get a replacement woofer.
You may not like polymer drive units but it is what the system was designed and tuned for, so you will probably get a better result that way.
If you plan to use them for mixing I would definately recomend getting a replacment driver.
Regards,
Andrew

Dear Andrew your words convince me that is better to give up on the project
I made a mistake buying speakers with plastic woofers
I shoud have first selected the drivers, then think at the best way to power them
I feel I risk to harm the speakers
Maybe for getting some experience I should start selecting a good pair of passive speakers and then to try to biamp them
So much less risky after all
Thank you for your suggestion that have made me understand better all the problems involved
Kind regards,
gino