Passive crossover newbie need your help.

[Rob41]

First off, thanks for the advice in advance.

I know almost nothing about crossovers and I'm not looking to reinvent the wheel with this project. I would like to end up with a much improved crossover for my speakers though. I have a pair of 28 year old Cerwin Vega PD-3's I bought new and want to improve. Out of necessity I replaced the original woofers with a pair of Dayton Pro-series due to their power handling and efficiency (I know, not exactly an audiophile method...or selection). I am pleased with the new woofers and the bass seems to be a bit more controlled to me. I then replaced the factory tweeters with a pair of Dayton PT2C-8's. Yes, another newbie mistake not even considering the crossover frequency for the very different driver. To be honest, I don't really hear much of a difference and in fact, I hear very little coming from the new tweeters. The PD-3's were originally rated to handle 400W and were fairly sensitive with an SPL of 104db @1w 1m.

I would like to get some input on weather or not I can make subtle improvements to the existing crossovers or if I should scrap them in favor of completely new crossovers. I took a couple pictures and they appear to my untrained eye to be relatively basic. Do the conductors for each driver usually fed from the same points? I would have thought there would be separate points for each driver. Maybe I'm looking at it wrong.

Anyway, I'd appreciate some input so I can figure out what I should do next.

[Inductor]

Originally Posted by Rob41

...Anyway, I'd appreciate some input so I can figure out what I should do next.

Take a picture (just for the sake of it), post, do nothing.
Phase must be all scr** out and the like with xover points & attenuation. The same with the alignment of the enclosure, etc, etc. 3-Ways (if that's yours) are the most difficult in relation to good design of the crossover (passive) and implementation if you want to know my opinion.

[Rob41]

Originally Posted by Inductor

Take a picture (just for the sake of it), post, do nothing.
Phase must be all scr** out and the like with xover points & attenuation. The same with the alignment of the enclosure, etc, etc. 3-Ways (if that's yours) are the most difficult in relation to good design of the crossover (passive) and implementation if you want to know my opinion.

Sorry, I really don't understand what you're trying to say other than you think it's all messed up.

Yes, it's my crossover is in the picture. Yes, I know it's pretty crappy compared to what most of the folks here have.

I'm not trying to have the end all beat all speakers. I just want to improve what I have to work with. Also, the three way toggle switch is supposed to control "presence" as CV puts it.

[Inductor]

Originally Posted by Rob41

Sorry, I really don't understand what you're trying to say other than you think it's all messed up.

Yes, it's my crossover is in the picture. Yes, I know it's pretty crappy compared to what most of the folks here have.

I'm not trying to have the end all beat all speakers. I just want to improve what I have to work with. Also, the three way toggle switch is supposed to control "presence" as CV puts it.

I know, you don't know. That's why I said take a picture (of the front) and leave it alone...
Don't want to be bad for you, but, as I said... 3-Ways are almost impossible for playing with, unless you design them from scratch, capiche?

[Rob41]

Thanks for the help Inductor?? But I'd like to hear from others here. I gotta believe with the wealth of knowledge and experience at this forum there must be more can be done other than leave them alone.

[Inductor]

You are welcome. They look nice anyway. Is there a Mid behind that little gray square in the middle, and no top tweeter (in the place of the old one) that you replaced with the new Dayton ribbon?

[AllenB]

Yes, it would be good to know which of the four drivers are currently connected, and if you can, indicate which of the components in the crossover pic are connected to each driver.

Considering the circumstances here I guess it would be most practical if you told us what you want more or less of and we could suggest a direction for you.

[Rob41]

Thanks. Yeah it's a small mid horn behind the foam square. The original tweeters are still mounted in their stock location even though they are no longer hooked up. I figure it will keep them from getting lost. lol

[Rob41]

Originally Posted by AllenB

Yes, it would be good to know which of the four drivers are currently connected, and if you can, indicate which of the components in the crossover pic are connected to each driver.

Considering the circumstances here I guess it would be most practical if you told us what you want more or less of and we could suggest a direction for you.

The tweeter center top is the driver not connected to anything. All other drivers share a common negative terminal as you can see by where they terminate on the crossover. The red wire feeds the woofer, the blue wire feeds the mid range horn, and the purple wire feeds the planar tweeter.

What I'm asking is (based on what you see in the pics) does it look like there is room to improve on the existing components of the stock crossovers IE, newer equivalents of better or newer materials, or could a higher quality crossover be bought or made?

Sorry, I didn't think I was asking such a vague question. I just figured with all the custom crossovers I've read about here that there would be a lot of room for improvement on a pair of almost thirty year old crossovers that were not at all audiophile to begin with. Someone once suggested to me that if I go with a linkwitz riley crossover properly designed for these speakers and drivers, I'd end up with much better sounding speakers.

[AllenB]

OK, nothing will make an improvement like getting the values right for this speaker, there is no such thing as a top shelf generic crossover.

The suggestion of Linkwitz-Riley is a little too vague to be of practical help. I think you first need to decide which drivers to use and where to cross them. There are a number of things that can be done after that.

What size is that woofer?