Good drivers in INDIA?

[goldyrathore]

I am an audio enthusiast looking for good drivers available in India (Bangalore if possible). Brands like Vifa/Focal etc are unheard of. Even Peerless which is manufactured in Bombay is not available locally. I intend to build a two way system with 24 db/octave Linkwitz/Riley crossover active system (TDA1514 based amp). My existing Floorstanders (home made) use Philips silk dome with Bolton polypropylene 7'' Woofer in a 19mm MDF cabinet totally filled with polywool. All they do is make some noise. Maybe its the lack of crossover which is to be blamed(in the name of crossover i have put just a capacitor with the tweeter). But anyway, I do not have any high hopes on the drivers either. I need to experiment with the crossover as well as active Bi-amps to prove my doubts of having bad drivers.

[herm]

Went to this site Vifa-speak

Clicked on distibutors - India and got this info

Nova Audio Pvt.Ltd.
8, Punam Co-op Society
29/30 Rd.No. 5
Union Park
Mumbai - 400 052
India
Tel: (91) 22 600 2012
Fax: (91) 22 496 3465
E-mail: novaudio@vsnl.com

Although looking at the map, Mumbai is fairly far from
Bangalore...

Check with Navin, I'm sure he'll know some good places
to get drivers ...

[navin]

no no no..nova moved its office.

in fact they are moving to a bigger place as we speak (this weekend).

best way it get nova is call.

6007700.

what do you need. email me. i can check them out.

also what is your budget. vifa/ss etc are not cheap here. also nova will only order boxes so doyou need 12 6"ers? nice if you are building a big HT / AV system.

you can import direct. i think dst will direct you to thailand. speaker are now OGL 50% duty, 28%CVD compunded it works out to paying Rs. 80 / USD.

Hope this helps.

let me know what you need. looks like you'd be better of with a 6" and 1" or 5" and 1". if your tastes run to rock etc (no jazz/claissical etc...) then the 8" peerless (denmark) CSX + 1" might work too (recessed midrange).

enjoy.

[navin]

oops....someone out there already recomended me :-)

well there is a small secret to the way i operate.

1. the word is always out that if anyone has small quantities of drivers (2, 4, 6) etc. and the drivers are good and need a home to call me. this way i got my last batch of vifa's. the ones that we on sale we shielded but i haggled and asked for a pair for non shielded 6" and 1" as an incentive for taking the shielded. cost rs. 700 each.

2. once in a while (in my younger days when a fiend and i were bachelors) we pooled together and imported 6 8546, 2 9900, 2 9500, 2 HM170Z0 from europe. these were legally imported at a time when they were a licence was required. we bought the licence on the open market

3. CMM , a local company represented Focal and Morel. They imported samples. I visited them as they were also agents of senheisser and again i negoatiated to pick up their senheisser focal and morel samples as they could not ake a got of either of those brands. built a MTM using 8N515 and MDT33. later used these with the 170zo above to built a watt/puppy lookalike. (discussed in a another post when the amp went dc and blew all the voice coils).

4. dynaudio was imported into india in 1989-90 by R&S electronics. one day i get a call asking me if i want any drivers so i pick me up the following. 24W100 x 2, 17W75 x 2, D52af x 2, D28af x 2, and D21af x 2. built a 3 way resembling the theil cs3.5 and a 2 way resembling a systhesis LM200 out of those.

you get the picture.

[RobWells]

Hi Navin, goldyrathore,

I know you guys are having problems getting drivers. What happens if someone posts them to you as a present? Do you still have to pay duties if they're marked as a gift?. If you dont then why not get someone on the forum (probably not UK as we pay more than most other countries) to get them for you and post them over. You could even order them from the company to be delivered to that person, and just post them the cost of postal..

If you want me to do this I'd be happy to, just check out the UK prices first

Rob

[navin]

Rob, you underestimate the Indian customs.

They have their own reference for drivers. If I bought them in the US and shipped them with an altered invoice they would know. they are manuals on every product.

The Indian bureaucracy is heavily overmanned. for example there are 1 million tax officers for a total of 5 million tax payers. Yes only 5% of the country pays income tax.

agriculture which employs 80-90% of India is tax free.

I have imported drivers (SS) once directly from a german dealer. The german dealer out of an act of good will included a pair fo Audax 6" without including it in the invoice. the hell we had to go through to prove that we were not smuggling! that was terrible.

i alos imported 6 (4 for me) 12" from Audio Concepts. 1 arrived damaged. it took a while to get it repaired here. the insurance (which i had) refused to pay for it saying that it must have been damaged before it was picked up. Audio concepts were willing to repair it but there was no way i could sent it back without incuring duties and taxes when i import the 7th driver.

the best way I find is...
1. get a bunch of guys so we can import 6-12 of each drivers at a time.
2. make the package big enough that it can be man handeld. that mean the pakcage should be 25-30kgs. that is a lot of drivers.

[r_s_dhar]

Goldyrathore,

Where do you get your caps and good quality resistors for your active crossover?

My PCBs for this project have been lying around for years for the lack of good quality caps. Where I live, I only get those polyester green caps.

Do you know of any good mailorder shops in Bangalore? I have just sent an email to Navin asking for such shops in Bombay.

[Vivek]

Hi and here we go again. Rathore, see the t/s parameters for Indian drivers thread on the loudspeakers forum. You will probably get answers for all your questions. I am sure Navin will agree with me.

Cheers

[navin]

to make life simple.....here's the link...there are 20 pages+

t/s specs for indian drivers

[goldyrathore]

Hi r_s_dhar,

I have used readily available Bolton 2 way crossover. It has an inductor and two caps. No other info. I was just going thru on of the threads and anshu says he can has measured the Xmax of poly coned Bolton to be 6mm. Thats too good for a 6 incher. I am using IMW series Bolton poly coned woofers. I am looking at realigning the woofs for a Push/Push sub. Hope to get better results. Recently there has been a lot of activity in audio industry. You see systems everywhere. Hope the situation of availability of good drivers improves.