My almost-5 year old 2912 left channel has developed a strange digital 'squeal' that's coming from a specific spot bottom left section of the speaker. Somewhat ignorable when playing stuff but still unacceptable given the quality of these speakers overall.
Trying to record it with a phone .. you can hear it clearly https://recorder.google.com/share/57968ffd-d5b6-49a2-af4b-9387dc51fec4 increasing in volume when mic is close, but the digital squeal nature of the sound is somewhat lost. Best I can describe it is that an old PC of mine long ago piped noises my harddrive made into the soundcard output (fun). Somewhat uneven noises.
How does an analog speaker even create this noise?
More importantly, anyone know if this is an easy fix (I'm not super skilled but I can replace a cap or two.)?
Trying to record it with a phone .. you can hear it clearly https://recorder.google.com/share/57968ffd-d5b6-49a2-af4b-9387dc51fec4 increasing in volume when mic is close, but the digital squeal nature of the sound is somewhat lost. Best I can describe it is that an old PC of mine long ago piped noises my harddrive made into the soundcard output (fun). Somewhat uneven noises.
How does an analog speaker even create this noise?
More importantly, anyone know if this is an easy fix (I'm not super skilled but I can replace a cap or two.)?
Most likely there is a leakage path or a corona discharge. It is usually caused by dust or other foreign particles internally.
I had the same (in a different model) and strange enough, it stopped squealing after a couple of weeks. But there is no guarantee yours will do so.
I had the same (in a different model) and strange enough, it stopped squealing after a couple of weeks. But there is no guarantee yours will do so.
Mine actually had this literally the first 10 minutes after I turned them on for the very first time but then it fixed itself. Perhaps the particles might shake themselves down if the speaker is used a bit more. I guess I'll wait a little while again. I'm somewhat lucky quad homebase is close to where I live. Man + van is pretty straightforward.
It's most likely a bad diaphragm in your panel. In the latest quad panels, they have changed the stator glue, but were having problems with what I call "diaphragm rot" where the diaphragm get cut-like little splits in it.
You either need a new panel or to have that one rebuilt.
Sheldon
You either need a new panel or to have that one rebuilt.
Sheldon
Did anyone urinate at it, a cat for example? I know from experience with a pair of ESL-63s that the dust covers are not necessarily sufficient to protect against that.
Particles? Try discharging the membrane and tap the speaker. It shouldn't help with intact dust covers but you never know your luck.
Sheldon's is an expert. Good luck.
Those 2912's sound so great till they fail. When Quad sold out to overseas manufacturing it seems Q is for quality departed also.
You might want to skill up in DIY Quad panel repairs if you are going to keep them. Theres a lot of panels to fail yet:
Turn it off, I assume. How long until this is done? minutes? hours? days perhaps?
Def true (I heard) for 989s but I would hope the 29xx's are better
Ha .. or drive to huntingdon a lot
Passive membrane discharge will take many hours after switching off at the wall, so overnight would be good, but I dont have Quads so Im just guessing 🙂 The fanciful notion is if some debris was within the stator from shoddy construction and its somehow dislodged and got stuck on the membrane with electrostatic charge, it might be dislodged after discharge and gentle tapping into a spot where its again innocuous. Good luck.
I hope your 29xx's are better then 989s. Did you read Sheldon's expert advice and the ER Audio comment? Road travel has damaged modern Quads with the vibration, so transporting them for repair is not so comforting. Get a quote first anyway. Make sure your sitting down and have locked the Scotch away.
I hope your 29xx's are better then 989s. Did you read Sheldon's expert advice and the ER Audio comment? Road travel has damaged modern Quads with the vibration, so transporting them for repair is not so comforting. Get a quote first anyway. Make sure your sitting down and have locked the Scotch away.
Ha, interesting theory but I think both my kid and my wife are properly potty trained by now. No pets.
Discharging the membrane can take anything from seconds to hours depending on the humidity level, at least for ESL63s.
I sometimes switched them off before switching off the audio (#). On wet days, you would hear the sound fade away in seconds. On dry days, if you turned everything off, came back an hour or two later and first switched on the audio signal and then the loudspeakers (#), the loudspeakers would play at almost the normal volume before they got turned on.
I didn't intend the text to become italic and bold, but the forum software interpreted my reference to a footnote as a command to make things italic.
(#): Never do this at high volumes, because the crowbar protection kicks in sooner when the ESL-63 is off.
I sometimes switched them off before switching off the audio (#). On wet days, you would hear the sound fade away in seconds. On dry days, if you turned everything off, came back an hour or two later and first switched on the audio signal and then the loudspeakers (#), the loudspeakers would play at almost the normal volume before they got turned on.
I didn't intend the text to become italic and bold, but the forum software interpreted my reference to a footnote as a command to make things italic.
(#): Never do this at high volumes, because the crowbar protection kicks in sooner when the ESL-63 is off.
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Ha, yes, a bit of whisky will help with the repair bill. Quads are fairly tempramental sadly, my previous ones (ESL989s) also needed a trip to mommy even twice, but eh, I live near London so it wasn't a huge deal. Not surprised travel makes it worse but i'm a gentle driver 😉
Yes seen the ER link but eh, Rob from Quad has been a straight shooter for a while, if some membranes need replacing I'm sure they will do 'ok'.. but indeed not for free.. still, tinkering by myself.. also scary. I'm worried I'd just make it worse.
Yes seen the ER link but eh, Rob from Quad has been a straight shooter for a while, if some membranes need replacing I'm sure they will do 'ok'.. but indeed not for free.. still, tinkering by myself.. also scary. I'm worried I'd just make it worse.
I have a pair of 2912's that I bought for an embarrassingly small amount of money because the previous owner was in exactly your situation. He spent a HUGE amount of money to ship one speaker out to have a panel replaced. He got it home and another panel went bad in the other speaker within a month or two. He just wanted them gone at that point. My panels were new enough that the stator glue was changed and the stators were well attached. For some reason the diaphragms were failing, see attached pic for the condition I've been calling diaphragm rot
I don't know what the current state of the quad panels are that are currently being manufactured and if they still have diaphragm rot, only time will tell. I can tell you that there's a good chance you are going to be dealing with other panels going bad. So mentally prepare for the cost and hassle of that.
I believe a complete repanel of those speakers is about $3500 in panel costs from quad, but I'm not 100% sure of the prices these days. I do a complete rebuild of the quad panels on that speaker for $2000, but I'm rebuilding your existing panels. The real killer is the cost of shipping them any great distance. They are big enough and heavy enough that freight is your only option.
Good luck and I'll be glad to answer any questions you might have.
Sheldon
I don't know what the current state of the quad panels are that are currently being manufactured and if they still have diaphragm rot, only time will tell. I can tell you that there's a good chance you are going to be dealing with other panels going bad. So mentally prepare for the cost and hassle of that.
I believe a complete repanel of those speakers is about $3500 in panel costs from quad, but I'm not 100% sure of the prices these days. I do a complete rebuild of the quad panels on that speaker for $2000, but I'm rebuilding your existing panels. The real killer is the cost of shipping them any great distance. They are big enough and heavy enough that freight is your only option.
Good luck and I'll be glad to answer any questions you might have.
Sheldon
Attachments
Interesting stuff, thank you for all that detail.
Diaphragm rot - that's a really strange phenomenon. I wonder if the material is being overstretched and when it fails it leaves tears? Arcing looks more like part of the film has melted in a spot, like someone touched a soldering iron against it, right? What did your speaker sound like when it actually looked like the picture?
Are there any manuals out there on how to disassemble a 2912? I'm tempted to open mine up purely to inspect the damage and see if it's this problem or something else completely, as well as checking if I should send in my other speaker as well. Certainly not feeling confident enough to truly take it apart but removing the outer layer of the onion might be worthwhile
I thankfully live near Quad HQ so I can fairly easily drive over there but if this is a structural problem with 'all' 2912s then perhaps it would not be unreasonable to ask for a recall...
Good luck with that. How many years are you out of warranty? Four? Whats the expected life of an ESL in consumer law?
Quad will happily replace the panels. Will you replace them one by one or just do the lot and repeat in five years?
Thats unlikely. Doesn't look anything like a tension tear:
More likely a bad combo of substandard Chinese film and a new reactive coating causing degradation with charge, oxygen and time. Suggestions that the Chinese did that on purpose have no basis in evidence. Just cause the Chinese peddle fake parts that fail early doesn't mean Quad did that intentionally.
Here's a fun one: the squeal just... stopped. All is fine. After about 3-4 days of having an.. electrostatic virus.
I did turn it off for a few hours and banged the top somewhat (pretty gently really but if it were a human it'd be angry 🙂 )
But that didn't help, at least not immediately. After another day of squealing it.. returned to normal.
Weird.
I did turn it off for a few hours and banged the top somewhat (pretty gently really but if it were a human it'd be angry 🙂 )
But that didn't help, at least not immediately. After another day of squealing it.. returned to normal.
Weird.