Quad ESL-63 Repairs

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I started blundering down the path of repairing a speaker and realized I have many questions so I thought I would put up a post and hope someone is out there who knows what I'm talking about:

1) I have one stator on the non-membrane side (Mid/Treble) that needs to be completely removed and re-glued. I de-soldered the contacts for the wiring and I'm wondering if anyone has any tips on the best way to re-solder them, it seems like it could be some tricky/ugly soldering.

2) I have a corner that has come loose on another stator. I don't want to take it all apart but how to I ensure all the old glue has been removed before regluing? It seems like if I pull the stator back to get in there more glue starts to fail at neighbouring spots.

3) What would be a good replacement wire for the connections between the two mid/treble panels? I'm reusing all the other wire.

4) I am going to gauge the tension required in the diaphragm by using stacked coins. I have a reference from good panels that it takes 31 nickels for the membrane to touch the stator on a bass panel ( I realize this may transfer some coating to the stator). The mid/treble stator is only 24 nickels. Does that make sense? I thought the mid/treble is supposed to have more tension.

5) While the "good" panels don't have holes they have spots of white material, maybe 20 or so. If I'm going to re-membrane two mid panels out of 4 does it make sense to go the whole way and do the other two as well or should I try and maintain original stock as much as possible?
 
1 Soldering is no problem, not too hot so the plastick melts..
2 remove the stator completely, clean, reglue..
3 old wire is ok, never use thicker copper, rather thinner copper wire if you have to replace. And use "fat" plastic insulation, PTFE is best.
4 tension is getting weaker efter some years..
5 you can use a razorblade to scratch the surface free from debris. Try on the really bad panels first. It works very fine.

Martin
 
they all have the the same tension bass or mid panels and a resonance of 71Hz while playing alone. i can recon that there are some failures every now and then but i got some panels 25+ years old, although stators fail all over, all membranes are all still 70-72 Hz.
pretty good i would say
 
i preffer different fs on the panels to some extent... but thats me :)

well the original is not. since they all end up giving a 50 hz resonance. its damped to extend the low ferquency(without creating a peak and without hitting the stators). if you tension them higher it wont extend and create a peak. if lower lower it will over extend. it will extend a bit lower but with slightly lower spl. but biggest problem is it wont reach the max aloud voltage before it hits the stators. everything is pretty much there for a reason. it is really impressive. nothing is by coincidence. (at least thats what it looks like.)

Btw ESl63 how can you get a higher resonance with the panels ? its impossible with 3 micron to be honest(at least for me). lower is posible and quite easy :0 just tension to the max without any heat and wait :)
 
I de-soldered the contacts for the wiring and I'm wondering if anyone has any tips on the best way to re-solder them, it seems like it could be some tricky/ugly soldering.

Strongly suggest you put some kind of splatter shield between the wire and stator when soldering the delay line and power wires back.
It is a good idea to do this during disassembly too; especially if you know the panel is still good.
This is to prevent any solder splatter from getting onto the diaphragms destroying it.
Some use pieces of foil stuck into the cell.
My trick is using playing cards cut to fit into the cell and is easily removable after soldering and securing the wire to the plastic matrix.

The suggestion to use PTFE jacket wire is excellent; that is if you are going to change the wiring.
 
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