Upgrading QLS-1 crossover to version 2.

We did listen to some Tony Levin and his Chapman Stick! I have a bootleg of Fripp's Projekt One with Trey Gunn, Bruford and Levin, it's the very last time Bill played live with Fripp.

And we listened to The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life, (and Sgt. Pepper remaster too, their bass player is pretty good!)
 
Yea, I got to see Tony Levin, Bill Bruford, Chris Botti, and David Torn, live at The Birchmere, in Alexandria, VA. An awesome show. Tony slapping with his Funk Fingers. And Bill Bruford so smooth and relaxed. It looked like he was barely drumming, but you were hearing this incredibly detailed sound from him, with no effort on his part. Probably the best drummer I've ever seen live. Plus, Botti and Torn aren't easy to ignore. David Torn is a wizard at his electronics. Like a manic Fripp. Then, Chris Botti, a master on his trumpet. And I don't like brass, and he was amazing. All four so polished and effortless. Their Upper Extremities release is an easy recommendation.
 
I've seen Bruford a few times with King Crimson, Carl Palmer with ELP, Bonham with Zeppelin, Neil Peart with Rush, Keith Moon with The Who, Bozzio with Zappa, Group 87 and UK, and Bruford made the biggest impression! His four part drum solo (four separate rhythms, one with each limb, which all resolved to one beat) in '81 was spectacular to watch! The only drummer I ever saw who impressed me more was Jack DeJonette with Pat Metheney, Dewey Redmond and Charlie Hayden, talk about effortless!
 
chef free said:
Five hours of serious listening with an audiofool friend yesterday. DVD remasters of Jethro Tull's Aqualung and Yes' The Yes Album, the latest Tedeschi Trucks band album, recorded on all analog equipment, The Grateful Dead's One from the Vault, a multi track recording and Yo-yo Ma, Edgar Meyer and Mark O'Conner's Appalachian Journey. That's a lot of great bass players!

Chris Squire's bass sounded very Rickenbacker like, Phil Lesh plays the whole bass, each note had the same tonal quality and volume, no peaks or valleys here! But the shock of the day was Edgar Meyer's acoustic bass battle with Yo-yo Ma's cello, whether plucked or bowed, each sounded so realistic, it was "like they were in the room with us".

I'm so glad I took the plunge and got these new Watkins woofers!
Click to expand...

Some how I've missed this thread, Chef, I can tell by your descriptions that we have similar 'tonal' tastes, every artist/song/album you listed is high up on my personal list, so tell me, how loud were you listening?

how about playing some rob wasserman (rip) (say, the moon is made of gold, maybe?)

I wonder what the difference between the Watkins in my Ren 90's and the new ones is...
 
jazzmans said:
I wonder what the difference between the Watkins in my Ren 90's and the new ones is...
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, Watkins is only selling new 12" woofers. No 8" or 10" models, as used in the Ren's. So, I guess there's no way of knowing the differences.

Also, are your Ren 90 woofers IMG cones, like the Kappa's used? I always wondered about that, since the earlier Watkins drivers were (treated) paper or poly. And do they use the dual voice coil Watkins crossover circuit too?

Thanks.
 


They are an IMG cone, but very different from any of my other Infinity IMG cones, (Kappa, Crescendo, RS,etc)
I've never pulled them, but they're supposed to be a DVC, so I'd assume they contain the Watkins circuit. All I know the the bass, while not overwhelming, (they do not totally ROCK), it's amazingly accurate, and different bass sounds sound clearly different to my ears.

I I like 'em a lot, at this point they'll never leave my possession. I'd give up every other speaker I own first.
Sorry for the slight smear of the image, but they're playing as I took this, Love them.
 
jazzmans said:
Some how I've missed this thread, Chef, I can tell by your descriptions that we have similar 'tonal' tastes, every artist/song/album you listed is high up on my personal list, so tell me, how loud were you listening?

how about playing some rob wasserman?.
Click to expand...

It's tough to get a lot of volume out of these 82dB speakers, and they are so smooth and effortless that It's hard to notice how loud they're playing (until you try to talk to someone!). I'm pushing them with 400 watts but we measured the amps and they hit rated distortion at about 596 watts. I don't let the limit lights flicker, and I'm sitting about 4 meters from the speakers so I'm guessing peaks of 95-100 dB max.

I did play some of the AIDS benefit with Garcia, Weir, Wasserman and Joan Baez and some Warren Haynes with Rob too.

I started this thread to be about crossover coil "upgrade" but it turned into a thread about Watkins woofer upgrade!
 
Glad those woofers are working out. The qls sure soaks up the juice. My mc200 is somewhere around 300 at 4ohm and is stable to one ohm. Never went into protection but scares me sometimes. I bet those woofers will even sound better after a few more months of use.
Jim
 
slimpikkins said:
Glad those woofers are working out. The qls sure soaks up the juice. My mc200 is somewhere around 300 at 4ohm and is stable to one ohm. Never went into protection but scares me sometimes. I bet those woofers will even sound better after a few more months of use.
Jim
Click to expand...

The woofers just keep sounding better as I hear more different music, that's for sure! I played them "gently" for the first two days then I really ran them hard. These woofers love power, they really open up at volume. (Still can't hear any difference between the new and old coils!)
 
geoff727 said:
With different woofers, how would you be able to tell what you are hearing/not hearing from the new coils?
Click to expand...

They are a pair of new matching Woofers, they should sound exactly the same. One speaker has the original version one crossover coils, 6.4 mH on the midbass and 4.3 mH on vc-1, with the newer version two crossover caps, the other speaker has the version two crossover coils, 5.0 mH on the midbass and 6.5mH on vc-1, and the version two caps. So the ONLY difference between the speakers is the new vs. original coils, the values are different enough that I expected to be able to hear some difference.

(Or am I missing something obvious? It happens all the time!)
 
I'm curious.
A 2011 pic of Ak'er cdfac shows the new Watkins woofer with a fat surround roll, quite a bit fuller than the originals.
How about your new woofs?
IMG_2013.jpg
 
tubed said:
I'm curious.
A 2011 pic of Ak'er cdfac shows the new Watkins woofer with a fat surround roll, quite a bit fuller than the originals.
How about your new woofs?
View attachment 777552
Click to expand...
Yep, that's them! The foam sticks out about 1/4" above the frame, the older ones were lower than flush. The basket is about 1/2" deeper too. I like the black poly cone much more than the clear.
 
chef free said:
Yep, that's them! The foam sticks out about 1/4" above the frame, the older ones were lower than flush. The basket is about 1/2" deeper too. I like the black poly cone much more than the clear.
Click to expand...
I just happened to find some oddball surrounds with some fat wide rolls that had the correct dimensions for the Watkins basket.
Lots of excursion freedom.
I can't measure for correctness but I think they sound real good with these goofy surrounds:)

Enjoy!

IMG_1561.JPG
 
I have listened to these speakers with new woofers and two different sets of coils for a month now and I can easily hear differences. While I still haven't measures the resistance of the original coils, I can hear that the newer ones are quieter than the originals and I suspect the different impedance is at work there. That makes it hard to determine which set sounds "better". The speaker with the original coils, right side, sounds like the loudness is on when compared, in mono, to the left speaker with the replaced coils.

I have always felt that the Mid Bass Coupler doesn't mate cleanly with the woofer, the MBC seems too loud. From that point of view, higher resistance in the coil on the MBC seems like a good idea. But why did they switch from a 6.4 mH to a 5.0 mH? Doesn't that change the high frequency cut off to the domes?

I'm wondering if these new Watkins woofers could handle having those 1600uF caps in the crossover and not bottom out since the new ones have a little longer throw.
 
"I'm wondering if these new Watkins woofers could handle having those 1600uF caps in the crossover and not bottom out since the new ones have a little longer throw."
Hmmm, sounds like another project...thanks for the info on the erse coils. That is on my list of "to do's" when I get some time to try them.
 
totem said:
Didn't Bill bump out his new woofers to alleviate the bottoming out issue?
Click to expand...
That's exactly what Bill Jr. told me. I assume most of the testing was done with the 1600uF caps, I'd like to hear it that way since all my original woofer caps were leaking. It would be pretty easy to rig a 500uF with some alligator clips for a test run!
 
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