scobbi Posted October 12, 2019 Posted October 12, 2019 Yep I got a quote from them also and it seemed as though he was just plucking figures out of the air ( got quotes for other items too to send with the Princesses ). Another member actually posted that the P and S in Hobart was outrageously expensive.
vur Posted October 12, 2019 Posted October 12, 2019 Defray your transport costs with other people by including other freight inside them. In the case of Sovs and Black Knights they can double as coffins. 1
kelossus Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 (edited) Just an update. Had a few of the mid-ranges go open circuit. Was able to get them repaired as only the braid wire had corroded. Was able to keep everything original including the spider. They have been out of commision for a week now and I only got to listen to them briefly in the first place. Upon firing them up this morning I am still taken away by their sound. I have had near every vintage JBL, modern JBLs, Marten's, Sonus Faber's. These are the best speakers I have owned. Only thing that comes close is the 250TI's but even the Princess has the wood on them (going by memory). Given the price of the Crown Prince/Princess they are one of the biggest bargains in hifi. You could easily double the price and the performance is justified. I am just blown away. From the build quality, the look of the speakers and the sound....They do it all. Edited October 18, 2019 by kelossus 8
frednork Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 20 minutes ago, kelossus said: Just an update. Had a few of the mid-ranges go open circuit. Was able to get them repaired as only the braid wire had corroded. Was able to keep everything original including the spider. They have been out of commision for a week now and I only got to listen to them briefly in the first place. Upon firing them up this morning I am still taken away by their sound. I have had near every vintage JBL, modern JBLs, Marten's, Sonus Faber's. These are the best speakers I have owned. Only thing that comes close is the 250TI's but even the Princess has the wood on them (going by memory). Given the price of the Crown Prince/Princess they are one of the biggest bargains in hifi. You could easily double the price and the performance is justified. I am just blown away. From the build quality, the look of the speakers and the sound....They do it all. And the good news is they respond really well to crossover upgrades and internal wiring upgrades!!! 1
kelossus Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 (edited) 2 minutes ago, frednork said: And the good news is they respond really well to crossover upgrades and internal wiring upgrades!!! That is definitely on the cards. Do you keep the coils and just change the resistors/capacitors? Chris. Edited October 18, 2019 by kelossus
frednork Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 4 minutes ago, kelossus said: That is definitely on the cards. Do you keep the coils and just change the resistors/capacitors? Chris. Prettymuch but you don't even need to do all of the capacitors and resistors but of course you can
kelossus Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 6 minutes ago, frednork said: Prettymuch but you don't even need to do all of the capacitors and resistors but of course you can Do you have a picture of the updated crossovers? Did Kiat do the upgrade?
Guest kab Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 (edited) I only kept 2 pairs of speakers over a 25 year or so period all the others i tried came and went. Yamaha NS1000 and Duntech Crown Prince great speakers enjoy. Edited October 18, 2019 by kab
Sub Sonic Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 1 hour ago, kelossus said: Just an update. Had a few of the mid-ranges go open circuit. Was able to get them repaired as only the braid wire had corroded. Was able to keep everything original including the spider. They have been out of commision for a week now and I only got to listen to them briefly in the first place. Upon firing them up this morning I am still taken away by their sound. I have had near every vintage JBL, modern JBLs, Marten's, Sonus Faber's. These are the best speakers I have owned. Only thing that comes close is the 250TI's but even the Princess has the wood on them (going by memory). Given the price of the Crown Prince/Princess they are one of the biggest bargains in hifi. You could easily double the price and the performance is justified. I am just blown away. From the build quality, the look of the speakers and the sound....They do it all. Great to hear. Glad it all worked out! SS 1
frednork Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 10 minutes ago, kelossus said: Do you have a picture of the updated crossovers? Did Kiat do the upgrade? I initially asked Kiat if he could do it and he convinced me as there was nothing fundamentally wrong with the crossovers it was uneccessary to change out all components and so a not too difficult DIY job.. Apparently the caps used in these do not deteriorate like some other types. In fact he only suggested changing very few components as that is where the majority of benefit is but I decided to change a few more in the end. The bits cost around $400 in the end but pushes the speakers well and truly into this century IMO. So you may have to spend a lot lot more to better them after the upgrades. I have some pics I will add when I find them. He recommended Mundorfs so i went with them and that is what they use when they replace them. I can also send a circuit diagram of my crossover if you want to look at which ones you may want to replace or not. There seem to be a couple of slightly different versions, so definitely worth checking. If you have basic soldering skills it should be a doddle. There is some good info here https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/215019-understanding-john-dunlavys-crossover-designs-crown-prince.html and also the circuit diagram for another version of the crossover and in hindsight some good suggestions on replacing with different combinations of cap values to what is in the original and if I had known then what I know now I may have followed some of those suggestions. Will post up some details of what was suggested and what I did soon
frednork Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 Found the pics Here are some Duntech did and here are mine and some closeups and more pics and schematics this is onefrom the link I posted earlier Duntech Full.pdf and mine (bass section) mid tweet I have all these in Xsim if you want the files to see what everything does 3
kelossus Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 (edited) @frednork You are a legend mate. Thank you very much for that, particularly the schematic I will replace all the resistors with MOX/Superes and replace the caps in the mid/tweeter section. On a side note I heard a pair of Dunlavy's SCIV awhile back. I was not impressed at all so I was a little hesitant to buy the Princess'. Edited October 18, 2019 by kelossus
frednork Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 41 minutes ago, kelossus said: @frednork You are a legend mate. Thank you very much for that, particularly the schematic, the Crown Prince network is different even factoring out the attenuation controls. I will replace all the resistors with MOX/Superes and replace the caps in the mid/tweeter section. On a side note I heard a pair of Dunlavy's SCIV awhile back. I was not impressed at all so I was a little hesitant to buy the Princess'. No worries mate, glad to help. Its also good to get this info posted here for all to use. Is the tweeter xover section the same with the different tweeter? Interesting regarding the Dunlavy's, I have wanted to hear some, but no luck so far. In a way am not surprised as I think a lot of the magic of the Princesses/crown prince and Sovereigns and other models is the Dynaudio drivers.
kelossus Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 4 minutes ago, frednork said: No worries mate, glad to help. Its also good to get this info posted here for all to use. Is the tweeter xover section the same with the different tweeter? Interesting regarding the Dunlavy's, I have wanted to hear some, but no luck so far. In a way am not surprised as I think a lot of the magic of the Princesses/crown prince and Sovereigns and other models is the Dynaudio drivers. I will pull out the crossovers before ordering the parts to confirm the values. Will check the tweeter circuit then. The SCIV's I heard had Vifa drivers....The bass was nothing like Princess, the whole speaker was a little underwhelming and the build quality wasn't as nice. I disagreed with the owner as I reckon they weren't real veneer but vinyl laminate. Does anyone know what year the Princess was manufactured? 1
tubularbells Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 (edited) Here's a scan of the original documentation that came with my Sov's Scan 2019-10-19 07.38.18.pdf Edited October 18, 2019 by Tubularbells 1
AudioGeek Posted October 18, 2019 Posted October 18, 2019 @kelossus i vaguely remeber you were using a deqx with your jbls Have you considered using the deqx with the CP, or having a play prior to redoing thecrossovers?
kelossus Posted October 19, 2019 Posted October 19, 2019 4 hours ago, AudioGeek said: @kelossus i vaguely remeber you were using a deqx with your jbls Have you considered using the deqx with the CP, or having a play prior to redoing thecrossovers? That is an interesting thought. I don't really have any other quality amplifiers to use in a 3-way active setup. Best I could do is biamp them. I am shying away from the Deqx as it is limited to PCM 24/96. Makes having a DSD capable DAC pointless.
AudioGeek Posted October 19, 2019 Posted October 19, 2019 Know exactly what you mean, i had to put away my dsd dac recently, and i do feel it was better, particularly with hqp. However active vs passive will probably make much more of a difference than pcm vs dsd. A flea powered amp should do for the tweeters
Silver Audiophile Posted October 19, 2019 Posted October 19, 2019 Duntech- Australia's finest speaker manufacture, pairs up with Australia's finest amplifier manufacturer, Halcro!
VAF Posted November 5, 2019 Posted November 5, 2019 Just rolling through this thread, thought I'd throw in some details - I've got more than a little history with Duntech so happy to help answer any questions on this topic. The crown prince and the princess (same speaker) have Dynaudio 24w75 woofers with D28AF (later D28/2) tweeters. the mids are scanspeak 13M8640 paper cone. Early 13M's were notorious for the magnet letting go with a hard knock or drop and this would jam the voice coil. Simple to tell, you can clearly see if the magnet is off centre by looking at the back of the driver, also the cone doesn't move!! You should be able to gently move the cone with your fingers, it's got at least 3mm of travel. If it doesn't move at all, there's your problem.... We used to easily collect the magnets out of these in failed units with a simple knock on the floor and the pole piece and backing would just come away with a pull. I must have had a stack of these a meter high. I noticed someone said replacement for the D28 could be the morel MDT32 - yes, this driver was made as Morels equal and is a nice little tweeter - it was used in the Duntech PCL25, D100 and D200 models. Also later in the Gemstone series. All these models had Morel drivers. Also, early ones had terrible corrosion problems at the back of the external solder point. Early drivers had a thinner magnet, about 12mm with later models being about 18mm. The earlier models was PCL1000 and PC1100 which was the crown prince and princess numbers, PCL standing for Pulse Coherent Loudspeaker. The redesign and later models were designated C for Classic series and only the Princess C5000 was made. Until the later C5500 Prince came along with all new drivers but using the 13M8636 Kevlar midrange. The aluminium washer on the back of the woofers is essential and helps realign the damping on the 24w75, without the washer the alignment goes way out and is underdamped. Sounds terrible without it. the foam on the back does nothing but try to stop bugs! It disintegrates with time anyway as did the foam surrounds which were OK for several years in the right climate, but ultimately all will fail. I'd be surprised to know of any originals still operating. We were the first to change these over to rubber surrounds and the first to make the 30W100 in this way before Dynaudio changed and stopped supply to all OEM's. Original Solen caps were used and are very stable - however definite improvements can be made with changing inline caps in mids the tweeter. On the Black Knight, which was the marketing name used to sell into the USA and also sold into Aus, the drivers are all dynaudio. Later called the Regent the only change was the tweeter from the D28AF to the D28/2. Mids and woofers continued to be 17W75EXT and 30W100. the felt on the woofers is important and helped control a resonance in the polyprop dust cap which reared up in the midrange - same treatment and reason for use on the Sovereigns. Felt on the 17W75EXT was for the same reason. There was a little mass loading going on as well so the felt is important. The Sovereign used the 17W75 standard, not EXT as the extended frequency response wasn't needed on the Sov being a 4 way rolling in to the D52AF (later D52/2) dome mids. Just for info, the Princess was chosen by several recording studios for their mastering speakers as the mid balance and detail was very natural. The Dunlavy SCIV was probably his most popular speaker after going back to the US and starting DAL. It was a VIFA line up, as was the Duntech Marquis PCL500, and later C4000. Having custom W21 woofers which gave the Marquis a perfect .707 critically damped bass response to 45Hz and off the shelf M10MD mids and D26TG tweeter. Dunlavy had the theory, if it measured correctly then it must be correct. Didn't matter about the cost of the drives, as long as they reproduced the measurements he deemed they needed to it was fine. Nice theory, but a little flawed. But that's another story. Anyway, hope that's of some interest. Don't hesitate to ask if you have questions - I'll try to stretch the memory! Cheers! Simon 11 1
Ahh- Schnoo Schnoo Posted November 5, 2019 Posted November 5, 2019 Thanks Simon Great info and very interesting as a Crown Prince owner
kelossus Posted November 5, 2019 Posted November 5, 2019 @VAF Thank you very much for the info Simon. Just a question regarding the SCIV, how do you think the Princess/Crown Prince compares?
vur Posted November 5, 2019 Posted November 5, 2019 On 18/10/2019 at 9:32 PM, kelossus said: @frednork You are a legend mate. Thank you very much for that, particularly the schematic I will replace all the resistors with MOX/Superes and replace the caps in the mid/tweeter section. On a side note I heard a pair of Dunlavy's SCIV awhile back. I was not impressed at all so I was a little hesitant to buy the Princess'. One "problem" with speakers like the SCIV is their "correctness". No frequency imbalance away from flat is present. Thus if your personal tast is for lively treble for example, they will not impress. Then there's the flat phase response. Depending on the recording, this may present as a lack of spaciousness for example. What you are hearing from them is the recording, warts and all. Lesser "correct" speakers may emphasise or detract from the warts but that is not the way things should be. There are other factors involved e.g. room effects influencing what you hear but accurate "correct" speakers are the ideal starting point in the quest. I just enjoy my Black Knights knowing they at least are right.
christosd Posted November 5, 2019 Posted November 5, 2019 3 hours ago, Ahh- Schnoo Schnoo said: Thanks Simon Great info and very interesting as a Crown Prince owner +1
frednork Posted November 5, 2019 Posted November 5, 2019 4 hours ago, VAF said: Dunlavy had the theory, if it measured correctly then it must be correct. Didn't matter about the cost of the drives, as long as they reproduced the measurements he deemed they needed to it was fine. Nice theory, but a little flawed. But that's another story. I have asked previously and havent received a reply thus far. what were the drivers actually tested for?
.thumb.jpg.cb6b24bd10b41bd7dcd534b13bb08334.jpg)
Recommended Posts