Man, I loved it when you slapped up your new frequency-response chart...and then flashed us all that big ol' self-satisfied grin, wide as Texas itself! Kudos, Danny--I nearly fell outta my chair when I saw that response-curve.
My RA at Michigan State had a pair of Cerwin Vegas powered by a 30 wpc Marantz integrated amp. They would play very loud with little power, but with boomy bass and sizzling treble. Way back in 1975, I actually enjoyed their presentation. The Cerwin Vegas were good for dorm parties, and drunk Freshmen would dance the night away!
Their design criteria was met perfectly. The more people in the room to absorb the hot top end the better. On that note, I was in a fraternity and in charge of the audio. After frying tweeter after tweeter, I slapped a pair of piezo horns in there and the system would make your ears bleed in an empty room, but with 100 sweaty dancing/partying people in the bar it "came in" and sounded great 😆
I don’t think so. I never liked them. There’s a ‘more bang for your buck’ mentality to these speakers that people were sold on, but I never bought into it.
I still really appreciate the old 'vintage' speakers like RTR Towers, early 901's, Advents, etc. Even with all their warts they still give me a smile as I recall the60's and 70's music scene.
That fuse save me from having blown speakers or tweeters more than one time when I was a teenager. I know now why it isn't good to be in the signal path but for the people that on speakers like this, it's a protection that comes in handy
I was a Cerwin Vega rep in the '70's. Cheap, big and loud! Gene Czerwinski was quite the character. He hated dome drivers! So he cut a basketball in half and glued it to an equal sized woofer to have a dome woofer as a joke!
You can do that easily ... no alchemy ... if you are prepared to give up 5 to 6 dB of sensitivity. 😃 Wondering what happened to the back-firing tweeter.
Hi Danny As you can see by my aviator I'm a bit of a fan boy from way back. Here in OZ a company called Douglas HIFI were the sellers. I had a pair I believe were made here in Australia with cerwin vega components, model CV123. Heavy, Heavy cabinets and I bought them in the late 70's and still have them. Removed the cheap wood veneer and painted them. replaced the 12" woofers with ribbed cerwin vega 12"woofers from the 80's. Still the original mid ranges and tweeters. 5 years ago I installed Dayton 3 way crossovers and put in some extra sound deadening. Just recently installed L pad controls for the tweeters as even my old hearing find them a bit "Bright" I might be bias but I think they sound great also my friends think so too Thanks Danny, love your video's and your recent one wearing John Zappia's drag racing Monaro too
Quite remarkable the difference made. Nice job. In the early 90's I remember thinking these things were fun for parties. Later building a DiY cinema in an old warehouse with the 2 way PA Cerwin Vega V152, 7.2 surround with custom made subs using car audio drivers. Rough speakers, but with 103db sensitivity and treated as smalls by the AV amp they worked well at filling the massive space. Later we upgraded to a Denon professional processor and Yamaha power amps, then JBL with smalled models on the rear 4 channels. My lad still plays around with the old CV V152 and likes the bass driver, and is interested in doing DiY to a pair to make three way with a proper but not too pricey crossover. A nice way to get him started and may sound better with his keyboard.
Merry Christmas Danny, thanks for sharing all your knowledge. I wish i could send my speakers to someone like you and have them looked at for possible performance improvement.
Amazing to see! And I’m happy to see that the two cerwin Vegas Danny worked on turned out better than the vintage JBLs. JBL fanboys always trash Vegas, but guess what… good bones! We the vega ppl has always known this of course😀
Uhh no! As Danny has often said, the mods will make the speaker more accurate but not necessarily good sounding. This tweeter here is absolutely atrocious. These aren't close to CVs better drivers, not that any of them were great.
@ Uh yes buddy! These Vegas are doing exactly what they are supposed to do. Play loud and live like. And now accurate and apparently clean. They were never designed as hifi speakers. Ppl forget that. Anyways, for a loud vintage speakers these rock. Period!
@@RennieAsh I agree. My ears are very sensitive to that band. Sadly to many vintage sets have this. You find this in modern speakers also. It’s a common problem area for crossover frequency.
Those red foam woofer surrounds only last 20 years. I have 4 Vega DX-5's, and I replaced the woofers at 20 years. Foam was gone, and I didn't want to hassle with rebuilding them. I got 4 new woofers from Parts Express with the same specs for $100 for all 4. I got these DX-5's on a clearance sale at a SEARS store back in the 90's for $100 each! Totally happy with them, until the woofer surrounds deteriorated. Replaced the woofers, and now they are good as new. Years ago, you could find great deals on audio stuff. Not anymore.
I attended a audio equipment show one year a long time ago, (I'm 77) and a person manning the Cerwin Vega exhibit plugged one of their large speakers into a 110 vac wall outlet. The volume level of the 60 hz hum was ridiculously loud, but it didn't blow up! Efficient, powerful, excessive bass & treble, and a total lack of midrange. The definition of a party speaker at that time.
that is great job on those speakers, vintage speakers needs to be restored for continue use and enjoyment:) but i was thinking about what can be done with the box itself, if we cut out the rear you can manufacture a drop in front baffle and glue it on, round over the inside holes, possible do that for all the inside, that is cheap and you get access to fit full length bracing to be placed, also shorten and reduce the internal volume for a sealed box conversion. you now also have the box thickness to round over the outside baffle for diffraction purposes.
@sudd3660 I didn't say it was easier, but rather than put a band-aid on an inherently bad design, start from scratch. You can keep the "look" and make a rock solid cabinet.
I always wanted a pair of Cerwin Vega's and when I finally did, it wasn't what I expected. Didn't keep them for long. But if TH-cam existed then, it might have saved them.
Great job Danny. Silk purse out of a sow’s ear…. Probably best to angle slightly outwards so the surface reflections from the control panel side are projected behind the listeners, like the Brute and Bully. And better to blank the control panel off flush with the baffle.
Cerwin Vega. Yup own a pair of RE30,s. Org owner. Forget what i paid . Before the surrounds went, they had micro cracks in the foam. I saw a Flex Seal commercial. Paint on surround repair! 10 yrs a go. There 30 or so yrs old now. But..... Ill put them up against ANY pro speaker, audio grade, like 50,000$ .
Haha! That frequency response went from driving through the mountains, to driving across the prairies! Good job especially with that mid! I bet that Vega! Will ROCK! That’s a pretty old Vega! They definitely started getting a little flatter measuring in the 80s and 90s. Once they went from filters to actual crossovers. Hopefully the customer reports to audio circle. I’m very curious on how he likes it.
During part of the last century I worked at a Box store that sold CV. I don't remember that model. That was more than 30 years ago. People loved them for their price and the 'bass' they could hear. The bass they heard was a big bump around 150hz., according to the charts I saw. Those speaker chart curved down under 150hz to virtually inaudible sound under 90hz. In the early days of 'sound surround', before sub-woofers, people liked that. When you put your palm about 6 inches in from of those speakers you felt nothing. Put your palm 6 inches in front of the higher priced speakers we sold and you could feel the bass. Among those of us who worked there we thought the CV we sold was just a high profit, low cost, money grabber we loosely called high fidelity. If you got your set through the CV rep, employee special purchase, they were practically paying us to own them. Great resurrection on the 316R. If I send a pound of lead can you turn it into a pound of gold?
I have a pair of the VS120s in my workshop. They image a lot better than their price/reputation would indicate. And as to price I often see folks describe them as cheap but the OG MSRP of most of these larger units were fairly stiff. They didn't make a lot of this model so finding the actual price has been tough. A seller on Reddit says their dad paid something like $1200 new back when these came out in the early 80s. That ain't cheap! My VS-120s were $690 in 1992. Plug that into the time machine and that's $1550 today!
I think the best Cerwin Vega speakers for home use might have been the DC series, because they were made at the Dali factory in Denmark. Maybe the were just been sold in Hi-Fi Klubben stores in scandinavia. Used thicker materials for the cabinets.
I have also some 70´s Tannoy´s that have in the back several positive conections that each as a design of the equalization curve to 5 diferent options of equalization , they are so big that to lift them and put them on those industrial trolleys with four litle but strong wheels, it needs 4 very strong men only to lift them a bit, and the big woofer to take it it´s a two strong men job and when off the cabinet one can enter inside and seat confortably on the foam it as inside, real powerfull ones ,all my life i saw once one speaker being sold on top of the same industrial trolley, in the U.S. this in late 2017, never again i saw others. There´s those with metal pins on the front, more litle that seem to do the same, moere litle compred with mine as the new ones are terrible expensive and big but less bigger than my 70´s ones, My father bougfht them to a terrible expensive Accuphase system he bought in them 70´s ,so i don´t know really how much it costed, but i remenber that in 79 my father either than the P3 bought a technics SL-1000nmkII ,all technics components as a mc cartridge with proper pre-amplifier for that model but that year he spent in some components the same that it costed the new BMW 535i new in early 1980 with a V8 engine, in design looked a lot like my 76 ,523i. tyhis sold by a dealer who was a friend of ours bought him a SAAB 900Turbo at the time and inlate 80´s a SAAB 9000 turbo with fastback and wankel engine, people complain about wankel engines but they if proper maintenance is done they ride for years still have a mazda also the RX-7 with a 1.3L rotor wankel engine bought new in 87 and both 9000 turbo from SAAB and the Mazda RX-7 still ride today perfect, one had 175 h.p. other 180 h.p., both said unleaded fuel but in Portugal there was only leaded fuel so i phoned to a friend in the netherlands to ask what to do, there was regular and super, he told me to put super and only the katalizator would go ,or destroid but the car was ok, this refering to the Mazda as the SAABs always putted there super leaded gasoline
Since an actual crossover was created, would it have been better to remove that volume control plate and all the stuff behind it and block off the hole? Just asking!
In 89 i got the AT100 for the 70´s Exclusive series ,system from Pioneer i had sent to be restored to original specifications, my twin 2401 pioneer Exclusive series speakers who are very nice and big , with the AT100 with 400 watts at 4 ohms it seem new again the never repaired system with two M6 monoblocks a M3 control amplifioer and a P3 turntable, at the time they used to say the cerwin-vegas were only good to rock music but i listen to almost all styles of music i know, if it pleasures me and those speakers were very good in detail even with old jazz recordings from late 40´s to the 50´s, later bought a cd player the PD-7300 from pioneer in 88/89 and the cassette deck i´ve used the Phase Linear from other system my father bought in late 70´s ,the 7000 from series two that resembles a lot the CT-A1 from Pioneer in early 80´s but built with two tones of aluminium brushed and not brushed and a better design compared to the CT-A1 , it seems Pioneer already had bought Phase linear as the shape of the display was with diferent colours but almost identical to the 79 , CT-F1250 cassette deck from Pioneer, it seems that in Europe the critics only like JBL from the several American brands, like klipsch or others , i have components from SAE, Crown, H.H.Scott and Altec Lansing big studio monitors bought in 1970. Those i didn´t knew them, but have others not so big without the red ribbon from the late 70´s or early 80´s, i think the woofers have written in black cerwin-vega at midle level with the midle part instead of outside round half a ball center ,it had like in the reverse position but i might be wrong as i have a big hi-fi component colection that increased for the doble when my father passed away and my brother and sister didn´t want any of it´s old equipment or record colection , that now i have 9.678 records and still counting but from 93 to 2017 only cds were bought. Also more than 5000
I got CV dx9 in my movie room and with just small tweaks with minidsp I got the response to be flat and waterfall looks nice too, exept under 50hz wich is sub territory. I do have a good room to work with, but this did get me thinking that are the dx9 so much better than any other models, since everyone just talks shit about cv. I have Genelecs on my computer as near field and they sound amazing ofc, but I still would rather listen to the CVs because they have so much more balls.
Yeah, Cerwin Vega definitely made some crap. But they also made some real bang for the buck too! I really do admire your crossover work Danny. But more and more I see DSP as the better way to go, especially for these old turds. Cheers 🍻
I live these Vintage Speaker upgrades…. There is something so nastalgic about the design. Nothing wrong with new. In fact, I’m intrigued by your new speaker designs. I have some vintage Kappa 8s , they are sentimental to me and honestly love their sound and they have the eye candy and conversation pieces. I often think, can they sound better? I don’t think so? I love their dynamics. Let me know if you have ever tackled a pair of these Kappa series speakers.
What speakers would replace my ancient and worn out Yamaha NS500 now? Between real 10" woofers and the beryllium dome tweeters...when they were new they were damn impressive. They come home with me after a long blind series of a/b comparisons at a high end audio store. (Hard to find those any more!)
Hopefully one day someone will bring in a Cerwin Vega VS 15. I would send in one of mine but I'm guessing it would cost a fortune to send from California to Texas. Mine have upgraded capacitors that really helped. Mundorf foil in tweeters, Russian Military red box paper/foil in mid and a mix of red box and Jenson metalized in the woofers. I think at the least the woofers needs a different resistor as there's no typical bass reflex coming out of these woofers. Cab definitely needs bracing and no rez
Not related to this video; Have you ever listened or tested the ESS AMT-1D?…… I used to listen to those at a music store in the Chicago area, decades ago. Always found them transparent good sounding, sometimes a little itch to the ears like having upper frequencies up in 30,000 cycles….
Awesome project for the owner. A question: Is it possible for a speaker that has drivers with terrible resolution to be accurate? As in, it could be 'accurate' but still sound like crap? Would like see a video on how accuracy relates to resolution or doesn't.
Great job Danny! I have an idea for an even better thing to do. Get with Eminence & see if you can acquire a red surround woofer option for the Brute so that the CV fanboys & everyone else who listens with their eyes rather than their ears will be motivated to build a pair.
Why didn't you set a higher crossover point for the tweeter & mid? Wouldn't the tweeter benefit from being able to take more power, and the mid would be able to, output more sound, having a larger surface area?.
Are you going to be covering the upgrade, or selling a kit... I was just clearing out a storage and have a set of these that need a refoam... Wondering if it is going to be worthwhile to spend the money?
If your XO design eliminates the need for those attenuation pots, maybe recommend the plastic module be replaced with a blank out panel at the same time the new bracing members are installed? I’d wager that many aficionados of such vintage speakers might also have electronics from the same era that would include decent enough tone controls to emulate that functionality. I’m thinking specifically of some of the mid ‘70s Marantz integrated amps and receivers - or for that matter old school analog graphic equalizers. Let’s face it, the woofer’s mounting hole is plenty big enough to afford easy access to the interior for such work. Pardon if this question has been asked before, but have you ever considered providing at least a 3D printed board for hardwiring of the XO such as included in the CSS kits?
It must be the case that some of these old speakers had very complex crossovers (ATC, I'm looking at you! - and the BBC designs) and the upgrade becomes complex. It must become cheaper to step back and look at cheap class-D power amps and a DSP front end. Also surprised - if you take triangular MDF pieces - surely you could add them into the box through the woofer opening? Side to side or front to back bracing will be hard, but they will materially change the modes on the thin panels, and possibly reduce the need for expensive damping solutions. After all, there are damping solutions for cars and vans, and one can imagine that cork tiles are also somewhat effective and good bang for buck.
I did a 1 to 1 upgrade of my LS 12’s and they have a bunch of parts in there. I didn’t know what I was doing at the time so I didn’t actually map it out or measure them. Eventually I will revisit them and design a new network.
Are the "after" measurements with NoRez lining? And does that apply to all your measurements on kits? Also, why not show the spectral decay chart with the felt insert mentioned?
No Rez was not installed. It does not effect the measured frequency response. It REALLY effects the measurements that we can make using an accelerometer though. The felt we through in the control cup is what I view as a variable. Whatever is put in there is going to help, but will vary from type and amount. It is a tweak that the customer can experiment with.
For that size 3/4” construction it should have a bit of “heft” to the box but that alone doesn’t automatically guarantee solid non-ringing but still why no bracing? 🤦🏻♂️🤷🏻♂️
Those drivers controls in the back can improve your listening experience and the woofer normally doesn´t have any as the mids and high´s needs the drivers to the signal not be mostly absorved by the woofer and letting almost no sound to the mid´s and high´s, allthough the AT 100 have more than 3 ways
👋Hey Danny, quick question. Have you ever looked at the obbligato ultra premium and miflex kfpm as bypass caps? I know your thing is jb and sonicaps however would be good to hear if you've tried others like the above I mentioned!
Man, I loved it when you slapped up your new frequency-response chart...and then flashed us all that big ol' self-satisfied grin, wide as Texas itself! Kudos, Danny--I nearly fell outta my chair when I saw that response-curve.
This is one of your best transformations. 💯
This clean vertical off-axis response is just unbelievable - amazing.
My RA at Michigan State had a pair of Cerwin Vegas powered by a 30 wpc Marantz integrated amp. They would play very loud with little power, but with boomy bass and sizzling treble. Way back in 1975, I actually enjoyed their presentation. The Cerwin Vegas were good for dorm parties, and drunk Freshmen would dance the night away!
Their design criteria was met perfectly. The more people in the room to absorb the hot top end the better.
On that note, I was in a fraternity and in charge of the audio. After frying tweeter after tweeter, I slapped a pair of piezo horns in there and the system would make your ears bleed in an empty room, but with 100 sweaty dancing/partying people in the bar it "came in" and sounded great 😆
I lived only a few miles from campus at that time. Now I know who kept me up at night
Great Work !!!!! Those Speakers reminded of rolling down hill on a Bike with no shoes on.
39 years after buying a brand new pair of Cerwin Vega D 9's, my tinnitus has never sounded better.
Dude, This stuff is so awesome!, i love how you do this because you enjoy it. We pay you for your passion. Thanks for these vids.
That was one of the most radical improvements I've seen yet! Wow.
CV weren't the BEST, but they certainly made one hell of a lot of people happy. Gotta give 'em credit for that.
They provided generations of people EXACTLY what they wanted, which is why they were so successful.
I don’t think so. I never liked them. There’s a ‘more bang for your buck’ mentality to these speakers that people were sold on, but I never bought into it.
Yup! Rocked many parties back in the day. Great memories. CV!
They may not have been audiophile style flat. But, they got LOUD.
@@bikdav efficiency is not exactly an audiophile standard trait, an efficient speaker can sound terrible as well as good
Cerwin Vega ; Big or small, save them all.
good job Danny Cerwin's are my fav vintage speakers i had in high school
These speakers are junk, just one step up from ‘white van’ speakers
I still really appreciate the old 'vintage' speakers like RTR Towers, early 901's, Advents, etc.
Even with all their warts they still give me a smile as I recall the60's and 70's music scene.
Magnificent as Ever 🥇💎🫡🙏🏼♾️🎶👍🤩🧠👂
Nice work, I was quite surprised 😮
I definitely think the additions you added to the Vega will be very noticeable. They are an awesome rock speaker.
That fuse save me from having blown speakers or tweeters more than one time when I was a teenager. I know now why it isn't good to be in the signal path but for the people that on speakers like this, it's a protection that comes in handy
Amazing. I wouldn't have thought it possible.
I was a Cerwin Vega rep in the '70's. Cheap, big and loud! Gene Czerwinski was quite the character. He hated dome drivers! So he cut a basketball in half and glued it to an equal sized woofer to have a dome woofer as a joke!
That's funny...ironically the shape of the driver in the horn tweeters is usually dome shaped.
Very happy with mine still got them
Wow....That Speaker is going to be reborn to the HiFi era.......Bravo
Shockingly good! Seriously this is alchemy. I would have never guessed you would be able to flatten the response with that midrange driver.
You can do that easily ... no alchemy ... if you are prepared to give up 5 to 6 dB of sensitivity. 😃 Wondering what happened to the back-firing tweeter.
stunning improvement.
Cerwin T 15 were incredible performers
Magician's work.
The only loudspeaker company to win an Academy Award for special technical achievement.
Hi Danny
As you can see by my aviator I'm a bit of a fan boy from way back. Here in OZ a company called Douglas HIFI were the sellers. I had a pair I believe were made here in Australia with cerwin vega components, model CV123. Heavy, Heavy cabinets and I bought them in the late 70's and still have them. Removed the cheap wood veneer and painted them. replaced the 12" woofers with ribbed cerwin vega 12"woofers from the 80's. Still the original mid ranges and tweeters. 5 years ago I installed Dayton 3 way crossovers and put in some extra sound deadening. Just recently installed L pad controls for the tweeters as even my old hearing find them a bit "Bright" I might be bias but I think they sound great also my friends think so too
Thanks Danny, love your video's and your recent one wearing John Zappia's drag racing Monaro too
Quite remarkable the difference made. Nice job.
In the early 90's I remember thinking these things were fun for parties. Later building a DiY cinema in an old warehouse with the 2 way PA Cerwin Vega V152, 7.2 surround with custom made subs using car audio drivers. Rough speakers, but with 103db sensitivity and treated as smalls by the AV amp they worked well at filling the massive space.
Later we upgraded to a Denon professional processor and Yamaha power amps, then JBL with smalled models on the rear 4 channels.
My lad still plays around with the old CV V152 and likes the bass driver, and is interested in doing DiY to a pair to make three way with a proper but not too pricey crossover. A nice way to get him started and may sound better with his keyboard.
Had a pair of these for years.
Great work from a 316R owner i am very intrested in this modification also keep up this magic 🙏
awesome work
Merry Christmas Danny, thanks for sharing all your knowledge.
I wish i could send my speakers to someone like you and have them looked at for possible performance improvement.
Impressive results!
Amazing to see! And I’m happy to see that the two cerwin Vegas Danny worked on turned out better than the vintage JBLs. JBL fanboys always trash Vegas, but guess what… good bones! We the vega ppl has always known this of course😀
Uhh no! As Danny has often said, the mods will make the speaker more accurate but not necessarily good sounding. This tweeter here is absolutely atrocious. These aren't close to CVs better drivers, not that any of them were great.
@ Uh yes buddy! These Vegas are doing exactly what they are supposed to do. Play loud and live like. And now accurate and apparently clean. They were never designed as hifi speakers. Ppl forget that. Anyways, for a loud vintage speakers these rock. Period!
3kHz squeal is something I associated with crap speakers when I was younger. It hurts lol
@@RennieAsh I agree. My ears are very sensitive to that band. Sadly to many vintage sets have this. You find this in modern speakers also. It’s a common problem area for crossover frequency.
I knew this was going to be a good one!👍
Acid Jazz, Funk & Brass🔈🔉🔊
We salute you!
Those red foam woofer surrounds only last 20 years.
I have 4 Vega DX-5's, and I replaced the woofers at 20 years. Foam was gone, and I didn't want to hassle with rebuilding them. I got 4 new woofers from Parts Express with the same specs for $100 for all 4. I got these DX-5's on a clearance sale at a SEARS store back in the 90's for $100 each! Totally happy with them, until the woofer surrounds deteriorated. Replaced the woofers, and now they are good as new. Years ago, you could find great deals on audio stuff. Not anymore.
Some of the older CVs did have x-overs, but oh boy. Years ago I worked on repairing some of CV's pro audio PRX-153 speakers. Good grief...
I attended a audio equipment show one year a long time ago, (I'm 77) and a person manning the Cerwin Vega exhibit plugged one of their large speakers into a 110 vac wall outlet. The volume level of the 60 hz hum was ridiculously loud, but it didn't blow up! Efficient, powerful, excessive bass & treble, and a total lack of midrange. The definition of a party speaker at that time.
Probably Gene Czerwinsky. he was known for the AC test on their woofers.
that is great job on those speakers, vintage speakers needs to be restored for continue use and enjoyment:)
but i was thinking about what can be done with the box itself, if we cut out the rear you can manufacture a drop in front baffle and glue it on, round over the inside holes, possible do that for all the inside, that is cheap and you get access to fit full length bracing to be placed, also shorten and reduce the internal volume for a sealed box conversion.
you now also have the box thickness to round over the outside baffle for diffraction purposes.
Just remake the cabinet from 1" ply and veneer on top.
@@miheadhurts if you think that is easier be my guest.
@sudd3660 I didn't say it was easier, but rather than put a band-aid on an inherently bad design, start from scratch. You can keep the "look" and make a rock solid cabinet.
We salute you
I always wanted a pair of Cerwin Vega's and when I finally did, it wasn't what I expected. Didn't keep them for long. But if TH-cam existed then, it might have saved them.
Great video !
Danny will sell you an $800 dollar crossover and they'll sound juuuusst right!😂
Man I want some 15" Cerwin Vegas
Great job Danny. Silk purse out of a sow’s ear…. Probably best to angle slightly outwards so the surface reflections from the control panel side are projected behind the listeners, like the Brute and Bully. And better to blank the control panel off flush with the baffle.
saving vega from the landfill.. great stuff
It’s just junk, those CV’s.
Awesome results there Danny.
Cerwin Vega. Yup own a pair of RE30,s. Org owner. Forget what i paid . Before the surrounds went, they had micro cracks in the foam. I saw a Flex Seal commercial.
Paint on surround repair!
10 yrs a go. There 30 or so yrs old now. But..... Ill put them up against ANY pro speaker, audio grade, like 50,000$ .
Haha! That frequency response went from driving through the mountains, to driving across the prairies! Good job especially with that mid! I bet that Vega! Will ROCK! That’s a pretty old Vega! They definitely started getting a little flatter measuring in the 80s and 90s. Once they went from filters to actual crossovers. Hopefully the customer reports to audio circle. I’m very curious on how he likes it.
“Sensitivity to burn” just burn the speakers for crying out loud 🔥
Wau..... 👌👌👌
Tak to je proměna .....
During part of the last century I worked at a Box store that sold CV. I don't remember that model. That was more than 30 years ago. People loved them for their price and the 'bass' they could hear. The bass they heard was a big bump around 150hz., according to the charts I saw. Those speaker chart curved down under 150hz to virtually inaudible sound under 90hz. In the early days of 'sound surround', before sub-woofers, people liked that. When you put your palm about 6 inches in from of those speakers you felt nothing. Put your palm 6 inches in front of the higher priced speakers we sold and you could feel the bass. Among those of us who worked there we thought the CV we sold was just a high profit, low cost, money grabber we loosely called high fidelity. If you got your set through the CV rep, employee special purchase, they were practically paying us to own them. Great resurrection on the 316R. If I send a pound of lead can you turn it into a pound of gold?
Someone please send Danny a Jamo Concert VII to upgrade!! Great, fun video with a magic result Danny, thanks.
I don't care what anyone says about Danny, but that there is some sorcery to pull that off, NICE!!
I have a pair of the VS120s in my workshop. They image a lot better than their price/reputation would indicate. And as to price I often see folks describe them as cheap but the OG MSRP of most of these larger units were fairly stiff. They didn't make a lot of this model so finding the actual price has been tough. A seller on Reddit says their dad paid something like $1200 new back when these came out in the early 80s. That ain't cheap! My VS-120s were $690 in 1992. Plug that into the time machine and that's $1550 today!
I think the best Cerwin Vega speakers for home use might have been the DC series, because they were made at the Dali factory in Denmark. Maybe the were just been sold in Hi-Fi Klubben stores in scandinavia. Used thicker materials for the cabinets.
I have also some 70´s Tannoy´s that have in the back several positive conections that each as a design of the equalization curve to 5 diferent options of equalization , they are so big that to lift them and put them on those industrial trolleys with four litle but strong wheels, it needs 4 very strong men only to lift them a bit, and the big woofer to take it it´s a two strong men job and when off the cabinet one can enter inside and seat confortably on the foam it as inside, real powerfull ones ,all my life i saw once one speaker being sold on top of the same industrial trolley, in the U.S. this in late 2017, never again i saw others. There´s those with metal pins on the front, more litle that seem to do the same, moere litle compred with mine as the new ones are terrible expensive and big but less bigger than my 70´s ones, My father bougfht them to a terrible expensive Accuphase system he bought in them 70´s ,so i don´t know really how much it costed, but i remenber that in 79 my father either than the P3 bought a technics SL-1000nmkII ,all technics components as a mc cartridge with proper pre-amplifier for that model but that year he spent in some components the same that it costed the new BMW 535i new in early 1980 with a V8 engine, in design looked a lot like my 76 ,523i. tyhis sold by a dealer who was a friend of ours bought him a SAAB 900Turbo at the time and inlate 80´s a SAAB 9000 turbo with fastback and wankel engine, people complain about wankel engines but they if proper maintenance is done they ride for years still have a mazda also the RX-7 with a 1.3L rotor wankel engine bought new in 87 and both 9000 turbo from SAAB and the Mazda RX-7 still ride today perfect, one had 175 h.p. other 180 h.p., both said unleaded fuel but in Portugal there was only leaded fuel so i phoned to a friend in the netherlands to ask what to do, there was regular and super, he told me to put super and only the katalizator would go ,or destroid but the car was ok, this refering to the Mazda as the SAABs always putted there super leaded gasoline
Wish i could afford to send my mach 2s down to you. Im sure theyll be made fun of, but damn did they put a smile on my face when i was younger.
I have 4 317p, 2 417r, and 2 RE38. Sound just fine to me.
Since an actual crossover was created, would it have been better to remove that volume control plate and all the stuff behind it and block off the hole? Just asking!
One could do that.
In 89 i got the AT100 for the 70´s Exclusive series ,system from Pioneer i had sent to be restored to original specifications, my twin 2401 pioneer Exclusive series speakers who are very nice and big , with the AT100 with 400 watts at 4 ohms it seem new again the never repaired system with two M6 monoblocks a M3 control amplifioer and a P3 turntable, at the time they used to say the cerwin-vegas were only good to rock music but i listen to almost all styles of music i know, if it pleasures me and those speakers were very good in detail even with old jazz recordings from late 40´s to the 50´s, later bought a cd player the PD-7300 from pioneer in 88/89 and the cassette deck i´ve used the Phase Linear from other system my father bought in late 70´s ,the 7000 from series two that resembles a lot the CT-A1 from Pioneer in early 80´s but built with two tones of aluminium brushed and not brushed and a better design compared to the CT-A1 , it seems Pioneer already had bought Phase linear as the shape of the display was with diferent colours but almost identical to the 79 , CT-F1250 cassette deck from Pioneer, it seems that in Europe the critics only like JBL from the several American brands, like klipsch or others , i have components from SAE, Crown, H.H.Scott and Altec Lansing big studio monitors bought in 1970. Those i didn´t knew them, but have others not so big without the red ribbon from the late 70´s or early 80´s, i think the woofers have written in black cerwin-vega at midle level with the midle part instead of outside round half a ball center ,it had like in the reverse position but i might be wrong as i have a big hi-fi component colection that increased for the doble when my father passed away and my brother and sister didn´t want any of it´s old equipment or record colection , that now i have 9.678 records and still counting but from 93 to 2017 only cds were bought. Also more than 5000
I got CV dx9 in my movie room and with just small tweaks with minidsp I got the response to be flat and waterfall looks nice too, exept under 50hz wich is sub territory. I do have a good room to work with, but this did get me thinking that are the dx9 so much better than any other models, since everyone just talks shit about cv. I have Genelecs on my computer as near field and they sound amazing ofc, but I still would rather listen to the CVs because they have so much more balls.
The box they came in said " Cerwin Vega 316r Hard Rocker" on it.
Yeah, Cerwin Vega definitely made some crap. But they also made some real bang for the buck too! I really do admire your crossover work Danny. But more and more I see DSP as the better way to go, especially for these old turds.
Cheers 🍻
I live these Vintage Speaker upgrades…. There is something so nastalgic about the design. Nothing wrong with new. In fact, I’m intrigued by your new speaker designs. I have some vintage Kappa 8s , they are sentimental to me and honestly love their sound and they have the eye candy and conversation pieces. I often think, can they sound better? I don’t think so? I love their dynamics. Let me know if you have ever tackled a pair of these Kappa series speakers.
What speakers would replace my ancient and worn out Yamaha NS500 now? Between real 10" woofers and the beryllium dome tweeters...when they were new they were damn impressive. They come home with me after a long blind series of a/b comparisons at a high end audio store. (Hard to find those any more!)
If you want to stick with an old school style then have a look at our Brute or Bully model.
Maybe the mum monitor speakers with 10" Purifi. Yes they are expensive enough . At least assuming you like domes
Hopefully one day someone will bring in a Cerwin Vega VS 15. I would send in one of mine but I'm guessing it would cost a fortune to send from California to Texas. Mine have upgraded capacitors that really helped. Mundorf foil in tweeters, Russian Military red box paper/foil in mid and a mix of red box and Jenson metalized in the woofers. I think at the least the woofers needs a different resistor as there's no typical bass reflex coming out of these woofers. Cab definitely needs bracing and no rez
Not related to this video; Have you ever listened or tested the ESS AMT-1D?…… I used to listen to those at a music store in the Chicago area, decades ago. Always found them transparent good sounding, sometimes a little itch to the ears like having upper frequencies up in 30,000 cycles….
Feather in your cap for this one Danny
I hope he does a cerwin vega AT 15 sometime.
hey, let’s put $30 sonic caps on a $10 tweeter .. Da hell Danny 😉 🤷♂️
Call me basic, but this is why I come here! Im infinitely curious as to how the most mainstream popular models of old actually measure up.
My issue is with using current audio standards instead of taking into account the era and price point the speaker was created for.
Seems like Cerwin Vega had no idea what they were doing when they made this big boy. Well done working out a fix for it.
Awesome project for the owner. A question: Is it possible for a speaker that has drivers with terrible resolution to be accurate? As in, it could be 'accurate' but still sound like crap? Would like see a video on how accuracy relates to resolution or doesn't.
8:15 MIRACLES are REAL!!!
Hands up all those that know of them because of " Earthquake ".
Great job Danny! I have an idea for an even better thing to do. Get with Eminence & see if you can acquire a red surround woofer option for the Brute so that the CV fanboys & everyone else who listens with their eyes rather than their ears will be motivated to build a pair.
Why didn't you set a higher crossover point for the tweeter & mid? Wouldn't the tweeter benefit from being able to take more power, and the mid would be able to, output more sound, having a larger surface area?.
Power handling is not an issue. Higher crossover points will cause more off axis comb filtering and cancellation.
Those were built at the Easy Street Simi Valley, CA location.
Would really like to see you working on Technics SB7070.
Agreed I describe them on my channel as my beautiful disgusting garbage angels.
Are you going to be covering the upgrade, or selling a kit... I was just clearing out a storage and have a set of these that need a refoam... Wondering if it is going to be worthwhile to spend the money?
🔥🔥🔥🔥👍👍👍👍
If your XO design eliminates the need for those attenuation pots, maybe recommend the plastic module be replaced with a blank out panel at the same time the new bracing members are installed? I’d wager that many aficionados of such vintage speakers might also have electronics from the same era that would include decent enough tone controls to emulate that functionality. I’m thinking specifically of some of the mid ‘70s Marantz integrated amps and receivers - or for that matter old school analog graphic equalizers.
Let’s face it, the woofer’s mounting hole is plenty big enough to afford easy access to the interior for such work.
Pardon if this question has been asked before, but have you ever considered providing at least a 3D printed board for hardwiring of the XO such as included in the CSS kits?
It must be the case that some of these old speakers had very complex crossovers (ATC, I'm looking at you! - and the BBC designs) and the upgrade becomes complex. It must become cheaper to step back and look at cheap class-D power amps and a DSP front end. Also surprised - if you take triangular MDF pieces - surely you could add them into the box through the woofer opening? Side to side or front to back bracing will be hard, but they will materially change the modes on the thin panels, and possibly reduce the need for expensive damping solutions. After all, there are damping solutions for cars and vans, and one can imagine that cork tiles are also somewhat effective and good bang for buck.
You can usually fit dowels for most dimensions through the woofer hole. Longest dimension may cause trouble
I did a 1 to 1 upgrade of my LS 12’s and they have a bunch of parts in there. I didn’t know what I was doing at the time so I didn’t actually map it out or measure them. Eventually I will revisit them and design a new network.
Yeah, my AT 10s seem to have a similar cross-over, horrible plastic pots. Fatigue does not take very long. Storage until I do the cross overs.
Are the "after" measurements with NoRez lining? And does that apply to all your measurements on kits?
Also, why not show the spectral decay chart with the felt insert mentioned?
No Rez was not installed. It does not effect the measured frequency response. It REALLY effects the measurements that we can make using an accelerometer though.
The felt we through in the control cup is what I view as a variable. Whatever is put in there is going to help, but will vary from type and amount. It is a tweak that the customer can experiment with.
oh wow i would have loved to hear the difference between the two! i bet there isnt a person around that could say "i dont hear a difference" lol
would like to see a al-1000 :)
was that crossover made by fisher price ??????????? :)
that box knock about a minute in was 1 of the worst i've ever heard hahaha! as an avid vega fanboy in my youth i liked this upgrade path a lot.
Danny, did you put a cap on the rear tweeter so the output doesn't wrap forward and cancel part of the front output?
Hahahahah...how great this has become...😅
Is the front panel with the knobs and fuses totally out…just decoration?
Just filling a hole in the box at this point.
For that size 3/4” construction it should have a bit of “heft” to the box but that alone doesn’t automatically guarantee solid non-ringing but still why no bracing? 🤦🏻♂️🤷🏻♂️
That was my first thought before he even said it. Can I even design a cross over for these speakers. Are the drivers compatible with each other.
Those drivers controls in the back can improve your listening experience and the woofer normally doesn´t have any as the mids and high´s needs the drivers to the signal not be mostly absorved by the woofer and letting almost no sound to the mid´s and high´s, allthough the AT 100 have more than 3 ways
Could you guys do a kit for the Cerwin Vega D9?
👋Hey Danny, quick question. Have you ever looked at the obbligato ultra premium and miflex kfpm as bypass caps? I know your thing is jb and sonicaps however would be good to hear if you've tried others like the above I mentioned!
I have bought and used thousands of the Miflex Copper foil caps as by-pass caps. I have not tried the Aluminum based Obbligato caps.