The Workbench

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Peter — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 14:11:51 GMT

In the UK at least, the S45-2 was sold alongside the new shape Uniphase range. I imagine the newer range were cheaper to make - the fit and finish is certainly not as good though the actual sound can be excellent. The S120 took over from the S45-2 as the best sounding speaker in the range.

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Dillen — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 01:22:42 GMT

Since it is a completely different product, I think the question should be more like
"Why did they use the same model name?"

The earlier Beovox S45 was a popular speaker so maybe that's why they wanted to ride
on using the same model name but on the other hand, using the same model name
doesn't make the launching of a brand new product really stand out.
Strange indeed, but not the only time we see this from B&O.
There are several other model name clashes.

Martin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Olin Shivers — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 18:24:34 GMT

Where the good old Beovox S45 (and S45-2) was a well performing three-way medium-range system, the
later (1980's) Beovox S45 was a two-way bottom range speaker.

So, this leaves the issue that I don't understand: why would a company make a given product *worse* -- why *change* the design of the S45 in a manner that clearly makes it less good? Very weird.

-Olin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Dillen — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 17:01:03 GMT

It can be quite confusing, really;
The original (1970's) Beovox S45 (Type 6302) had a slight mid-production upgrade and
became Beovox S45-2 (Type 6312).
The main difference being the type of tweeter (and a slight modification to the crossover accordingly).
Actually, to add to the confusion, the new tweeter was already introduced in the latest Beovox S45, that is before
the model name and type number change.
The Beovox S45-2 was never changed, but was discontinued when the new series of speakers were introduced.

The new series of speakers had the S45 (Type 6427) as the smallest model, you can easily tell them
from the earlier types by the front grills. The earlier types had fairly sturdy one-piece grills where the later type
has rather flimsy two-piece grills.
Where the good old Beovox S45 (and S45-2) was a well performing three-way medium-range system, the
later (1980's) Beovox S45 was a two-way bottom range speaker. Not the worst sounding two-way speaker really,
not at all, but there were better ones available, even in the earlier range (f.e. Beovox S40).
A direct comparison from the later series to the earlier is not very easy but the old Beovox S45 (& 45-2) would
probably fit in somewhere between Beovox S55 and Beovox S80 range-wise as they are both three-way
speakers and fairly good performers for their size.

So basically we have three different Beovox S45 speakers.

Martin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Olin Shivers — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 16:36:52 GMT

Peter :

The best upgrade is to buy some S45-2 speakers! Same frontal aspect but a superior speaker. Available for usually little money - I gave a pair away not long ago! Still kept one pair - I must do the cross overs some day but they still sound great!

I'd love to get a pair and fix them up. They usually pop up on eBay for more than "a little money," though. All I really need is for the veneer to be in good shape, and the drivers to have nothing wrong that a refoam of the woofer couldn't address; I'm perfectly willing to deal with crossover fixes.

While on the subject of S45.2's... can someone explain to me why the *later* model S45.2's dropped the phase-link driver? I thought the Baekgaard crossover & phase-link unit was the central tech behind this speaker's claims to excellence. So why'd B&O punt on it?

-Olin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Peter — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 16:23:18 GMT

The best upgrade is to buy some S45-2 speakers! Same frontal aspect but a superior speaker. Available for usually little money - I gave a pair away not long ago! Still kept one pair - I must do the cross overs some day but they still sound great!

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Rich — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 16:00:07 GMT

Olin Shivers:

Dillen has already provided me with the one hard-to-determine spec, the coil inductance (however, he also recommended leaving the coils as-is), and he went on to say that he can probably get a full schematic up on the download section behind the paywall pretty soon, so I'm going to wait for that and get the whole picture before proceeding.

"Do what thou wilt," of course. But listening to Martin (Dillen) is Never A Bad Thing (tm).

I've refurbed M70s, S45-2s, and S40s, and I've never replaced an inductor.

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Olin Shivers — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 08:14:18 GMT

Peter :

Schematic now on site - good luck!

And now on my hard drive; thanks!

-Olin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Peter — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 00:52:58 GMT

Schematic now on site - good luck!

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Olin Shivers — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 22:43:20 GMT

Rich:

Welcome, Olin, to Beoworld.

Thank you, Rich. People here are amazingly friendly. As I remarked in a private message to Dillen earlier today, I was browsing around this forum yesterday and stumbled over a thread started by this disgruntled guy in Florida who had decided that B&O gear was complete crap, worse than useless, an outright scam, for which, fortunately, he was too clever to fall. Etc., etc. Aggressively hostile, and pretty relentless. I was astounded at the universally courteous way everyone else on the forum responded to such blatant trolling. I've never seen anything like it, anywhere else on the net (and I've been using the net since 1979). If you pulled a troll like that on any other forum, you'd get flamed to a crisp.

I guess B&O fans just do things a little differently.

Have you tried the search function in the forums yet? There's at least one S40 refurb project detailed on the forum, and probably many more. If B&O made it, chances are someone on this forum has fixed it at least once.

Nope! There's exactly one s40 refurb writeup: yours. Or at least that's what my search turned up -- searching this forum was the first thing I tried.

Here's my S40 refurb project. Do the refurb. You won't regret it. The people here will walk you through it whether you have a schematic or not.

Dillen has already provided me with the one hard-to-determine spec, the coil inductance (however, he also recommended leaving the coils as-is), and he went on to say that he can probably get a full schematic up on the download section behind the paywall pretty soon, so I'm going to wait for that and get the whole picture before proceeding.

Thanks for the encouragement -- not only your email but for taking the trouble to do a project writeup of your refurb.

-Olin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Rich — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 21:32:47 GMT

Welcome, Olin, to Beoworld. Have you tried the search function in the forums yet? There's at least one S40 refurb project detailed on the forum, and probably many more. If B&O made it, chances are someone on this forum has fixed it at least once.

Here's my S40 refurb project. Do the refurb. You won't regret it. The people here will walk you through it whether you have a schematic or not.

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Dillen — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 11:19:02 GMT

There's one coil in each cabinet.
It's listed as 0,26mH but I wouldn't replace anything apart from the capacitors.
I would certainly replace them though. Put in a good quality electrolytic type, bipolar of course.
The rest will be fine unless electronically failing.
Replacing the coils, in my opinion, would be overkill, a waste of money and completely unnecessary.
The dimensions of that coil is more than adequate as-is, it's not as flimsy a thing as it may look.
Don't throw 500 US Dollars in an upgrade attempt, you won't hear any difference.
That's my advice, anyways.

Martin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Olin Shivers — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 10:57:15 GMT

Thank you for your fast reply, Søren.

Søren Mexico:

The crossover in S40 will be a simple one as its a 2 way speaker,

Yep.

Søren Mexico:
first check if both speakers are bad, if yes, check them with another source, just to be sure that its a speaker failure and not amplifier. Open one speaker, check driver for foamrot, check all connections and solder points, check resistors, coils and caps, change the caps, they are old and if not bad now they will go bad within short time. If only one speaker sounds bad use the good one as reference, I would open both speakers and use one for reference and cross check and when one is repaired and tested, do the reference speaker.

Yep -- I'm pretty much past this point. The amp is known good. The speakers are definitely bad. The drivers have no foam rot. These are speakers that have been sitting in storage for the last ten years; during that time some parts must have aged out and failed. I just moved to a new, larger home and have a room where I can use them, so it's time to fix them up and deploy them.

It is a very easy job to replace the crossover. But as long as I'm going to do it, I think I'll upgrade *all* the parts, not just the caps. I'll upgrade the resistors to nicer resistors rated for higher power, and I'll chuck in some Goertz foil inductors. I'll probably also stick a cross-brace into the cabinets to stiffen them up, as long as I've got them open. This is all easy.

The only thing that is blocking me is knowing the spec'd values for the handful of parts in the crossover. In particular, the coils. They almost certainly won't be marked. Thus: I need the service manual. Or, at least, I need someone who has access to one to tell me the specifics of the crossover.

Olin

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Søren Mexico — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 10:35:41 GMT

Olin Shivers:
Can anyone tell me if an S40 schematic or service manual exists behind the beoworld paywall?

I just checked, there is aparently no manual for S40, but it may be hidden in some manual together with other types.

The crossover in S40 will be a simple one as its a 2 way speaker, my sugestion will be, first check if both speakers are bad, if yes, check them with another source, just to be sure that its a speaker failure and not amplifier. Open one speaker, check driver for foamrot, check all connections and solder points, check resistors, coils and caps, change the caps, they are old and if not bad now they will go bad within short time. If only one speaker sounds bad use the good one as reference, I would open both speakers and use one for reference and cross check and when one is repaired and tested, do the reference speaker.

I did a pair of S45s myself, new sorrounds and 1 cap in each crossover, a simple and easy job.

Re: Refurbishing a pair of Beovox S40 speakers

Dillen — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 10:31:09 GMT

There's currently not a Beovox S40 schematic in there but that can easily be arranged.
The Beovox S40 service manual is basically just an update to the Beovox S35.
Merely a parts list, exploded view and schematics.
I will have Peter put them both up in there.

Martin