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Speaker damage

Hello all. I’m spiraling and thought maybe a discussion with you all would help me chill out. 
 

I own a pair of B&W 804S’s that I bought second hand a year ago. The tweeters were dinted so I replaced them immediately. Loved the sound, eventually added a “vintage” REL sub and power everything with a Rogue integrated, 100w. 
 

I’ve been chasing down tube problems for the last year while waiting to get my Krell integrated fixed, but during that time I’ve been enjoying system. Listening mostly on vinyl, some digital, and the movies and video games.

Recently, I started to listen to some recordings a little louder. This was after a discussion on Reddit on how people interpret some recordings that are written by the artist to “listen loud”. I found that most of my time listening, I am listening around 75 to 80dB. My listening position is about two meters away. 
 

The new “loud” has been 85-90dB. Only certain recordings, but still. This is not even “half way” on the volume knob on my amp and the speakers seemingly never distorted. 
 

Last week, I’m listening to a deliberately distorted industrial metal record and it gets to a point where there is some droning frequencies that are lowering in pitch. In this lowering, there’s a distinct almost “crackle” sound coming from my right speaker. I turn down the audio, play again and still hear it in the same spot. I switch to the digital recording of the track thinking maybe it’s the record. Same thing. I switch tube slots—same. Move speaker cables—same result. Right speaker crackle.

I switch out tweeter—same. I order a replacement MF driver—ah ha! No problem. So I order another MF driver to keep them balanced. The ones they are replacing are from 2008, these are manufactured in 2025 from B&W. 
 

But now I’m paranoid. It wasn’t the cheapest replacement and I still don’t know what caused the “failure”. I can’t emphasize enough that the crackling was almost song/section dependent. I listened to more recordings before replacing the driver and only noticed something maybe similar once. I’m in my head. 
 

So now I have two new drivers and I’m having a difficult time enjoying my hobby. I’m afraid every time I hear a pop or a crackles from vinyl surface noise. I’m listening quieter again. But I feel like I need some perspective here. Is there anyway to find out what happened to that previous driver? Maybe it was always shot but just needed the right frequency and amplitude for me to notice?

I do listen to a wide range of music: metal, noise, drone, electronic and all the standards as well. Am I listening too loud? I don’t feel like I am, especially when considering the numbers, but maybe I am mistaken?

Thanks in advance!

h3n_drix
elliottbnewcombjr
7,729 posts
 

My Woofers used to face down, speakers were on 8" legs. A weird noise, what the hell, now can’t hear it, there it is. Random, very infrequent ...

Finally took the sealed back off, it was a staple that held the insulation inside that had come loose and fallen down onto the back of the woofer cone. 

Some unique combination of frequencies would get it over where it would be under part of the metal spider, and do a dance like a cat on a hot tin roof. I got it out with a magnetic tool I had.

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Years later, I paid Andre, a pro, to put new cloth surrounds and coils and paper cones/dust caps for those woofers, ElectroVoice 15W, 37lb monsters.

 

Now they were facing forward in a taller enclosure.

I heard a noise, left side, the coil was rubbing just as described above, he redid it, no charge.

Since then, I’ve put new coils/surrounds/cones/dust caps myself twice. I have a full set of spare drivers, crossover, and a woofer re-build kit 

......................................

I restored two pairs of AR-2ax (1st pair sounded so darn good I moved them up to my office and got a second set for the garage/shop system). One woofer coil was rubbing, I noticed some missing paint on the spider on it. I just smacked a leg of the metal spider opposite, and problem was gone. Whomever had worked on the woofers (new surrounds before I bought them) had dropped it I guessed.

 

bpoletti
1,590 posts
 

Buy extra drivers and stop worrying whether you're going to have another failure.

dahodevil
30 posts
 

If you still have the old drivers, check the spider behind the cone. It may have come unglued from the frame. 

h3n_drix's avatar
h3n_drix OP
16 posts
 

Welp, I’ve enjoyed listening to several albums without any issues… until today. I was playing a record that was particularly quieter than the others so I decided to turn it up. In doing so I heard the familiar buzz that I heard from the fault MF driver I had replaced. I turned it down a little bit, then the buzz happened again. It almost sounds like an electronic buzz/crackle instead of what a clipping distortion would sound like. I’m a little discouraged. It doesn’t sound low enough to be from the LF’s nor does it sound high enough to be the tweeter. It has more “body” to it. I haven’t played around with the recording to see if I can get it to buzz over and over like I did with the last driver. 
 

this is in the same channel. Could it be the crossover? Why would the problem seemingly go away after replacing the drivers, then surface again at higher volume?

for the record, I had the volume about halfway—and was barely hitting 90dB. Other records at at 85-90dB a good bit before that. This record is intended to be played loud and I was excited to listen to it but was also not so surprised when I heard my problem come back. Any guesses?

noromance's avatar
noromance
10,472 posts
 

At this point, you need to be certain it’s in the speaker. Swap channels (again!) at the preamp and see if the distortion moves to the other speaker. If it does, it’s further up the chain like the power amp. Can you switch to mono–then it should occur in both speakers–assuming it’s being generated outside the speakers? If it doesn’t move to the other speaker, then you may have an issue with the crossover. (assuming the driver isn’t failing again)

PS Are you sure it's not in your ear? Like tinnitus?

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