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I did a very cheap tweak to my 901's that made them sound SOOOO MUCH BETTER ! I put two coats of Elmer's Carpenter's wood glue on all the paper cones and dust caps of the speaker drivers.
I put one coat of wood glue and let it dry good for 24 hours and then put another coat of wood glue and it dry good for another 24 hours before playing any music.
My 901's sound like different speakers now, I'm hearing a more extended top end...more realistic and a more extended deeper bottom end and the mid-range sounds cleaner more 3-D.. more realistic WOW !!...
This AMAZING SOUND was there all these years, you just had to tweak it out of them !
Follow Ups:
I have seen radial scratches on the woofer of Sonus Faber speakers. I did read somewhere about the designer himself showing how those cuts were made which improved the sound of the woofers. Perhaps the OP can try that on one of his 901s? It should be done gently, not hard.
Cheers
Bill
These modified 901's put out powerful deep bass and to our ears, sound their best turned around backwards.So 901 owners that want to try this tweak out on their 901's should keep this in mind because they don't sound as good turned around the other way now....
Edits: 07/13/12
A bit of satire?
"Your liver suffers dearly now for youthful magic moments...so rock on completely with some brand new components"
Cone and dust cap "mods" without before/after measurements are of no value. You can't know how you changed the response, and you can't claim it's better simply because it's different. But, this is the mantra of all tweaks really: "I tweak therefore I am", and; "If it sounds different, it's gotta be an improvement".
Nice thing about a 901 is that you'd be hardpressed to make the sound any worse.
I have three pair of 901's and I have one pair with coated paper cones and another pair without coated paper cones and there is a night and day difference I'm hearing here.
To my ears, stiffening the paper cones with wood glue produces far less distortion and improves smoothness, transparency, detail and extension on both ends !...
I coated my 901's paper cones with wood glue more than two months ago and they have improved even more as the months have gone by !...
What is your technique for getting an evenly thin layer of glue on the speaker cone? Can you post a picture?
I just used my fingertip to put the wood glue around the paper cones.
I put the wood glue on as is, I DID NOT use a 50 50 fix of water and glue together.
No, I have no way to post pictures.
No highs no lows, must be Bose...
Old Bose hazing video but still funny
Talk about polishing a terd....
As long as you are happy though that is all that matters, I owned the 901 series v for a few years, they sounded okay but I never missed them when I moved on. If glue dopping transformed them, that is really an impressive tweak!
Try this wood glue tweak on his 901's and do an updated review on a much improved 901's ...
...that seems lost on many tweaksters. Different isn't necessarily better. In the case of the 901's, since they use an equalizer, who is to say that after the "glue on the driver cone" mod, changes in driver impedance and frequency responce due to the added mass to the cone, won't just be equalized out? Then the user is basically back to square one.
The speaker mod kits from a company called Soundaids included some white glue to be painted on woofer cones. But this was to mod Radio Shack (Optimus?) Model 7 and 77 speakers. So I'm not sure I'd try it on anything worth more than these good but cheap speakers. As to Bose, no comment.
If I recall correctly Elmer's white glue is PVA or related to it, the material that is the shiny coat on top of all bextrene cones and sometimes on other cones. It's a damping material which is why itwas used on bextrene which had some bad break up problems. And it will damp resonances in other cones, of course making them smoother sounding. So it's entirely possible it did the same thing here.
With my planar speakers the glue is already in there, on the inside.
I have learned that !!!! (exclamation points, especially in emails) means "bullshit"
I see them, I usually just laugh.
nt
$$$$........@&@
You may have improved them with the glue, but do you really think smearing Elmers Glue on a 901 will make it "hang with" high fidelity speakers?I do recommend that you refrain from getting any of the glue into your ear canals. I'm sure there must be an physician in your area who can remove it for you.
Edits: 07/08/12
nt
"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro." -HST
You might try a little epoxy in the voice-coil gap of all the drivers. I've heard that makes a very noticeable difference. ;-)
Good luck,
John Elison
at last we agree on something (just kidding).
...regards...tr
As someone who has built my own kayak from wood, fiberglass, and Epoxy, I have a great deal of experience with Epoxy. When it comes to Bose 901s, I can't think of anything more deserving of the best - and lots of it!
To that end--and to begin with, for that matter--I recommend "MAS" resin and hardeners:
MAS Epoxy - expensive, but good
Your idea of applying Epoxy in the voice-coil gaps of all the drivers is a good "backup" measure, just to be safe, but what I have in mind is a more impressive sort of Bose 901 Epoxy Tweak. I say fill those drivers to the brim with custom thickened Epoxy! Different fillers for different colors (WAF, and all that, no doubt); fine wood dust for brown, graphite powder for black (and extreme durability under duress), and silica (perfect for our favorite audiophiles, as it has excellent dielectric properties).
To apply Ultimate Bose 901 Epoxy Tweak®:
1) Turn Bose 901 so that speaker cones are facing the sky (for many of us, that's "up"). Mix large batches of Epoxy with thickener(s) of choice (recommend slow hardener here, as fast hardener on large batches is contraindicated). Fill those babies up to the brim (don't worry about the previously tweaked dust caps - they're protected by Elmer's!). Let cure at least overnight.
2) Crank it.
Then just try that LP with 16 minutes of silence. Bet it never sounded better. ;^)
"For a nominal service fee,
you can reach nirvana tonight."
I think you really have something with that epoxy tweak. Finally a tweak so good it assures the speakers will need no further modifications .
I seem to be one of the few here who actually has listened to and likes 901s. They are hi-fi's "go-to" whipping boy, so I guess people either love or hate them. In any case, they are easily had used and suitable for restoration or other Frankenstein-like experiments. While I haven't done the Elmer's trick, I did something similar. I was putting a coat of polyurethane on the cabinets of a pair and I had a "WTF" moment and did the same for the drivers. Sound change? Coundn't tell, but it did make them nice & shiny. My "inspiration" was from an old DIY book that suggested impregnating the paper cones of CHEAP drivers with melted parrafin, which might improve the sound quality.
I suspect the OP's enthusiasm reflects a clever troll, since Elmer's is not volatile. Otherwise, his thinking that the speakers had improved could have been forgiven by his inhaling fumes of organic hydrocarbons causing light-headedness and/or brain damage :)
Nearly all of my listening to 901's makes use of extensive EQ (DEQ2496 or miniDSP) in place of the Bose EQ.
I would also like to report that I finally found a set of "original" 901s (series I, II) that did not have its original drivers! This surprised me, having had three pairs previously that appeared to be 100% original with no defects ("Other than being Bose", mutter the wiseasses!). They look like crap, but no major defects after much listening. Another benefit of dealing in the low end is I can sell stuff back to other low-brows on Ebay when I tire of them :)
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