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I built a pair of 1Pi speakers for a friend last summer and ever since then he never complained at all about them and told me he was happy with them. But then one day I brought along my very small Sonab OD11 speakers (30 year old speakers from the late Swedish designer Stig Carlsson) that I had restored, to try them with his tube amp. We were both shocked by the difference! The old Sonab speakers had a very natural sound with lots of "air" while the 1Pi speakers sounded dull, overdampened and boring. The bass and midrange sounded as if somebody had put a bunch of t-shirts or something over the speakers. I read somewhere that somebody stated that the Alpha based models have a vintage sound. Is this what it means? I can only think of one thing that could be wrong with the speakers and that is the internal dampening. We used high density fibreglass insulation instead of the very soft type that I see most people are using. But could it really cause this much of a difference? /Erik
I really like the little one π's, although they do lack some bass. When used in a very small room or with subs, they sound great. Did we sell you kits or did you pick up the parts and build 'em yourself? If you bought the parts yourself, did you get the genuine KSN-1038 or a substitute? And in either case, are your speakers pre-2003 models or if newer, did you install the midwoofer coil? I ask because they can be a little midrange-heavy without the coil. If the answer to any of these questions is "no" then you may find a problem that has an easy and inexpensive solution. Oh, yeah - One more thing. It's very easy for debris to fall into the tweeter during assembly and I've found that is a common condition with speakers in the field. So you might want to remove your tweeters and take them apart and clean them. Remove the three screws in the back and carefully take off the back panel. Inspect the cone and cavity for debris, and gently blow across them to stir any that might be there loose. If there's any sawdust inside, that will obviously reduce their performance and this process will ensure that's not ailing your speakers. I don't think your choice to use fiberglass insulation is causing you any problems - In fact, that's the stuffing I prefer. But there are several suggestion here in this forum's archives, and things to think about and try to get the most from your speakers.
The tweeters are cleaned. The speakers does not have the coil but that's not the problem here. The only thing I could think of is that the high density fiberglass stuffing isn't working well and that we should use the low density stuff that is normally used. And no, we did not buy the parts from you. But the tweeter isn't the problem here, actually the treble is quite nice, it's the bass and lower midrange that is dull. It really doesn't sound like we're listening to music but instead to a loudspeaker. /Erik
I like R11 and R13 insulation best, so you might give that a go. And you might also want to install a 0.5mH coil in series with the Alpha 10.