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In all honesty, I think your supplier is making claims that are not supported. The data sheet from Solen is going to be the final word. I've only bought Solen from Solen directly so can't speak about 3rd party suppliers.

Do solen caps even have markings for polarity? I'm trying to remember if I saw anything on the caps themselves to indicate direction and I just don't remember seeing anything on them. Maybe I'm just forgetting?

Interesting videos. Question, is the noise only introduced if there is something coming into physical contact with the backwards cap?

I'm familiar with how a capacitor functions. I don't recall this information on the solen caps I have bought before (similar to the black solen cap you have in the picture). Makes me wonder if I installed them correctly (last time was a cap replacement in the crossover for my magnepan n 20.1 speaker...

Do those caps have polarity?

Hi David,
Welcome to CJO, great to have you with us.

All our available schematics are available for download in the troubleshooting section of the forum. If it's not listed there, we don't have it.

Link to schematics: https://www.conradjohnsonowners.com/viewtopic.php?t=128

It's a little beyond "a 3 year old", but the basics are pretty easy, and it can do a lot if in the future you really want to get crazy with it.

Calibration mic: https://www.minidsp.com/products/acoust ... ent/umik-1

Calibration software: https://www.roomeqwizard.com

Interesting little device. I use active room correction/equalization in my home theater setup. It's near impossible to calibrate 8+ speakers all at once with simply "moving them around" or putting acoustic treatments here and there. However, my expectations of hometheater is very different...

Paolo,
Do you just do the room correction by ear or do you employ any calibration tools?

I don't, but not sure how much it matters in this case as the ML's have their own amplifier to control the woofer and the ESL membrane is so light that it really doesn't need dampening in the traditional sense (like you would with a large heavy magnet).

A less ideal alternative would be to use a thin but insulating glove, AND with your other hand firmly in your pocket and feel the resistors to see if the two triads are equally warm. Not sure I should be recommending that and you'd need to be very careful! I would be cautious with this one. You can...

@pfmmx Wow, that is a lot of tube rolling. Very insightful. Must have been fun exploring all those different options. Definitely more difficult to do those kinds of things today with the crazy tube prices. @pfmmx and RJ As for the design of the new line including the ART88 it's definitely a more cla...

Very common to see these kinds of modifications with speakers of this age. It's also a relatively simple crossover design which makes it easier to do component replacements. Again, I think it's a good time to inspect components and do replacements if you have the speaker disassembled already.

It should be fine. I used to run a ML Vantage for a number of years. As a large part of the ML is "self powered", it doesn't take a lot of wattage to run properly. It's more about the quality for the quantity of that power. And the Premier 11 certainly has the quality. Do you have the Prem...

I completely agree here. No reason to keep chasing the unicorn constantly. Sounds like you have a system that sounds great. Perfect, now sit and enjoy those sweet tunes. I think many audiophiles get caught up in the constant "have to get better/different gear" cycle and they miss out on th...

Very nice. Looks like there is a viable repair solution here. As for the crossover caps, I think the black ones are not original. They appear to by Solen. The white ones are original. I would just check them carefully, if there is any sign of bulging or dysfunction, now would be the best time to rep...

Really good analysis here by RJ. I am also in the camp that I don't view tubes as more or less like solid state. Tubes offer a unique sound and within that category have different unique properties. I am currently running two CJ amps that take KT120's and EL34's. They have a different sound but woul...

Zero chance that they still make those so I think you are looking for a replacement as the only option. If you go with replacement, definitely replace the one in the other speaker as they will not sound the same. As a side note, I would also take a look at the crossover. If you have the speaker apar...

I've been monitoring the website access load this past week and I think we are good. Since making the recent change total bandwidth is now back to normal (about 1/20th of what it was during the downtime period) and number of page reads is back to normal as well (about 1/200th of what it was during t...

Both ends are grounded if that is what you are referring to. The single wires going into the RCA plugs actually have two internal wires inside.