[jvgillow]

I had some radio music playing at fairly low volume (-25 MV) through my LS-6 this evening and happened to be walking past one of the speakers and noticed the top two Neo 8 tweeters weren't producing any sound.  I unplugged the good speaker and turned up the volume a bit, then unscrewed the top panel to check the wires and everything looked fine with the solder, screwed that one back in and then while I was unscrewing the panel below it, the tweeter sound returned.  The wires on the second one are fine too, wiggled them around a bit and there was no cutting out of the sound.  Got everything screwed back in, and tapped around the metal grill on the tweeter and shook the speaker lightly just to make sure it didn't cut back out and it seemed fine.

I dropped the volume back down a bit and played music for another 10 minutes, and the top two Neo 8 had cut out again.  I cranked the volume up to -12 and they started working, which made me think at first that it was volume-dependent.  However, I did some more troubleshooting and found the Neo 8 pair is actually cutting in and out on its own, even if I don't touch the volume for a while.  So what am I looking at here, a defective Neo 8, or something going on with the crossover?  The other 4 tweeters have been fine.

Thanks,
Jeremy

[nickd]

Jeremy,

The good news is its most likely NOT the crossover.
The bad news is you most likely need a new Neo 8 driver.
Time to call Danny. (I think he may be on vacation this week)
They are wired in series / parallel, sounds like in pairs of 2 in that model. When one quits, they both quit.
you can test the drivers with a AA battery and a couple of wire leads to try to find the bad one. it sounds like it may be the bottom of the two. I had to replace one on my LS'9s. The wire etched on the film is very thin not sure if they can withstand high solder temps. That or there is just a defect in 1 out of 150 drivers or something like that? A new driver will get you smiling again.

[Danny Richie]

Sounds like an intermittent connection issue on one of them internally. Send the bad one back to me and I'll send you a new one. 

[jvgillow]

Hi Danny,

Thanks for the quick reply.  I didn't buy the kit from you so I don't mind buying a replacement Neo8.

Is there a way to test the 2 suspect Neo8 to figure out the defective one, without damaging the good one?  I've only tried the AA battery trick on woofers before, seems like that would kill a planar.

I suppose I could hook up each to an amp playing 1kHz+ sine wave at low volume?

Jeremy

[Danny Richie]

Hi Danny,

Thanks for the quick reply.  I didn't buy the kit from you so I don't mind buying a replacement Neo8.

Is there a way to test the 2 suspect Neo8 to figure out the defective one, without damaging the good one?  I've only tried the AA battery trick on woofers before, seems like that would kill a planar.

I suppose I could hook up each to an amp playing 1kHz+ sine wave at low volume?

Jeremy

The battery trick doesn't work with planar drivers and could damage them especially if it was a 9 volt battery.

You can hook a music signal to each driver independently and see if one or the other has the intermittent connection issue. And yes I know intermittent connection issues are a pain. 

[jvgillow]

The battery trick doesn't work with planar drivers and could damage them especially if it was a 9 volt battery.

You can hook a music signal to each driver independently and see if one or the other has the intermittent connection issue. And yes I know intermittent connection issues are a pain.

After de-soldering and some testing I found the culprit. It didn't cut out nearly as frequently when hooked up all by itself, but I got it to happen a couple times.  When the Neo8 is working I get < 8 Ohm impedance reading.  When it's not working, 96 - 97 kOhm.