[Early B.]

I turned on my system today and realized the right speaker wasn't playing. I checked all of my connections, switched speaker cables and ICs, then realized that the right woofer is playing, but the tweeter isn't. I checked my crossover and tweeter solder points. Seems OK. I have an ohm meter, but forgot how to use it (don't ask). How do I check to see if my tweeter is functional? What settings do I use on the ohm meter?

Thanks.




 

[Jaytor]

Disconnect both speakers from the amp. Set your multimeter to measure resistance (which is what you have it set to). Measure the resistance across the tweeter on both speakers. If the resistance isn't approximately the same, then you have a bad driver (or bad connection to the crossover).

You could just try measuring the non-working speaker, but I don't know what influence the crossover will have on the reading, so you'd need to disconnect the tweeter from the crossover first. If you want to do this, you should get an impedance in the 4 to 8 ohm range. If it measures as an open circuit (often shown as --- or OL), then the tweeter has a broken connection somewhere inside and probably needs to be replaced.

[S Clark]

Disconnect both speakers from the amp. Set your multimeter to measure resistance (which is what you have it set to). Measure the resistance across the tweeter on both speakers. If the resistance isn't approximately the same, then you have a bad driver (or bad connection to the crossover).

You could just try measuring the non-working speaker, but I don't know what influence the crossover will have on the reading, so you'd need to disconnect the tweeter from the crossover first. If you want to do this, you should get an impedance in the 4 to 8 ohm range. If it measures as an open circuit (often shown as --- or OL), then the tweeter has a broken connection somewhere inside and probably needs to be replaced.

+1
Set your meter for a range around 100 to 200 ohms

[Early B.]

OK, I got 5.2 on the right tweeter and 4.9 on the left one. I'm assuming the tweeter is OK, and the problem is somewhere else???

[Hobbsmeerkat]

Can you check the signal coming from the tweeter circuit?

[Early B.]

Can you check the signal coming from the tweeter circuit?

Translate, please.

[Hobbsmeerkat]

I don't know now multimeters work so im not 100% sure how to explain, but maybe an easier option would be to connect the tweeter circuit to a different driver to see if sound still comes from that driver?

[Early B.]

OK, it's working now.

[Hobbsmeerkat]

Yay! I wonder what happened? Maybe a bad soldering joint?

[SoCalWJS]

Yay! I wonder what happened? Maybe a bad soldering joint?

Distinct possibility. I’ve had an occasion or 2 where I just decided to redo all of the solder joints in a circuit and the problem goes away. “Cold solder joint” I think they are called.

[Early B.]

Yay! I wonder what happened? Maybe a bad soldering joint?

Probably, since I'm the one doing the soldering.   

[S Clark]

OK, it's working now.

Hopefully you have a bad solder joint- so the issue isn't going to fix itself.  Put on some music at a low volume and gently wiggle the wire at each solder connection starting at the terminal tabs of the tweeter, and work backwards in the circuit.  Or just reflow all the joints.