[Letitroll98]

So I'm reading this old thread on AA and there's a link to a post describing how to eliminate the entire fuse and attenuator assembly on the MMG.  I quote:

...may I suggest a better way? Rather than bypass, you can actually eliminate them, their wiring, and the attenuators/jumpers in one fell swoop. It's a simple process too, will cost you nothing, and only take a few minutes. In the image below you will see that there is a yellow and a red wire above with a blue wire on the lower right. Take off the back plate (just four screws). Remove the nut for the yellow wire and remove the wire that leads to the fuse - don't remove the yellow wire. Then remove the nut for the blue wire and move that wire onto the connector with the yellow wire and put the nut back on it. Put the back plate back on your MMGs and you're done!



http://db.audioasylum.com/cgi/m.mpl?forum=mug&n=129016&highlight=blue+wire+wazoo&r=

Ok fire away.  Thoughts, admonitions, testimonials, whatever.

[Davey]

Yeah, that will work.  You don't even have to remove the wire from the fuseholder.  However, you'll defeat the capability of adding an attenuation resistor to the tweeter........if that's a concern.

Dave.

[drphoto]

I wouldn't do it. I removed the fuses on my old 2c's and burned the tweeter wires. The sonic gain is minimal and not worth the risk of damage IMHO.

[Letitroll98]

Thanks guys.  So aside from your well founded caveats, there's nothing insanely stupid about the idea, no short that is overlooked etc.?  And of course you also remove the jumpers, correct?   

The reason for the question was the testimonials about the massive increase in sound quality after the mod.  There were admonitions if your amp is not up to driving Maggies you shouldn't try this, with counters that most would blow the amp fuses long before the 4A tweeter fuses anyway.  Another thought was that if you do completely smoke the panel, it's not a financial disaster, and it's completely and easily reversible if you hear no difference.  I have a big, ballsy American amp with a stiff power supply that has never had a wit of trouble driving the MMG's and I've never used the attenuators, not really sure if they're still in the box, so I may go for it.  I'll certainly take it very easy with the volume control early on.

[pelliott321]

When I rebuilt my Maggy IIIa's over a year ago, it was no question in removing the fuses, fuse holders and pin connectors er al.
There is volumes if testimony over on AA planer about the benefits of this mod. 
If you have good, clean, stable, amps then you should have no worry doing away with the fuses. 

[Letitroll98]

Thanks, I did it.  As always with these things, 15 minutes on the first one, two minutes for the second speaker.   

It's late here so the volumes have to be kept low, but even at that, wow, what a transformation.  Perhaps I'll edit this post tomorrow, but as it stands it's like getting a new and improved model speaker.  So much of the Maggie mist is gone.  On Sara K's Closer Than They Appear Chesky release the third song has a tenor sax that always sounded great, well back in the soundstage with lots of air, but now, the clarity is stunning.  Of course everything below the crossover is technically unaffected, but it seems improved, I suppose maybe some of the harmonic overtones are clearer or something.  Whatever, even the midrange and bass sound a bit better.  Best tweak of 2011 for me.

[SteveFord]

On the subject of fuses, has anyone here blown a Magnepan fuse? 
Lynda's daughter managed to pop both on my old IAs many years ago.

[Letitroll98]

I guess not.  Maybe we should ask for a show of hands of those who have not blown a Maggie fuse.   

[cityjim]

Removing fuses and attenuators DOES work. Reason is the cheap plastic fuse holders that are used are junk. They make poor connections and cause signal loss at times.

 On my 20.1's I thought the tweeter was blown. Speakers were then new. Anyway I saw a blue electrical acring at the fuse holders and the fuses were hot. Sum it up there was a POOR connection on the fuses. Removing or bypassing these is a definite improvement.

cityjim

[andyr]

On my 20.1's I thought the tweeter was blown. Speakers were then new. Anyway I saw a blue electrical arcing at the fuse holders and the fuses were hot. Sum it up there was a POOR connection on the fuses.

cityjim

Wow!  Frightening.    Not really acceptable on their "premium" speaker, IMO.

Regards,

Andy

[Letitroll98]

Well I've had no desire to put them back in.  The SQ is much better and I've measured no change in frequency response.  I was hoping for an improvement in the FR curves thinking there was perhaps some unintended attenuation going on, but didn't get it, just a veil of mist removed.  They sounded brighter, but didn't measure that way.

[2bigears]

   interesting stuff,can you yank the fuses on 3.6's with no troubles also ???? tweak away......?? thks  Pat   

[cityjim]

 I don't see why not. I did on my 20.1's with no issues. I went from using 450 watt per channel SS amps all the way down to my current reference 45 watt SET full class A triodes. I never had any problems with blown anything.

 Now if you listen to distortion like the 1000 watt club above states then I would leave the fuses in. Or if you are a mature listener remove the fuses.

 Here's a little tip on amp selection and will show you how many watts you are listening to. Take an O scope (best) or a multimeter and place the leads on the amps output terminals. Turn on your song of choice at YOUR listening level. Take note of your O scope or MM values for AC voltage. Then using simple Ohm's law take the voltage and divide into 4 ohms for the speakers impedance. That gets your current draw from the amp. Then multiply current by the read voltage to get your watts. Then report back here and with your wattage. I think most guys will be way under 10 watts. I was and I'm driving 20.1R's. This will prove to YOU how many watts you REALLY need. I guess Andyr envites the Rolling Stones over to his house?? Got to have those 1200 watts per.... LOL.

 Of course you guys will never do the wattage test. Because everything you've heard about Maggies is you need 600 watts to drive MMG's. Clearly not the case. Magnepan recommends a couple hundred so that people won't blow tweeters and such. That's because they know guys out there that will use a car radio to drive their speakers and blow tweeters. Headaches for Magnepan and the user.

cityjim

[SteveFord]

A lot of amps have meters on them.  A few years back I was using a modified Carver M500t which has meters on it and the needles would jump up a fair bit on transients when the music was cranked.
That amp was rated at 420wpc at 4 Ohms and these speakers really can suck up a lot of power at higher volumes. 
Most of the time it the amp was loafing along at 10-50W but I did see over 300w on occasion which is when I'd get worried about blowing things up. 
This was on IIIAs and 3.6s, I wouldn't attempt to drive a set of MMGs anywhere close to that loud.

[cityjim]

 That's what I saw, roughly 5 to 40 watts. My normal level was less than 1 watt to say 5 watts. No doubt like you saw SteveFord when the music is cranked those watts go way up. I don't push my speakers hard though. If I want ear busting levels I go in the other room with the GR Research LS9 towers. I enjoy my 20.1R's much more.

cityjim

[rw@cn]

It is not necessarily the watts, you don't want an amplifier that will clip under stress. Clipping and other distortions is what normally blows fuses. Quality is what counts. Of course with low efficiency speakers like Maggies you also need high quality quantity to bring out their best sound.

Fortunately, there are a number of relatively well designed amps available.

[SteveFord]

You gentlemen are both right.
I was happy when my VTLs were back from the shop as I missed that David Manley sound.
What's odd is that one of the VTLs had a capactitor go berserk when I was in the other room and I heard BAM!  BAM!  like someone was banging on the front door with a telephone pole. 
It blew the amp's fuse but not the speaker fuse.

[cityjim]

 If you aren't getting the sound you want with 50 or 100 watts then a 600 watt bruiser won't help either. And if you are clipping your amps you're most likely driving the speakers too hard. Look to replace the tweeters soon. You can buy some 1000 watt monos all you want. Truth is you'll never use 80% of the amp.

 I agree quallity is best. That's why I use full class A tubes on mine. I've tried many a brand of solid state amps. Tried three highly hyped class D amps. My experience was anytime I moved away from class A and especially tubes the sound degraded. That's why you see so many class D and other solid state amps for sale. Just look at the small number of tube amps on the used market in comparison. Then ask yourself why.

 Lets revist amplifiers. The more watts an amp has the more amplification stages that amp has. Simply meaning more parts that have to be matched to replicate the other gain stages. If and when the parts drift which they will leads to things like current hogging and so on. The best sounding SS amps I've heard were ones with a single pair of outputs per channel. And ran in full class A at that. Other than that I'd pass on SS amps.

 So far there have been no posts about guys measuring their wattage read at the amps. Other than SteveFord which had a similar experience like I did. Thanks to SteveFord for posting BTW. I want to hear from someone that can't hear their speakers from their listening chair unless they have a 750 watt amp.

 Most likely IF you are blowing fuses it's the poor connection at the fuse. Not the power delivered to the speakers with a 100% reliable fuse connection. Which does lead to more watts being delivered due to the high resistance from a crap fuse holder on the speaker. The ones Magnepan uses are junk. Even on the 20.1R's I have. I could see blue electrical arcs at the fuse holders. The fuses also got hot as fire. So I bypassed them and never looked back. Nice sonic improvement to boot.

cityjim

[srb]

That's why you see so many class D and other solid state amps for sale. Just look at the small number of tube amps on the used market in comparison. Then ask yourself why.

I did and the answer was that solid state amps outsell tube amps more than 10 to 1 (for home audio amplfiers not guitar amplifiers).  I'm not saying that tube amps aren't better (or are), just that the number of used sales also relates to the number of new sales.
 
Steve

[cityjim]

 I hear you Steve. Might be also that SS amps are the new toy so to say compared to tubes. Possible reason why those class D amps are the latest buzz. Also not many tube manufacturers left. Most people want zero maintenance and are unschooled on tubes. Actually if an amp does fail then tube amps are far easier to repair. Especially those bruiser 400 watt SS monos with 3 and 4 gain stages. Lots of possible parts to fail. Tube amps are more simple to me I guess. Anyway to each his own. Thanks for posting Steve.

cityjim