BR-1 Help

[krieram]

Hey all,

I'm building my first pair of speakers using the BR-1 kit. Followed the instructions/videos exactly but when I hooked the first speaker up to the amp....nothing. I cranked the amp and got a little bit out of the tweeter but nothing I would even call a signal. Same issue with the second speaker.

Thoughts? What am I doing wrong?

Thanks in advance for any help

[coffeebum]

Solder? I mean did you solder the components into the crossovers, and the crimped wire connections on the board with electrical (silver) solder as well? Sounds like a connection problem to me... That is one possibility. What kind of amp and what kind of signal? Could be a signal problem..... Needs more info. Pics?
I recently built the shielded version of these and like them alot

[JimHRB]

Or the crossover is wired incorrectly. Check it carefully against the diagram.

[krieram]

Yeah soldered everything to the crossover board. They seem to be in their correct spots. I didn't solder the crimped connections though.

It's a Denon amp/receiver just set to tuner to get a signal to the speakers for testing. Works fine when headphones are plugged in.

It's interesting to me that I would get the exact same result on both speakers. Only a tiny bit of high end out of the tweeter. Say 10k and above and thats only when the amp is cranked. Most likely a crossover issue but how do I remedy it. All of the solder points seem to be good ie shiny smooth etc.

I didn't scrape off too much of the excess leads on the inductors could that cause this big of a problem?

thanks

[jclin4]

I know this is stupid, but just worth checking: does your receiver have speaker A and B selectors. Is the right one selected?

I only ask because it would seem a low probability that both your speakers are mis-soldered or mis-wired in exactly the same way.

Even if the woofers are not connected due to the inductors, you would be able to hear some signal in the tweeters (better than what you describe).

[krieram]

That's a good point. Although I am hearing a little something. I'll do another check on the amp. Unfortunately I don't have any other passive speakers around which would be a good test

[whatatrip]

Can you take a picture of what you have done on the crossover and post it here?

[coffeebum]

I could not get any kind of signal on my tuner until I added a bit of coax as an antenna, I just stripped down to the core and got it hanging up... You locking onto any radio stations? I also ran a coax from my SPDIF on the PC over to the tuner digital input, setting it on DVD lets me play files through winamp or whatever. Have you got this amp running before? If you followed instructions you should be fine with the build, unless of course they are both wrong in the same way. Can you borrow a speaker from a friend?

[krieram]

Attaching some pics. sorry for the terrible quality.

Headphones work fine so I think the tuner source is working correctly.

[Mark65]

Hard to tell from your photo, but it looks like there might be a short or three on the back of that board.


Mark

[john trials]

Hard to tell from your photo, but it looks like there might be a short or three on the back of that board.


Mark

It is amazing how poorly that bottom layer is arranged. Huge areas of copper conductor, yet almost every solder joint is right on the edge!

There is solder mask on the board, so hopefully there are no shorts, but it's worth checking.

[williamrschneider]

Out of curiosity, does a AA battery making/breaking contact across the speaker inputs cause the woofers to "thump" a little?

That's a fairly simple test to narrow down the possibilities.

[krieram]

thanks for the replies guys. youll have to bare with me as im new to all of this (obviously)

Mark65 how do I recognize these/can you identify the possible shorts you are seeing?

williamrschneider - I'll check that out tonight thanks.

[whatatrip]

Hard to tell from your photo, but it looks like there might be a short or three on the back of that board.


Mark

I agree with Mark. In your picture it looks like the upper left hand solder has crossed over the gap from the In+ terminal sheet to the W+ sheet.

Just to the right of the middle and below the T+ terminal it looks like the solder has crossed over to the T- sheet.

Right in the middle it also looks like your solder has crossed the gap between the sheets of copper. You can’t do this. There should be no solder crossing any gaps.

[krieram]

Gotchya. Somewhere i read to load on the solder but that makes sense not to cross any of those gaps. Can I simply heat those up and move that solder away or is a new board in order?

[jclin4]

You can stop by Radio Shack and pick up some solder wick or a suction ball to help in removing the solder. But yes, you reheat it first.

You do not need new boards.

[coffeebum]

Yes. You can use a de-soldering wick, google it bro for more detailed instructions. If I were you I would really try to borrow a working speaker from someone and play with the amp settings, just so you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you have a problem with the BR-1's. Also, did you get down to bare metal on the leads from the coils before you soldered? I documented what I did withe shielded BR-1's here http://coffeebum.imgur.com if it helps you at all. Good luck my friend!

[whatatrip]

Gotchya. Somewhere i read to load on the solder but that makes sense not to cross any of those gaps. Can I simply heat those up and move that solder away or is a new board in order?

If you don't have any de-soldering tools you can use your solding iron by heating it up, wiping as much solder off of it as possible ( just use a paper towel), apply new solder to it so you get some flux on it and then tap the iron so most of it falls off. Then you can heat up the soldered joint at the point where it should be soldered. As the solder melts the excess should wick onto your iron.

The goal is to draw the solder to the iron and away from where it should not be. A pencil tip soldering tip would work best.

[krieram]

so i just tried the AA battery test (without any resoldering) and got a thump out of the woofer. what does this mean? should i do this test on the tweeter as well or will that harm it?

[Chris Roemer]

so i just tried the AA battery test (without any resoldering) and got a thump out of the woofer. what does this mean? should i do this test on the tweeter as well or will that harm it?

It just means the driver is OK.

Did you try making your solder blobs smaller, so you're not "bridging the gaps" yet?