sundown x 12s surround vs glue

[sundownz]

We have been working on the surround glue issue since we discovered it :

1) It is intermittent -- so not all woofers are affected and those that are not uniformly affected. More than likely if your woofer is fine after a few hours of play you will not run into any issues at all. You do not need to take it out and mess with it and potentially cause damage.

2) As soon as we discovered there was any issue all woofers were tested more thoroughly for any such issues with the gaskets being removed and workers checking for adhesion; any that did not adhere completely from the factory were carefully re-glued by our staff at this point. Most of these were successful as our glue is superior to the factory glue (not an issue on anything else we've made, though).

3) Some of the early units that we re-glued resurfaced again with the adhesion issue after shipping to customers. We met with adhesives engineers at this point as we have always used the same glues and procedures with no problems -- we discovered that the new surrounds had "mold release" compound on the glue surface area of the surround but at varying levels of concentration (eg: the workers apply it and then make 10-20 surrounds, then re-apply, so the first one has the most compound on it) making it intermittent and thus very hard for us to track down and acutely diagnose -- this is not something we have seen before on our other surrounds but after then bringing this up with the surround manufacturer AND a few industry insiders that we know we discovered this was necessary due to how large the surrounds are so they didn't stick in the mold during mass / fast production. This is also something the surround manufacturer failed to mention to us OR our build house ahead of time AND something not present on prototypes and samples -- as small volume sample runs allowed time for the workers to slowly remove the surrounds from the molds thus not requiring a release agent.

Any units we have re-glued and/or built in house since we discovered all this have followed procedures recommended by the adhesives engineer to prep the surfaces; so far all of the units treated this way adhere just as well as all prior surrounds. For anyone attempting a DIY fix simply remove as much of the old adhesive as possible in the detached area, clean both surfaces with rubbing alcohol and/or acetone applied to a cloth, allow full dry time, and re-glue with E6000 adhesive (closest thing to our adhesive readily available).

4) As a result any additional factory made drivers coming into stock that we already had started production on will have the surround BOLTED to the frame in addition to glued. Furthermore; around 60-75% of all Z v.4 and X series will be assembled here at our facility by the end of 1Q 2014 as well... and 100% by the end of 2Q 2014. In order to ensure that we do not have any similar problems in the future we are building an assembly line system for this; as we have traditionally "hand crafted" one by one all of our big drivers. Obviously this is not possible on higher volume lines like the X and Z v.4 so we'll be doing mass production here in NC on those lines coming up in 2014.

We, of course, realize this has been frustrating to some customers -- it's just as frustrating to us due to the intermittent nature of the problem; at several points along the way we thought we had it fixed. As with any "all new" product that launches at high volume some snags are possible. As a manufacturer all that we can do at this point is to fix any problematic drivers for our customers -- which we have gladly done for anyone who contacted us with this problem and will continue to do so AT NO COST.

There are some people who have chosen to refuse service and would rather blast us on the internet. I suppose that is their choice to do so -- but we would prefer to simply take care of any customers affected. If your woofer is damaged in any other way as a RESULT of the surround glue problem we will completely re-build the driver or replace it for you. We have also offered customers the option of trying a DIY fix if they choose to do so to avoid down-time -- we will also COVER the DIY fix if it is unsuccessful and the issue resurfaces.

I also took the time to make this post to let everyone know we know about it and have been working tirelessly to improve our processes using this as a learning tool -- as well as doing whatever we can to take care of any affected customers. We appreciate everyone that has taken up their issue directly with us and allowed us to fix it for them. The internet is a great tool but often times people choose to use it to viciously attack one another, products, and companies rather than to have their problem actually solved.

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That's great to hear guys! I hope your great customer service continues for years to come.

[zayres29]

i ordered (8 ) sa8s a couple years ago and one was shipped with a spot on one of the surrounds that wasnt glued right out of the box

[cyclogenisis]

I planned on ordering one and came across the glue issue on a youtube video. I hope this has been resolved.

[zydrix]

This issue has been resolved, sundown did an awesome job taking care of the customers I have seen this happen to.

[sundownz]

I planned on ordering one and came across the glue issue on a youtube video. I hope this has been resolved.

I would guess Andrew Walunus (Sp?) video... he is running the woofers to this day and doing killer numbers with them.

Either way we fixed it a long time ago and all X and Z v.4 woofers are still under warranty periods so we take care of any older units still out there as well.