RE-Cone/Align W7 with EXTERNAL shim's only?

[Drgeta]

Hi All.

I currently have an old JL 13W7 which the voice coil is rubbing on the motor. When pushing down on the cone on one side it will move freely but when pushing down equally on both sides it will rub slightly, the voice coil is still intact as both sides show stable ohm’s (1.6 ohm each) so my question is,

 

Is it possible to replace the spider and re-align using the existing coil/cone using only external shims to line it up?

 

Normally you use both internal and external shims and re attach the cone once the spider is glued, but since I can’t remove the dustcap (the W7 cone is one piece) and I can’t remove the cone from the coil without breaking the coil. Could I just use external shims and glue a new spider?

 

I’m wanting to try and keep the original coil as much as possible as I’m wanting to use this more for SQ than an SQL banger with a new PSI voicecoil.

[audiofanaticz]

No, you need to know the order of assembly..

To install new spiders around the voice coil they can only go on one way, and that is from the top of the voice coil before the cone gets attached. The cone is one of the last things to get put on during assembly (not counting the dust cap.

The JL W7 DOES have a dust cap, its a full dish dustcap the covers the entire cone of the woofer. The surround is sandwiched between the full size dish style dustcap and the actual cone. This large dish plastic dust cap is applied glued down to the surround and in the middle of the dustcap with adhesive, you will most likely ruin the surround trying to remove it, but the dustcap can be saved if done carefully and you use a little heat from a heat gun (not too hot that you melt/deform the plastic dust cap).

However the cone is glued to the voice coil with a much stronger adhesive that is not really possible to remove without damaging the cone or the voicecoil former. This is typically the same type of glue used to glue the spiders to the voicecoil former as well as glue the spiders to the basket. Not to mention that the tinsel lead wires are also soldered to the voice coil former and then coated in the same glue.

Trying to disassemble all this without any damage so that you can reuse everything is like 0 in 100, especially if you have no hands on experience. You have a better chance winning the lottery.
Not to mention if the voice coil is rubbing there is a possibility of it wearing down the wire windings which could have an effect down the road.

In all honesty the time you will take to try and tear it apart without damage and clean all the old glue off everything without out damage it would be far quicker to just rebuild it all with new parts.

You can typically find OEM parts that are the same in almost every way and nothing will be changed with how it sounds. 

Also I have never heard of an external shim in my life, and Ive built a lot of woofers.. The only shimming that gets done is on the inside of the voicecoil while building the woofer, once the woofer is finished being built the shim comes out prior to putting the dustcap on in this case .

[Drgeta]

Thanks audiofanaticz, the 13w7 does not have a dust cone...well it does but even removed the cone has no access to the voicecoil,  below the 13" size it does, the 13 is a solid "W" cone.

i think i'll just have to go with an aftermarket voicecoil.

 

also check out the video here, 11:25, shows the external shims i was talking about https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1ZizF9Nsjc

[Jessica]

skip to about 13:30. good luck

 

 

[Drgeta]

how the fuck did i miss this video? this is exactly! what i asked for,  duck you champion.....now the hard part....

[audiofanaticz]

There is a voice coil former cap on the JLs, many woofers use this, or a really small dust cap under the big normal dustcap that is seen.

The cap aids in more pressure being created for better cooling through the voice coil and motor assembly. This is typically done on woofers that are using a larger dust cap due to the larger cap reducing the cooling. Some other brands off the top of my head that have done this besides JL are Digital Designs, SoundQubed, Sundown to name a few.

Simply put, Doug has no idea when it comes to speaker building.. 
There is no reason to shim the outside gap...

When you shim the voice coil you shim it evenly from the inside of the gap. You keep adding shims until the coil will not instantly fall inside the gap, but so its own weight is supported.  

[audiofanaticz]

Kind wish I wouldnt have deleted all my recone videos off of youtube.. I had a lot of them, and they where kind of long but full of information. Sadly a company was using them for their own gain and tried to copyright my content and I pretty much deleted all my content.

[Ron36]

Sounds like he’s do for an upgrade FI, Sundown, AA or anything would be an improvement.

[Drgeta]

On 9/13/2018 at 8:39 PM, audiofanaticz said:

You can typically find OEM parts that are the same in almost every way and nothing will be changed with how it sounds. 

The only JL parts i can seem to find are the aftermarket ones, JL doesn't sell the re-cone kits anymore, closest i can find are the fixmyspeaker and lordofbass. but i've always thought any slight change in any parts (thickness of the wire/type of wire/layers/etc) would drastically change the T/S information of the woofers, especially the voicecoil.