Santana II Questions

**voice of the theater** · July 11th, 2013, 09:39 PM

I just bought my second pair of Santana II's.

I really like how my first pair sounds stacked on top of the Model 19's in my rec room and I've been looking for another pair to stack on top of my second pair of Model 19's that I have in my in home recording studio. Here's the thread last from last August when I bought my first pair of Santana II's.

http://www.hostboard.com/forums/f700...-speakers.html

Anyways, this purchase motivated me to recap both pair of Santana II's like I did with my Model 19's and 14's. I opened up my older pair and one of the caps in particular didn't look good at all.....

FIRST QUESTION: I like to listen to these Santana II's with the treble pot on the speaker turned all the way up. I thought that maybe I could bypass the 30 year old pot altogether so the signal doesn't have to pass through it at all. As you can see in this photo, the L Pad (pot?) has three terminals and there is a jumper from one of the terminals connecting it to the center terminal. If I disconnect the red and black wire from the pot (L Pad?) and connect them to each other, would that be the same as running the pot "full throttle"? Or would bypassing this L Pad (or pot?) in this manner have a negative effect on the impedance or some other undesired effect?

By the way, this pair has the newer 13 1/2 inch frame woofers as you can see in the photo above, and my first pair has the older style 12" frame woofers. Same voice coil and cone, just different frame. As I was advised last year here on this forum, they sound identical and are identical other than the style of frame.....

Here are the Santana II's I bought last summer.....

**VolvoHeretic** · July 11th, 2013, 10:07 PM

Nice looking woodwork. Sorry, no advice on speakers.

**alancohen** · July 11th, 2013, 10:38 PM

Originally Posted by voice of the theater

If I disconnect the red and black wire from the pot (L Pad?) and connect them to each other, would that be the same as running the pot "full throttle"? Or would bypassing this L Pad (or pot?) in this manner have a negative effect on the impedance or some other undesired effect?

Unsolder the black and red leads from the pot, leaving the jumper in place. The jumper turns the L-Pad into just a variable resistor. Turn the knob all the way up and measure the resistance across the terminals. If it goes all the way to zero then you can just solder the red and black together. If not, you will need to add a 10W resistor matching the value of the reading.

Nice speakers...BTW.

**Old Guy** · July 12th, 2013, 01:13 AM

Be careful about cranking when the tweeter is up. The tweeters blew out a lot in those.

**voice of the theater** · July 12th, 2013, 11:11 AM

Originally Posted by alancohen

Unsolder the black and red leads from the pot, leaving the jumper in place. The jumper turns the L-Pad into just a variable resistor. Turn the knob all the way up and measure the resistance across the terminals. If it goes all the way to zero then you can just solder the red and black together. If not, you will need to add a 10W resistor matching the value of the reading.

Nice speakers...BTW.

Thanks Alan. Who would have thought that when I ran across your thread over at L.H. last year and I recommended that you check out the Altec Users Board that you'd turn out to be such a valuable member here! Anyways, unfortunately I don't have anything to measure resistance with. From your post I think I can at least gather that when wired with the jumper, the L-Pad doesn't affect the impedance so at least I can rule out that potential problem from removing the L-Pad from the circuit. I was hoping someone here would know the answer to my question (without me doing any measuring) like they did with my Model 19's and 14's. I run the treble "pot" full throttle on those and bypassed the treble pots on them by disconnecting the two wires from the pot and soldering them together after members here told me that it would be the same as leaving them connected to the pot when it's "all the way up". BTW, I didn't bypass the mid pot on my 19's or 14's because the optimum range for those is towards the middle of their range -- to get a flat response you need to set those towards their middle range and that's where they sound best as well. The optimum range for the treble pots on the 19's and 14's is at the uppermost part of their range so that's why I only bypassed the treble pots on them and not the mid pots......
QUESTION ONE AGAIN Based on my photo in post one of this thread, If I disconnect the red and black wire from the pot (L Pad?) and connect them to each other, would that be the same as running the pot "full throttle"? Or would bypassing this L Pad (or pot?) in this manner have a negative effect on the impedance or some other undesired effect?

Originally Posted by Old Guy

Be careful about cranking when the tweeter is up. The tweeters blew out a lot in those.

When I initially tested these out, I cranked them up much louder than my usual listening levels and they survived that so I'm sure they'll be fine in my day to day listening use. Not to mention that I play them and the Model 19's simultaneously so when I crank my system, the Santana II's aren't getting pushed nearly as hard as they did when I initially tested them out at very high SPL's on their own without the 19's. I know if these were my main speakers and I cranked them up really high for a party etc. without the 19's being played simultaneously the tweets would be at risk -- especially since I run the crossover pot for them full throttle so thanks for the heads up Old Guy! By the way, I think you were the one who was good enough to alert me about the tweeters last year when I bought my first pair of Santana II's so I bought a spare pair of tweeters last fall because Bill/GPA doesn't service these tweeters.

Which brings me to the next question. I noticed that the tweeters on my new pair of Santana II's sound brighter than the tweeters on my first pair of Santana II's. I wanted to swap tweeters and see if the difference is the tweeters or the crossovers. I can't for the life of me get the tweeter out of the cabinet. I bent a screwdriver trying to pry it out (after removing the four screws of course).
DUMB QUESTION TWO: How do you get the tweeters out of these cabs? Is there a trick to it or something else that needs to be loosened besides the four screws?
DUMB QUESTION THREE: The woofer cones are in great condition. Do these look like the original Altec woofer cones? (Santana II woofers are the same woofers that are stock for Model 15's and Model 9's)

**Earl K** · July 12th, 2013, 05:34 PM

QUESTION ONE :

- To answer the question safely, one needs to see either a schematic or a picture that clearly shows where all the wiring ends up .

QUESTION TWO :

- don't know

QUESTION THREE :

- don't know

**Altec Best** · July 13th, 2013, 03:46 PM

For the tweeter question.If there is enough slack in the wiring.Try popping out the XO or the woofer and gently push from behind the tweeter.

**voice of the theater** · July 14th, 2013, 09:14 AM

Originally Posted by alancohen

Unsolder the black and red leads from the pot, leaving the jumper in place. The jumper turns the L-Pad into just a variable resistor. Turn the knob all the way up and measure the resistance across the terminals. If it goes all the way to zero then you can just solder the red and black together. If not, you will need to add a 10W resistor matching the value of the reading.

Nice speakers...BTW.

Thanks Alan. Sounds like I'll have to do some measuring since there's no schematic or other way to answer this question. What type of meter do I buy to do this and where's a good place to buy one? Radio Shack?

Originally Posted by Altec Best

For the tweeter question.If there is enough slack in the wiring.Try popping out the XO or the woofer and gently push from behind the tweeter.

Thanks John--I'm going to give it a try.....

By the way, can anyone tell from the photo in post 5 of this thread (above) if this is an Altec cone number? Just wondering if these are original cones or if they're generic--they look and sound authentic/original to me......

**alancohen** · July 14th, 2013, 09:23 AM

Originally Posted by voice of the theater

Thanks Alan. Sounds like I'll have to do some measuring since there's no schematic or other way to answer this question. What type of meter do I buy to do this and where's a good place to buy one? Radio Shack?

Chances are you'll be OK just connecting the red & black leads, but I'm old enough to have confirmed many times that if anything can go wrong, it will; and usually at the worst possible time.

I have this one: Tekpower TP2844R True-RMS Auto-ranging Digital Multimeter - Amazon.com

But you can get a basic one for as little as $10 from Amazon. You'll pay more for the same thing at RS and HD, but it might be worth a look. They're good to have around.

**Alien_Shore** · July 15th, 2013, 04:08 AM

Originally Posted by Earl K

QUESTION ONE :
- To answer the question safely, one needs to see either a schematic or a picture that clearly shows where all the wiring ends up .

Earl's right. Do you have a better pic, or can you describe which wires go where?
It's hard to tell from the pic, but if L-Pad pins 1 & 2 are jumped, the L-pad is essentially defeated from it's primary purpose (maintaining constant impedance), and the impedance that the XO is seeing from the tweets is reduced. I would doubt that the L-pad was wired that way from the factory.

Does anyone have a pic of a factory Santana XO or a schematic?