N500-G Dividing Network, Rebuilding Altec Magnificent's

**johnny_fever** · May 15th, 2014, 10:58 AM

What overall opinions do you guys have of the N500-G crossover? Did Altec come up with anything better after 1969 when these were built? I just Installed new GPA DF's and the 416-Z's were just redone at GPA and will arrive today. The DF's were mis matched and one of the 416's had voice coil rub. So now Its time to look at the XO's. At the very least I will put In new caps. Any known XO up grades? Thanks Rick

**Old Guy** · May 15th, 2014, 11:43 AM

I like these:

ALTEC N1209-8A CROSSOVERS MATCHING PAIR - Canuck Audio Mart

**Altec Best** · May 15th, 2014, 11:33 PM

Any photos of ther internals of the N500-G ?

**johnny_fever** · May 16th, 2014, 01:14 AM

Sure AB
I take It the caps are In that cardboard box? I hope nothing under the tar bed needs to be replaced.

**Altec Best** · May 17th, 2014, 06:06 PM

No the caps are probably under the tar..It was unecessary and just made it a PIA to replace any of the parts after they went bad..Use a hair dryer to heat up the tar if you want to try to rebuild these..There are some folk's on this board who have gone this route with some success.Any crossover that is original that you buy online like from eBay will likely need to be rebuilt.But if you can find some without the tar will make your rebuild a whole lot easier.The upside is those XO's don't have a whole lot of tar in them from the photo so you maybe able to remove it quite easily.IIRC some one on here has even used a oven at like 150-200? for 10-15 minutes.. You will of course need to use oven mits.Here are a couple of threads that may help you. Best of Luck with it.

http://www.hostboard.com/forums/f700...rossovers.html

http://www.hostboard.com/forums/f700...ecap-help.html

http://www.hostboard.com/forums/f700...lfunction.html

**aditya** · May 18th, 2014, 01:42 AM

Actually the capacitors can be changed very easily here in this case. They are right there inside the cardboard box, which can be opened easily.

The Altec N500G & N800G crossover modules do not use the standard ww-potmeters for the attenuator. It uses switchable fixed resistors. The tar portion is there to hold the bunch of resistors only, and the capacitors are inside the cardboard box.

**Altec Best** · May 18th, 2014, 08:00 PM

Aditya Thanks for the input..With other Altec crossovers that had the tar, the caps were completely encapsulated in the tar.

**johnny_fever** · May 19th, 2014, 09:13 AM

Thanks for the reply's. My other question was did Altec come up with a better design XO for the Mag or A7 than the N500-G. I see the A7's went to a different design like the 801 & 501. Thanks Rick