Speaker repair/matching dillemma

[Michael977]

Good evening all,
Thanks in advance for the help. I'm in a bit of a quandry as I build by HT (haven't even built the room yet). I have a 5.1 system now and want to upgrade to 7.1 or 7.1.4 someday. My setup now is a hodge podge of stuff.

Here is my current setup.
L/C/R/spare (4 cabs total)-- Electro Voice Sentry V

HF ST350 tweeter horns on all four are good to go. No problems.
LF drivers in two need to be custom built. The originals are gone. Someone threw the originals away and put Rockford Fosgate subwoofers in at one time. I found some old Pioneer Project 100 10" drivers and threw them in instead.

For picking them up at a thrift store on a fluke, they sound way better than I expected. I expected the HF horn to significantly overpower the LF driver. Surprisingly, this didn't happen. The RF, being subwoofers, completely lacked any mid-range. The freq range of the Project 100s are roughly the same as the Sentry Vs. The specs on the Pioneers don't give a +/- range or sensitivity though, so who knows what the freq response actually is. Side by side (not a great receiver), I'm actually impressed with how close they are for not even trying to match anything. I'm running this as my center channel right now.

I put the RF subs in the Pioneer cabs and run them as subs.

In the other two speakers, the drivers are original, but are badly in need of re-foaming. They sound ok (no distortion or cracking, VC seems tight still). This is obviously relatively cheap.

Sentry V specs: http://www.electrovoice.com/downloadfile.php?i=971302

​

L/R Surround -- Peavey TSL 1

I picked these up at a pawn shop for $100 last week. They are in great shape and need nothing.
Peavey TSL 1 Specs: https://assets.peavey.com/literature/manuals/80301066.pdf

I like the sound of these as surround speakers. I haven't tested them as mains.

The local pawn shop has 8 more Peavey TSL 1s. One of the local theaters just remodeled. i think they came out of there. Weird thing is, they are all priced differently. Two sets have a price of $49 each, while another set has a price of $65 each and yet another set has a price of $149 each. I didn't hook them up or listen to them, just visually inspected them. Cabinets are all in decent shape. One of them has a tear in the driver.

​

Options I am considering:

The frequency response of the Sentry Vs is far better than the Peaveys.

Question: How important is it to match the L/C/R and surrounds in 7.1 or Atmos 7.1.4?

Option 1)

L/C/R -- Re-foam the original Sentry Vs and have custom driver built for the other two cabs. I also have a lead on a company that would custom build me a driver. EV custom built the drivers specifically for the Sentry Vs, so there are no direct replacements unless I find cabs. They show up on eBay once in a while, but they are almost 70lbs each, so shipping is a killer.

Surround -- Keep Peaveys and buy 2 more so I can go to 7.1 or 7.1.4 when the boss lets me get a newer receiver.
​

Option 2)

Buy 5 more Peaveys and run L/C/R and surrounds with Peaveys.

​

Option 3)

Buy four Peaveys and replace drivers in Sentry Vs. All the drivers would match.
​

Option 4)

Keep searching for more Sentry Vs and get surrounds to Sentry Vs. This presents a space problem. They are big and wouldn't mount very well on the wall (8' ceiling). This was part of the reason for exploring the Peavey when I found them.​

The Sentry Vs that came with the RF subs came from a local theater about 30 years ago when they remodeled. These have been in the family since then and have been in my posession for almost 10 years.

I am leaning towards Option 1. i can easily build the room to accommodate the Sentry Vs up front. I'm thinking I'll put them behind a transparently acoustic screen. My budget is pretty much 0 at this point. Getting the second pair of Peavey's shouldn't be an issue. Much more than that and the boss and I are likely to come to words unless I start selling stuff.

--Michael

​

 

[highfigh]

Good evening all,
Thanks in advance for the help. I'm in a bit of a quandry as I build by HT (haven't even built the room yet). I have a 5.1 system now and want to upgrade to 7.1 or 7.1.4 someday. My setup now is a hodge podge of stuff.

Here is my current setup.
L/C/R/spare (4 cabs total)-- Electro Voice Sentry V

HF ST350 tweeter horns on all four are good to go. No problems.
LF drivers in two need to be custom built. The originals are gone. Someone threw the originals away and put Rockford Fosgate subwoofers in at one time. I found some old Pioneer Project 100 10" drivers and threw them in instead.

For picking them up at a thrift store on a fluke, they sound way better than I expected. I expected the HF horn to significantly overpower the LF driver. Surprisingly, this didn't happen. The RF, being subwoofers, completely lacked any mid-range. The freq range of the Project 100s are roughly the same as the Sentry Vs. The specs on the Pioneers don't give a +/- range or sensitivity though, so who knows what the freq response actually is. Side by side (not a great receiver), I'm actually impressed with how close they are for not even trying to match anything. I'm running this as my center channel right now.

I put the RF subs in the Pioneer cabs and run them as subs.

In the other two speakers, the drivers are original, but are badly in need of re-foaming. They sound ok (no distortion or cracking, VC seems tight still). This is obviously relatively cheap.

Sentry V specs: http://www.electrovoice.com/downloadfile.php?i=971302

​

L/R Surround -- Peavey TSL 1

I picked these up at a pawn shop for $100 last week. They are in great shape and need nothing.
Peavey TSL 1 Specs: https://assets.peavey.com/literature/manuals/80301066.pdf

I like the sound of these as surround speakers. I haven't tested them as mains.

The local pawn shop has 8 more Peavey TSL 1s. One of the local theaters just remodeled. i think they came out of there. Weird thing is, they are all priced differently. Two sets have a price of $49 each, while another set has a price of $65 each and yet another set has a price of $149 each. I didn't hook them up or listen to them, just visually inspected them. Cabinets are all in decent shape. One of them has a tear in the driver.

​

Options I am considering:

The frequency response of the Sentry Vs is far better than the Peaveys.

Question: How important is it to match the L/C/R and surrounds in 7.1 or Atmos 7.1.4?

Option 1)

L/C/R -- Re-foam the original Sentry Vs and have custom driver built for the other two cabs. I also have a lead on a company that would custom build me a driver. EV custom built the drivers specifically for the Sentry Vs, so there are no direct replacements unless I find cabs. They show up on eBay once in a while, but they are almost 70lbs each, so shipping is a killer.

Surround -- Keep Peaveys and buy 2 more so I can go to 7.1 or 7.1.4 when the boss lets me get a newer receiver.
​

Option 2)

Buy 5 more Peaveys and run L/C/R and surrounds with Peaveys.

​

Option 3)

Buy four Peaveys and replace drivers in Sentry Vs. All the drivers would match.
​

Option 4)

Keep searching for more Sentry Vs and get surrounds to Sentry Vs. This presents a space problem. They are big and wouldn't mount very well on the wall (8' ceiling). This was part of the reason for exploring the Peavey when I found them.​

The Sentry Vs that came with the RF subs came from a local theater about 30 years ago when they remodeled. These have been in the family since then and have been in my posession for almost 10 years.

I am leaning towards Option 1. i can easily build the room to accommodate the Sentry Vs up front. I'm thinking I'll put them behind a transparently acoustic screen. My budget is pretty much 0 at this point. Getting the second pair of Peavey's shouldn't be an issue. Much more than that and the boss and I are likely to come to words unless I start selling stuff.

--Michael

You don't want to think about having custom drivers made- the fact that you're shopping at thrift stores tells me this. Second, reverse-engineering is a good way to become incredibly frustrated because the driver determines the cabinet's dimensions and the type of cabinet and need for a port, or not. I would look at one of the existing EV drivers for the part number and date code, then look for more of them on ebay. If they cones are bad, get the best price and have all of them recone, so they're all on equal ground from the start. Mixing drivers of varying condition isn't the best way to go.

The Peavey drivers may work in the EV cabinets, but only by coincidence.

 

[Michael977]

Returning to this subject. The Thrift store shopping was by chance. It was not my intention to purchase speakers. I watch CL to see what pops up. The Peavey's happened to be there and seemed like a good fit.

I'm starting my HT design and the Sentry Vs are going to remain the L/C/R stage. I am going to replace the Peavey's. Above 10,000 Hz, they don't have the dispersion angles for the dimensions of my room without getting a 3rd pair (they are incredibly hard to find). I am going to switch to something with a horn that is a little more common. I'm leaning towards JBL 8340 (not 8340a) as they have a 100 deg. horn and similar specs, although the enclosure is a bit smaller.


As I started looking at them, the driver seems like a closer match to the EVs. Rather than trying to have custom driver built, how well would this work as a replacement driver? If they work, I would be willing to swap all 4 drivers for these so they all match. The driver specs are:
MODEL FS QTS QMS QES VAS EFF PE XMAX RE LE SD BL MMS FLUX

127H-2 30.17 0.26 2.73 0.28 4.8 1.23 125 5.6 0.738 0.0345 11.3 34.6 11.3

Here is the spec sheet for the EV.
http://www.electrovoice.com/binary/Sentry V EDS.pdf


Thoughts? I've been casually researching this stuff for a while, but still extremely green on it. I love the sound of the EVs, so don't want to get rid of them.

 

[Michael977]

I think I just found my answer on eBay. There are a pair of Interface C drivers for sale. Interface C was the consumer version of the Sentry V.

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