Powered Advent Refoam - Who to send them out to?

[charlie2951]

Hi Everyone,

Longtime reader, first comment. I finally got my hands on a nice pair of Powered Advents. I've been debating myself for about a month on whether I should do the refoam myself, but ultimately, I'm too nervous and I'd like these to be perfect, cost (almost) no object. Does anyone have a recommendation on who I should send the woofers to?

Thank you for your help, and thanks to this community in general. I've learned a lot from you guys over the years.

-Charlie

 

[Pete B]

Where are you located?

[charlie2951]

I'm just outside of NYC, although I'm willing to send the woofers anywhere in the U.S. for the best job possible.

[Pete B]

I sent you a PM but I might as well ask here, did all PA's use the NLA all metal woofer?

[charlie2951]

Personally, the short answer is that I'm not sure, but I'd bet yes.

Advent used the metal frame woofer starting with the New Large Advent (NLA) around 1977 through the 5002/5012 until about 1985; into the Jensen years. The woofer might have undergone some small changes, but from the Advents I've owned they look the same, and according to the various refoam kits, they take the same foam. So they're similar, to say the least. This leads me to believe that the woofer used in the Powered Advent would be the metal frame version. All the pictures I've seen of the system seem to use the metal frame woofer.

Examining the system that I bought, the one woofer that I have looks a bit different from the standard NLA metal frame woofer. It doesn't have the tell-tale ridges that run along the circumference. I can't find any other woofers online that look like this one, so I assume that the previous owner ordered a replacement.

I would bet that the correct PAL system uses the standard metal NLA woofer.

I attached some pictures of my system below.

[Pete B]

Looks like the woofer that is there was reconed with the incorrect cone and dust cap.

This looks correct:  http://www.fisherdoc.com/advents.html

They could have done a custom impedance, but I doubt it.

What's going on with the charcoal looking foam on the left, did it burn up?

[charlie2951]

Wow the PALs at that link are gorgeous. Definitely the right woofers. I didn't consider that it had been reconed. That makes more sense.

When I opened up the grill, it looked like that. It appears the foam has just disintegrated over time.

[Pete B]

It shouldn't be too difficult to find a new set of woofers.

[srkitchens]

Late replay - I should monitor the forum more often.  Good score on the PAL's.  The black acoustic foam disintegrates into a sticky mess with age.  I couldn't find a cheap replacement that was fire rated so I opt'd to use fiberglass on my PAL rebuild.  The transformers vibrate a bit (see earlier post) and I might one day attempt to reseal them.  Isolation washers took care of the majority of the vibration.

Do the amplifiers work.  Mine required two costly repairs (one was self inflicted when I attempted to repair a  several blown resisters and created a far worse failure) but are now happily playing in the basement office.

You should be able to use any NLA metal frame woofer.  Re-foam is pretty easy and if you mess it up you can always pay a proshop professional to redo your work.  I've done numerous OLA and NLA re-foams using Simply Speakers kits (I like their glue).  Watch one of their re-foam videos and decide it you can do it yourself.