What does a bad tweeter sound like?

I've had crossover caps start leaking real bad and it sounded very much like the driver was blown, but only at very specific frequencies. It was also slightly louder. I was dealing with an AMT though. 

Thanks all....I just removed the tweeter from my Vandersteen 5A (left side) and am sending it back to Vandersteen for a rebuild.  I hear just as you describe...louder on that speaker, fuzzy and metallic on some frequencies.   I thought it was the midrange, speaker, but removed that one last month, got it back rebuilt, and the noise is still there.  I hope its the tweeter.

I'm not familiar with those speakers, but if the crossover isn't a real bitch to remove checking those caps out wouldn't be a bad idea. I doubt you have a leakage tester, but all the caps should measure up into the megaohms on a resistance test after a few seconds. Caps also tend to drift out of spec when the go leaky, but not always. Most of the leaky ones I've dealt with had drifted outside tolerance, but not all. They all failed to effectively block a few volts on a ohm meter though. 

I just found the 5A crossover. :) I would leave it alone unless you are already pretty well versed.

The 5A uses batter biased caps int he mid and tweeter sections. Pretty funky if you ask me. :)

Geez Stringeen ......I thought you had '' golden ears '' as you have proclaimed here after working in recording studios and you couldn't tell know if those older Vandersteen's tweeter is gone ? Maybe it is time to use them as door stops ......