Modification that has proved to be transformative


in a manner well beyond swapping out gear, tweaks, wire and the like. Ok Agoners I have owned and gone through lots of great gear as evidenced by my feedback:-)

However, over the past year I have learned something I want to share. Some of you will know all about this and others will have heard about it, but with doubts. Three words....

Duelund CAST capacitors

Sure, I have cap rolled and part rolled for a few years now. Fun stuff to do and sometimes I liked the change and other times not so much. However these CAST capacitors are an entirely different animal. I placed them in my tube preamp, hybrid amp and speakers. In each component the improvement was dramatic and a game changer in many ways. Universally, each component was greatly improved by a percentage easily exceeding 25 -30%. I can't understand why gear retailing for $10,000 or much more would skimp on a crossover or coupling cap. My hybrid amp used $30-$50 caps that sounded good, but not great. Same thing in my speakers for the midrange crossover caps. The Duelund CAST caps made these high dollar pieces sound the best they are capable of.

I picked these up at Parts Connextion at a great sale price recently. They are very expensive caps, but made more affordable due to the recent sale.
I cannot overstate how superior these are to all other boutique type caps often talked about in audio threads. This, at least in my experience, has been the case in my cap rolling endeavors. I say confidently they will greatly improve any component they are used in. No need to debate about synergy and the builders tuning with parts etc...as these CAST caps are just going to make good and great sounding gear much greater!

So if you have gear utilizing coupling caps in key circuit positions this is an upgrade that will deliver far more then their high cost. Spend your thousands here before any wire change or buying and selling gear. If your gear is of very high quality and the key circuit caps are good, but not Duelund CAST, consider a cap upgrade.

I purchased two .47 uf caps for $398 and four .22 uf caps for $800. I used these in my tube pre and hybrid amp. This is easily the best $1200 I have spent in my 30 plus years in audio. As much as wire and certain tweaks do improve the sound, these caps did even more. Other highly touted caps did not garner quite this reaction from me in my system.

Now, these caps would have cost me double this if not on sale. However, they would still have qualified as a best buy in terms of their impact on my music.
grannyring
I just read Coincident uses metal oxide resistors and they may be Mundorfs and that is good. The inductors also seem to be of good quality based on current builds. The Auric caps are good, but the Duelunds are in a completely different class to be honest.
A Duelund on the tweeter is the most important place with the mids to place a CAST cap. It would do wonders Charles. For the builder to say he does not like the CAST is, I have to say it, strange and I am being most kind. Read any and all other reviews and they always are rated #1 by a wide margin. In audio, nothing is absolute exempt CAST always being a nice improvement :-)

I figured he would say that, but the CASTs are simply without equal and on your tweeter would be heaven. No way his comment is based on using the latest CAST cap in that position. Oh well, I wish builders were not so closed minded and defensive. Of coarse some are, but many are not.

Tell him I will eat the cap if it does not indeed sound better. Well I suppose it depends how big it is!
Grannyring,
I`ve never read a negative comment about Duelund caps(only high praise). Actually I`m pleasantly surprised at how simple and bare bones the crossover is(a single cap,hard wired and no circuit board). If there were room for the Duelund I`d give it a try just out of pure curiosity, but I won`t go to the extent of external crossovers.I suspect Israel feels that with such a minimalist design perhaps a single cap won`t matter much(just me speculating of course).

Grannyring I don`t doubt for a moment the improvement you`ve found with your speakers. My 8 watt Frankenstein drives this speaker so effortlessly and with such sucess I`ll leave well enough alone.
Regards,
Charles.
Grannyring,I am amazed that a 10,000.00 pair of speakers came with 15.00 Chinese caps.You would think at that price point better parts would be a given.Im guessing that a certain amount of talent went into putting 10m speakers together,cabinet,drivers,finish,crossover parts,that would convince someone to pay 10m.You would think!Thanks for bringing this up.
Charles, I think the CAST cap would fit depending on the value. No doubt it would improve the sound, but understand it would cost and it can be hard to break away and go to someplace new. I have done it so often now that I no longer mind or fear the whole process. I have learned a great deal.

My crossovers are also hard wired and many are.

Raytheprinter, I would say the vast majority of speakers selling for $7500 and above use decent sounding and performing crossover parts that can be purchased very cheaply. $30 caps are a norm.

They are usually housed in a speaker cab full of vibrations that hurt the sound. Many have tested this and plotted the improvements. Actually pretty simple to mod a speaker with an external crossover. I purchased custom made wood cabs that match my speakers, upgraded the caps, speaker wire and damped the crossover cab fully with proper deadening material.

The fact is we owners can greatly improve the sound of our existing, highly touted and reviewed gear, with parts like Duelund CAST caps etc... The builder may or may not agree, but no worries as they don't often know as they have either not tried or decided they they cannot afford it. Some don't believe in these boutique caps etc... So they scoff. This scoffing is also prevalent.

I owned Soundlab speakers that came with $30 caps etc...and the owner actually helped me mod the speaker to great effect. I did a host of modifications to the active crossover based on a schematic he made for me. Great guy!

One of my favorite all time speakers are the Silverline Bolero's. They came with $20 crossover caps and the sound was greatly improved with Duelund caps. The builder did not believe in these caps! Ha!

I own another set of speakers that sounded great, but once I opened up the speaker I noticed the tweeters were wired incorrectly. They always sounded good, but a bit dull in the highs. I reversed the wires to the tweeter and bingo - huge improvement. HUGE. I will not mention the company, but they are well known.

My Aesthetix Atlas amp is amazing and a great sounding amp. I noticed the rather mid grade caps employed in key positions and replaced them with with the Duelund CAST caps and the amp now sings so much better in every single way important to the fidelity of the music we love.

One has to be willing to learn, try and perhaps make mistakes along the way. Yes, even Sphile Class A gear can be greatly improved! No, builders don't always think their gear can be improved.