Vandersteen 5a battery biased crossovers


I've been using my 5As nearly every day for over 2 and a half years now and I feel they are the best move I ever made in audio. I researched them (and many other speakers)thoroughly before I made my purchase. I must say that everything incorporated in this design makes more sense to me than any other speaker I've encountered(Richard Hardesty's review covers this all very well for those not familiar) The one feature I still wonder about though is the battery biased crossover. How much does this help the sound? I believe that after about 5 years the battery needs to be changed on each crossover. Has anyone here had the 5A long enough that this had to be done? Did you do it yourself or does it require shipping to the factory?( I think the batteries are soldered in place to keep from rattling)Also, has anyone just let this go and not really noticed a difference?
sonofjim
I am not sure what caps are used but any high voltage signal path application for caps generally requires high quality caps.

Most speakers use high quality polypropylene caps for the crossover ($5 to $10) as do Vandersteens (I think) - these do not need reforming like electrolytic caps (although like any cap they drift with use with most drift occuring in the first 100 hours). So I am not sure what the battery actually does unless? As for peformance - within a few minutes the capacitors within your speakers should perform optimally so I am not sure the advantage there either. (The rubber surround on the speaker drivers will also ease up after a few minutes each time you power up too and thermal heating of the voice coil will change the way the speaker behaves too - do you have a "block heater" on the driver motor assembly as we Canadians have on our cars? It would be a sensible addition if one is worried about capacitor warm up)
Sono, I have not heard my Vandys with dead batteries, but I have heard Audioquest DBS cables with batteries dead and after a day or so they sound like the cables that "come in the box" .Richard does nothing without due consideration. It is the dielectric he wants to keep constant. The batteries are marked/dated for replacement. Not to insult, but anyone can perform changing them.