I've recently noticed that my front speakers are crackiling quite a bit during movies. They sound "staticy" at some points. Since the speakers are two "pieces" it's almost like the crossover in the woofer is failing and its sending the lower frequencies to the "incapable of handling low frequency" smaller speakers. But I have no idea. They ARE quite old. I'd say they are around 20 years old at this point.

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I'd first check the surrounds of the speaker cones and make sure everything is physically intact. If the surrounds have deteriorated, the excursion during low frequencies is likely to cause distortion/crackly sounds.

I just setup my 90's era Infiniti speakers for my son. It's a 12" passive sub with crossovers and output to some smallish bookshelf speakers for the mids and highs.

I don't know if they still make passive subs with crossovers! I have seen external crossover circuits.
Have you tried plugging the speakers directly in and listening for the noise? If they make on their own, then its not the crossover.

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San Antonio, TX (in the old city)


"All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke
“Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented." - Eli Weisel

"To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." - Theodore Roosevelt (1918)

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They've probably looked better...

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What they're connected to aren't strictly subs. They are connector to woofers. I don't think they go low enough to be considered subs. It's essentially a 3 way speaker split into two pieces.

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.....pubic speaking is a major phobia, it isn't easy being a good speaker......

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I reject your reality and substitute my own!

I’d google replacement surrounds for (speaker name, model). I’ve done it, it’s a bit of a pain , but worked well.

And what Rabso said-try a direct connection.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/27/2020 11:13AM by anonymouse1.

Clearly the speakers are messed up so that is an indication to get new ones...not fix the old ones. Yeesh!

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Crackly sound coming from the woofers can be due to metal fatigue on the wires which lead from the terminals on the woofer itself to the voice coil. I had a pair of Realistic Minimus 25s when I was a wee lad which, due to excessive overuse, led to metal fatigue of those wires at the spot just past the solder points. Luckily those wires were long enough that a bit of desoldering, pulling the wires just a bit farther through, and resoldering fixed them. Until I overused them for a few more years and ran out of wire. I actually bought replacement woofers from RS and continued using them. Got about 25 years of hard use out of those, perhaps the best $70 I've ever spent in my life. Maybe second to my Grado SR-60s which also lasted about 20 years of hard use.

I’ve had foam-surround woofers (like in your picture) where the speaker started sounding flaky, and so I pried off the front speaker cover to find there was basically NO foam left - the cone was just flapping in the breeze. The problem is that then the voice coil attached to the speaker cone isn’t held in alignment and bangs all around the little magnetic gap when it plays. Buzz, buzz, distortion.

May not be cost-effective for you, but you can buy woofer edge surround repair kits on eBay for pretty cheap. They worked for me, and I replaced the old foam surrounds with butyl rubber ones which (I think) will be more durable.

You can easily tell if they need refoamed by looking at them. The foam ring near the outside will be rotted. It's usually about $30 to buy the foam. Google the name of your speaker and "refoam" and you'll get lots of information. It's not hard to do.

I need to refoam the sub on my ProMedia set. Maybe a project for this vacation week.

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It is what it is.