[ballog]

Hello folks
 
The foam surround on one of the speakers of my beloved Audioengine A2 has gone bad (rot due to mold).
I was thinking of changing the foam surround myself but I can't find replacements on eBay for this size (its a 2.75" unit).
The A2 were a gift and since I'm cash-strapped lately can't afford a replacement set.
Would appreciate if anyone could help me find these online.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

  Hello folks
 
The foam surround on one of the speakers of my beloved Audioengine A2 has gone bad (rot due to mold).
I was thinking of changing the foam surround myself but I can't find replacements on eBay for this size (its a 2.75" unit).
The A2 were a gift and since I'm cash-strapped lately can't afford a replacement set.
Would appreciate if anyone could help me find these online.

 
Did you email AudioEngine? Best ask them if you can buy just the drivers, which likely are proprietary even if subconned to a driver manufacturer (ex Vifa makes drivers for a lot of other companies). And keep in mind you can't just shoehorn any other 2.75in driver in there either other than what Audioengine uses since the enclosure specs, particularly the port tuning, could cause a huge problem for the new drivers.

 

[ballog]

Did you email AudioEngine? Best ask them if you can buy just the drivers, which likely are proprietary even if subconned to a driver manufacturer (ex Vifa makes drivers for a lot of other companies). And keep in mind you can't just shoehorn any other 2.75in driver in there either other than what Audioengine uses since the enclosure specs, particularly the port tuning, could cause a huge problem for the new drivers.

Thanks for the suggestions. This might be a too costly solution. I'm from an island in the Indian Ocean and shipping might be too costly. Have been thinking of getting some bookself speakers in my local market. There are a few Microlab or Edifier models with incredible price quality ratio. I will let the A2s go or might try modding some 3" surround in place of the 2.75" first.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

Thanks for the suggestions. This might be a too costly solution. I'm from an island in the Indian Ocean and shipping might be too costly. Have been thinking of getting some bookself speakers in my local market. There are a few Microlab or Edifier models with incredible price quality ratio. I will let the A2s go or might try modding some 3" surround in place of the 2.75" first.

 

That's why your best option is to have Audioengine ship the drivers and you screw them in. It will still cost more but not as much as shipping the whole speaker set to Audioengine for them to do the swap. Not that different from how you were looking through eBay unless you find drivers there that are available where you are.

 

If that's still too expensive you really might as well just ditch Audioengine and get an Edifier in the local market, because you can't just go "modding" a 3in speaker to fit. You'd have to make a mounting ring adapter that has basically the measurements of the 2.75in speaker ring on one side to screw into the stock mounting hole, then you screw and glue that to another piece that will fit the 3in speaker. Even if you don't care about aesthetics, at minimum you'd have to own the woodworking tools. If you don't, and you can't borrow any, you'd have to add the cost of buying or renting the tools, plus buying the MDF, and all the time you'd have to spend working on the adapter. And after all that, even if you spent $50 on a pair of quality drivers, you'd still end up dealing with how the T/S parameters likely don't match the port tuning and box volume.

 

[ballog]

 

 

That's why your best option is to have Audioengine ship the drivers and you screw them in. It will still cost more but not as much as shipping the whole speaker set to Audioengine for them to do the swap. Not that different from how you were looking through eBay unless you find drivers there that are available where you are.

 

If that's still too expensive you really might as well just ditch Audioengine and get an Edifier in the local market, because you can't just go "modding" a 3in speaker to fit. You'd have to make a mounting ring adapter that has basically the measurements of the 2.75in speaker ring on one side to screw into the stock mounting hole, then you screw and glue that to another piece that will fit the 3in speaker. Even if you don't care about aesthetics, at minimum you'd have to own the woodworking tools. If you don't, and you can't borrow any, you'd have to add the cost of buying or renting the tools, plus buying the MDF, and all the time you'd have to spend working on the adapter. And after all that, even if you spent $50 on a pair of quality drivers, you'd still end up dealing with how the T/S parameters likely don't match the port tuning and box volume.

Thanks for your suggestions. In fact I was thinking of modding some only the foam surround for a 3'' driver in place of the one that has gone bad.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

  Thanks for your suggestions. In fact I was thinking of modding some only the foam surround for a 3'' driver in place of the one that has gone bad.

 

That's as bad an idea as shoehorning another driver in there, and likely even worse. Replacing the driver with something else is like mounting the sport coilovers for a 3-series BMW on a Mazda 3. Modding the foam surround is like taking the coilovers apart and then cutting the spring so the Mazda3 rides lower.

 

Even a speaker tech would try to get the exact kind of surround for a particular driver, since that has to match how far the speaker excursion is as per the other parts' capabilities (which, without being replaced, would have no idea if the new surround doesn't move like the original). On top of which, how good are you at repairing speakers? If you're not as skilled as a speaker technician what will likely happen here is you might be able to get it mounted, maybe the sound isn't too bad, but they'll come apart soon. At which point you'll order surrounds again, spend another day repairing them again, and it will come to a point that the man hours and parts costs would have cost the same as ordering drivers or just getting new speakers.