Orthodynamic Roundup

[nick n]

Gurubhai :What were you doing with the YHE50a was the stock housing not to your liking>?

 

[gurubhai]

Quote:

Sure bro. How about next weekend? 
My YHE50 transplant turned out to be a big FAIL!
Having realized i won't be able to do them justice, I'll bring along the drivers & you can make them your test subject

Sure. Next weekend would be be perfect.
 
Quote:

Gurubhai :What were you doing with the YHE50a was the stock housing not to your liking>?

The YHE50A is mono & would have required recabling before it could be used. The stock YHE50 housing is flimsy and I managed to break a few clips despite following Kabeer's guide & it won't close properly after that. So, I just decided to transplant the drivers into a sony mdr ma100 :
 

 

[nick n]

uh oh it's that hard to open is it ?
I have a new looking one coming. You can't run a strip of tight electrical tape around the edge. I did that with the HP-50A I recabled just to seal up the seam between baffle and cup edges. After the pads are flapped over the edge it can't be seen. then again the YHE pads are flush mounted with no flaps if i recall, so that won't work.
 
 Everything i read so far ( not much on them ) impressions say they are pretty good as is, maybe a minor bit of damping. Think I will try to keep them in the stock housings and cross my fingers opening them. I already know what NOT to do from the HOK80 and the HP-50A

 
Thanks for checking in and mentioning them.
 
Oh an MA-100 the newer Sony thing I first thought it was something else in the picture. That's going to be interesting! Great idea for a transplant shell

 

[gurubhai]

It is.

I was really mad when I  managed to damage them because they were basically NOS before I tried opening them. ( Yours should be similar so be careful)
The HP50 are a breeze to open compared to YHE50. The clips on yhe50 are very fragile & Yamaha has done us the kindness of gluing the baffle. Kabeer wrote the guide & stlill managed to break few clips & so did I.
 

 

[nick n]

gluing the baffle also ///

  We shall see what happens i guess. Off to go find the instructions from kabeer.

 

[gurubhai]

Kabeer's guide is here :
http://wiki.faust3d.com/wiki/index.php?title=Yamaha_YHD-3
 

 

[takato14]

Hey guys, looking for someone willing to sell or trade a Sansui SS-100. I've looked around everywhere for one and figured it couldn't hurt to ask here.
 
Great thread by the way, I've only taken a cursory look at it but still learned quite a lot.

 

[nick n]

Boy an SS-100 that would be nice. ^
 
Just revisited the open backed SFI pioneer portables I had not used for a bit. They were in need of some upper register increases and since the interior was severely limited for space due to the past 3-layer Acoustipack tweaked foam disc I had in there, I opted to try something completely new and started from scratch.
Yeah strange pads but leather and when on properly they work excellent. Also need to trim down the gasket  that is protruding from the seam there.
 About 12 trials later I think I found something that gives me what I need. You know the see-saw effect change this and then that changes etc. I can't go any larger on new screw sizes again either so this is it.
 
Spatial sound, depth of bass, tightness of sound, and enough highs to keep me happy. The highs are just a notch above dark sounding and just below any sense of sibilance ( at least on the tracks i tried so far ). Riding that irritating sometimes hard- to-nail-down boundary there. Since they are to be portable outdoors use this may not be so bad anyhow.
I wasn't expecting this type and level of lows with the open back, then again this damping material would be the reason:
 
INSOLE FELT 8mm thick

 
Only remembered the stuff because I was researching some Russian orthos and recall BMF had used this exact material I sent to good effect on his Russian TDS-5 HP-1 "clone" we now know is sort of but not entirely one. ( on the wish list for down the road )
 
Direct damping the SFI driver rears with both a disc of Arctic Bamboo and Cotton materials in combination with this insole felt , as well as trying to line the cup rears with Arctic Bamboo/Cotton + the insole felt proved just too much, so I let it fly nice and open on the driver rears and wowza. Just this insole felt in the cup space and it presses just enough on the driver rears.
 
It's funny stuff you can apply pressure and it simply sort of wants to slide out from under your fingers a bit to the sides, doesn't seem to ever get too tight under compression which is ideal I think. I'll have to go get some more it's really cheap.
 
 Now  considering it in the HP-1, but that is nice already.  Always something new to try though right then the second guessing as I look at some other things.

 

[Hutnicks]

Quote:

Boy an SS-100 that would be nice. ^
 
Just revisited the open backed SFI pioneer portables I had not used for a bit. They were in need of some upper register increases and since the interior was severely, limited for space due to the past 3-layer Acoustipack tweaked foam disc I had in there, I opted to try something completely new and started from scratch.
Yeah strange pads but leather and when on properly they work excellent. Also need to trim down the gasket  that is protruding from the seam there.
 About 12 trials later I think I found something that gives me what I need. You know the see-saw effect change this and then that changes etc. I can't go any larger on new screw sizes again either so this is it.
 
Spacial sound, depth of bass, tightness of sound, and enough highs to keep me happy. The highs are just a notch above dark sounding and just below any sense of sibilance ( at least on the tracks i tried so far ). Riding that irritating sometimes hard- to-nail-down boundary there. Since they are to be portable outdoors use this may not be so bad anyhow.
I wasn't expecting this type and level of lows with the open back, then again this damping material would be the reason:
 
INSOLE FELT 8mm thick

 
Only remembered the stuff because I was researching some Russian orthos and recall BMF had used this exact material I sent to good effect on his Russian TDS-5 HP-1 "clone" we now know is sort of but not entirely one. ( on the wish list for down the road )
 
Direct damping the SFI driver rears with both a disc of Arctic Bamboo and Cotton materials in combination with this insole felt , as well as trying to line the cup rears with Arctic Bamboo/Cotton + the insole felt proved just too much, so I let it fly nice and open on the driver rears and wowza. Just this insole felt in the cup space and it presses just enough on the driver rears.
 
It's funny stuff you can apply pressure and it simply sort of wants to slide out from under your fingers a bit to the sides, doesn't seem to ever get too tight under compression which is ideal I think. I'll have to go get some more it's really cheap.
 
 Now  considering it in the HP-1, but that is nice already.  Always something new to try though right then the second guessing as I look at some other things.

 
That stuff is great. If you have dollar stores where you are they have a grey version that is really coarse and offers more "Breathing" Oh and if you need bleed through earpads (Think Stax here) the memory foam insoles are two layers of thin memory foam sandwiching open cell foam, the possibilities are endless.

 

[nick n]

I actually never thought about the memory foam insoles, no idea why but  that's a great suggestion for ( insert blank purpose here ) .
 
Will keep an eye out for the grey versions of the insoles also.
 
Always good to have the odd little thing kicking around in the modding supply drawers. And the layered aspect might work for something.
There is some interesting foam Kalbee sent me  here also. From a pillow i think.

 

[Hutnicks]

Quote:

I actually never thought about the memory foam insoles, no idea why but  that's a great suggestion for ( insert blank purpose here ) .
 
Will keep an eye out for the grey versions of the insoles also.
 
Always good to have the odd little thing kicking around in the modding supply drawers. And the layered aspect might work for something.
There is some interesting foam Kalbee sent me  here also. From a pillow i think.

 
I had a diabolically difficult time with a set of portables that I just could not get right. Solid pads and the bass thumped and muddied, pure foam and the tinniness crept up, The memory foam bled off just enough of the bass to balance out the phones and they turned out great. They are comfortable as all get out and do not seem to heat up at all when wearing for long periods of time. There are also a 3X5 makeup pad which is cotton and about 3 mm thick but can be teased out to enormous proportions. I think they are 50 for a buck.

 

[nick n]

I shudder at the amount of time these have been opened up. One of the earliest things I made. They deserved some final "closure"

 
Also add in the resonant haze that somehow gets in there and it's frustrating at times, but end results we can all feel proud of i think. I've slowly learned to prefer something that doesn't have as much of a super-duper wow factor at first listen, that always tends to get tiresome as time goes on. Had these on all night and nothing amiss so far, forgetting about them and enjoying the music is where it should be at .
 
Think I have some makeup pads here somewhere ( for MODDING ) lol have to dig those out again.

 

[Hutnicks]

Quote:

I shudder at the amount of time these have been opened up. One of the earliest things I made. They deserved some final "closure"

 
Also add in the resonant haze that somehow gets in there and it's frustrating at times, but end results we can all feel proud of i think. I've slowly learned to prefer something that doesn't have as much of a super-duper wow factor at first listen, that always tends to get tiresome as time goes on. Had these on all night and nothing amiss so far, forgetting about them and enjoying the music is where it should be at .
 
Think I have some makeup pads here somewhere ( for MODDING ) lol have to dig those out again.

 
I'm pretty much over the wow phase on just about any phone. I have realized that it takes a good half hour for my ears to acclimatize to any mod or new phone so I am patient for that amount of time. I do sometimes scratch my head when working over a set, thinking, "man maybe I just should make a new enclosure and be done with it" Usually while eyeing a sheet of ceramic that I have been half dying to form into something useful.
 
 I have a friend who has a useful test. The equipments good if you are not even tempted to answer a phone call while listening

 

[vid]

Took me a while to settle on a scheme for the HP-50 that, instead of giving the initial wow but then falling short soon as the wow wears off, instead doesn't immediately hit you but as you listen on you realize how good the sound is.

 

[Hutnicks]

Quote:

Took me a while to settle on a scheme for the HP-50 that, instead of giving the initial wow but then falling short soon as the wow wears off, instead doesn't immediately hit you but as you listen on you realize how good the sound is.

There has to be something psychoacoustic going on when the better sound is slowly emergent. While the WOW sound fades rapidly.