So, long time lurker first time poster. I got a pair of these recently that I've been fiddling with. First of all, let me say that they sound absolutely fantastic. I had a couple of questions however.
The main one is how to disassemble the cups. I want to recable them with something solid and quality instead of the almost 40 year old strand wire that's going green. The screws under the headband adjusters only give you access to the suspension gasket and then you have to use mounting adhesive to reseal them at the bottom. The inside of the ear has no accessible screws. It looks like the top and grill are held on by tension of a few metal tabs around the outside of the driver. But I can't tell if you're suppose to twist them or pop them with a screwdriver or what. Anyone who has dealt with these before, it would be a huge help if you know or have any pictures of a disassembled one. I haven't been able to find any.
But anyway here are mine, that I got at a good price. Needed a few minor repairs like the suspension gasket for the left ear but nothing major. I hate cleaning chrome and the old cover was wrecked on the jack so I upgraded it with a modern gold-plated 1/4 jack with unscrewable metal cover. And a few pictures to show the evolution of things. Everything I've done has been fully reversible up to this point.
Cleaned with gasket repaired
Drybrush paint touch ups (Coat d' arms aluminum and GW Bone white are perfect matches to the original paint colors)
Tried it with Shure HPAEC750 over ear pads. They fit but clamped on the spot just above my ears way too much. I knew I needed more padding.
Öp
And current with new Audeze LCD-2 pads and some temporary extra padding headband I made from some foam and scrap white pleather. Better headband pad coming in the mail soon. Headband padding is necessary to let the arms extend enough to sit properly on your head with the thick pads instead of angled out to the side.
Anyway, notes on what the current changes does to the sound. The bass is greater, tighter and better defined. The soundstage is increased in depth. You lose a little of the airiness but the preciseness and direction of sound as well as the instrumental separation is superior. But that's kind of what you would usually expect with a better seal. It's just great to be able to take advantage of the size of these big drivers. I just love them.
Another interesting note is this already has 4 conductors in the main cable and can be converted to balanced very easily without recabling the whole thing. Just terminate it in a male 4 pin XLR and you can plug in the 4 pin to new balanced amps or make/buy an adapter for dual 3 pin xlr balanced amps and still have a 1/4 stereo to 4 pin XLR female to play unbalanced on anything else.
