Damaged Drivers

[MyPal]

I was fortunate to find 2 pairs of Dali Grand Coupe monitors to match & compliment my existing HT setup from a private seller in San Francisco. Cosmetically, 9+/10. Very happy with the cabinet condition considering they are around 2003 vintage by the driver serial stamps.

So then time to test these beauties. Considered by some as one of the best full range monitors ever made, I was eager to compare them to their biggest brother, the floor standing Dali Grands. So, I dutifully mounted a pair on SolidSteel 600mm monitor stands & hooked them up to my MC2301s which would drive these 250w 4ohm monitors comfortably.

I chose Ella & Louis (mono) SACD to give them a push. All sounded good & we were quite surprised how close these timbre matched wonders gave. So then cranked them up to -5db to give them a bit of a stretch. How wonderful..... But then...the left 6" driver crackled & died. No way, I thought. These should handle reference level @ 300w.

Time to trouble shoot. Are they Cooked? Is the crossover damaged?

I proceeded to remove the affected driver & swap out with the same left driver on the other set. Hmmmmm, as I removed the driver from the other set I noticed that the inside of its rubber suspension was split (blown). So the left 6" drivers on both sets are buggered. Sounds a bit suspect & I will be contacting the seller in an attempt to understand their history a little better. Somewhat disappointed by the lack of disclosure, even though I did advertise that I was prepared to consider blown if I could procure spares from Dali Denmark (which I am confident I can).

The seller did state that they have been in storage since 2008 & that he was going to try them out in this new home which has a much bigger room.

Ok then, so the last remaining 6" driver looks intact on the 2nd set. Swapped out, back up to -5db & the working set is holding up. So it appears no damage to the internal crossovers.

He also chucked in a Dali Grand Vocal centre speaker. The silk dome tweeter driver is also blown on this speaker. I can deal with that. The same failure happened to my other Grand Vocal.

Apart from the centre speaker which I repaired with a replacement driver from Dali Denmark, my Dali Grand floorstanding fronts have never missed a beat in the 11 years I've had them since new.

[B]To me it would seem that he may have driven them hard with under powered amps to cause this type of damage? What do guys think? A little concerned about overall possible level of deterioration...[B]

[Doug Lax]

I would be looking for a partial refund. A few years back when I got my 802 two drivers were cooked. I called the owner and was credited the replacement plus shipping and then some. I would also factor in the tweeter. If it was part of the deal it should be working..everything should be working

[MyPal]

Originally Posted by Douglax

I would be looking for a partial refund. A few years back when I got my 802 two drivers were cooked. I called the owner and was credited the replacement plus shipping and then some. I would also factor in the tweeter. If it was part of the deal it should be working..everything should be working

Thanks, Douglax. I suspect he's clipped them with some low powered multi-channel rubbish else I would think that if they were given too much power everything would have been cooked. It takes a lot to push these monitors as they are not an efficient design, but with the right power, they do excel. Perhaps he's doubled up to a single amp. He did say he was going to assess his decision to sell based on their output performance in a much bigger room. Let me say, they can comfortably fill a 5x7 room as fronts with the right amps. It's odd that both the lefts have similar driver damage. I will be back in touch with him.

[MyPal]

Seller come good with sufficient compensation to cover complete NOS driver sets all round. Everything will be new & timbre matched from Denmark. Essentially new Dali Grand Coupes...unheard of. The drivers that are OK will be kept as spares. Good outcome.

[Doug Lax]

Glad to hear it worked out ..Most of the time people will work with you.

[MyPal]

Originally Posted by Douglax

Glad to hear it work out ..Most of the time people will work with you.

He was apologetic & blamed the unbeknown damage on the housekeeper... :