I own a pair of Tannoy Berkeleys (with HPD 385) and I am generally very satisfied with them, after I installed new surrounds from ‘Speakerbits’.
But the satisfaction of repairing them myself and the reading of all the information about possible tweaks on several sites (and of course the Tannoy Yahoo group), made me aware of the fact that even Tannoys can be improved.
So I made a list of all upgradable items:
- Cabinets showed the signs of time (wood discolored from sunlight, grill cloth started deteriorating also were discolored)
- Drivers are not at ear height
- Hardly moveable by my wife
- Sound often boomy (concrete walls, drivers and ports too close to the floor?)
Considerations:
heavily tweaking
building new (bigger) cabinets.
Limitations:
WAF (I have a very understanding wife, but bigger cabinets were out of the question)
Room (I ain’t a Kennedy)
To cut a long story short; I eventually did the following:
I made new stands on wheels
I sanded the cabinets and applied new color and varnish layers
I applied new cloth for the grill with these ‘minor’ changes all improvements are more or less implemented.
I can die a happy man (after enjoying music on my Tannoys for many more years to come)
Ton Rijsdijk, Netherlands.
© PE1MMK Hans Hilberink, Ton Rijsdijk, 2003.