Effect of capacitors in crossovers

[glynnw]

I just want to share a recent change in my system that after 2 weeks still has me shaking my head in wonder.  About a year ago I built a pair of Basszilla speakers (never having heard a pair), mostly out of a simple desire to build something for fun. Initially I used Solen capacitors in the crossover, to save money. until I could listen for a while and decide if I liked the speakers.  After many comparisons, I decided I preferred the clarity of the Basszillas to the great soundstage of the Straight 8s I had been using for several years. Having so decided, I started to upgrade the cossovers in the Basszillas.  I have long used Auricaps, but in all honesty I never heard them make a profound change, just small improvements, but for the price it was worth it to me to use them wherever possible simply to avoid audio nervosa.  The crossover of the Basszillas called for, on the Fostex midrange, a capacitance of 104 uF, to be made of 2 51 uF and 1 (higher quality) 2uF cap.  These larger caps can be very expensive and are hard to find.  Auricap had quit making them in the 50 uF value, but John McDonald there agreed to make a new batch and sell me the 4 I needed. This process took a few months during which I made all the other upgrades to the crossovers - all Auricaps, air coil inductors, and Mundorf resistors (@ $18 a pop), but the sound of the speakers remained the same.  When the 50 uF Auricaps arrived, I burned them in for a week on a receiver into a dummy load and then installed them in the Basszillas without an accompanying 2 uF cap.  I was immediately impressed by a marked improvement in the sound.  A week later I added a 2.7 uf V-CAP OIMP to these 2 Auricaps to finish the crossover.  I can't really say this V-Cap improved anything, but I am too lazy to remove it and make comparisons.  This has created one of the largest improvments to my system of anything I have done in the last 30+ years, comparable to when I switched from transistors to tubes.  I now use a PC for music playback and can change songs instantly.  For the past 2 weeks I have listened to a lot of music, some of which I haven't played in years.  While occassionally I am unimpressed with the sound quality of a song, more often I am amazed at how great some of these older recordings now sound.  Who new the Mama's and Papa's could sound this good?
A few months ago I put V-CAP teflon caps in my Parasounds as coupling caps and this improved things noticeably, but not like this latest change.  Well that's it - in the right place in the audio chain the right part can transform a system.  And 100 changes in the wrong places make little improvement.  It's just trying to find out the right place.

[John Roman]

Hello Glynn,
I've been searching for some 50uf Auricaps for the same application. Can't seem to find Auricaps in that size. Found some Obbligatos that are 47uf. Those Auricaps must have been pricey! Hope you're doing good.
John