Trying to find replacement tweeters for my circa-2000 Innovative Audio Cabinet Speakers

[scottm18]

Hey all . Talk about a great audio purchase... these still-amazing sounding speakers lasted completely issue-free for 24 years (!)... but finally two of the same driver went out in the speakers. They are equipped with higher-end Scandinavian drivers--Peerless (tweeter) and Seas (midrange). Both tweeters are now suddenly dead with no sound whatsoever. I have a center channel as well with the same upper drivers and it's fine so I'm not sure what happened to the right and left channels. While they were firing on all cylinders, paired with my AR Phantom rears and super high quality analog equipment...talk about awesome 5.1 surround sound.

Anyway, of course the drivers are all high-quality and the Tweeter is Peerless--back when they were good (made in Denmark rather than wherever inferior place they're made now). In the interim, I replaced it with a tweeter pair from a spare AR Phantom 8.3 I happen to have which is luckily also 8 ohms...but that metal dome is a bit on the bright side so I'd really like to find a replacement for the original smooth-as-silk Peerless 812687 (pic) if it all possible.

If someone knows a good modern replacement option with similar specs and SQ and the 4" casing needed that will work, please let me know. Even better, if someone has parted out a 20+ year old high-end speaker with this particular driver and has it available in good shape (x2), let me know as well.

Both tweeters appear to be in great shape cosmetically but there's now no sound whatsoever...so is this possibly something a speaker fixer could take a look at? There's a good one in Tampa which is fairly close to me.

Thanks!

 

[Horbus]

It's quite unusual that both tweeters are stopped working at the same time unless they would have been killed by a high signal or distortion from the Amp. I recommend checking those tweeters first by this repair shop. It also could be that there is a protection circuit within your speakers to protect the tweeters from being overloaded. Sometimes they use a simple fuse or resistor for this purpose.
Anyhow you could also ask at "Parts Express": https://www.parts-express.com/brand/Peerless-by-Tymphany for a recommendation of a replacement for your Peerless DT 105 H 812687 8 Ohm Driver.

 

[scottm18]

Thanks for the insights

Oh I've certainly looked there but most I've seen are only 4 ohms and or very low power handling of maybe 30 watts versus the 130 the original had. I know there's also a forum there that I'm going to look into as well.

Ironically, it took me almost a month to discover the issue because I was doing constant 5.1 (including a whole weekend of catching up with the best technically produced show on TV, the brilliant Randy Faustino-mixed American Idol so I could get to the HOF induction episode)...and the old saying the center channel is 80% of the 5.1 front sound is no joke, especially as good as the original drivers are in those speakers. It's so fluid that it it hid the fact the main speakers had no tweeter...for who knows how long. Amusingly, it's when I replayed back the lazily L&R-mixed (not center) vocals of the Billy Joel concert off CBS where I thought it sounded even worse than his typical bad sounding concerts (heard the abysmal Live at Shea Stadium?). Anyway, when I fired up a sterling sounding two-channel (and mono) Beach boys DSD recording it became very apparent that there were no highs at all.

I actually set up two different replacements... One from my AR Phantom 8.3s & another from a single Mirage FX3 I had, which is no slouch of a bookshelf speaker. Since my center channel is still using the original tweeters working fine, I was able to easily compare the sound of the right channel versus the left channel The ARs (right) were a little bright and the smaller Mirage (left) were a little dull.. but I think I'd rather have dull than bright in tandem with that potent center channel. I also have yet another speaker that's custom made from about that same IA vintage with Scan-speak drivers--which also being Scandinavian might work well. But as you can see in the attachment they are unfortunately soldered in and I didn't want to deal with that at the moment--plus they were only 6 ohms. The details of those drivers are shown. Not sure how much the Tweeter ohms would matter to match the 8ohm drivers of the rest--but both the AR and the Mirage are confirmed 8.

I may pay these guys a visit although full disclosure is one of the tweeters had the terminal rip right off when I removed it due to age. I thought that was the cause of it not working but I realized that was not the case when I checked the other tweeter and it also didn't work. It's just completely dead and I have no idea what happened.
https://reconingspeakers.com/

 

[Horbus]

Have you asked for a recommendation at the shop I linked, or just looked at their website? Sometimes they have more detail insights. Then you wrote, that your original tweeters do have 130 W handling power which to me sounds pretty high for a tweeter. 30 W as stated for the other one is a normal handling power for tweeters since most of the amp power is used for the bass and then midrange. It could also be that some parts of your crossover is defect (resistor or more possibly capacitors).

 

[scottm18]

Update: I tracked an eBay seller of the EXACT model tweeter and he had two NOS models in stock. On their way to me now .

He also had some other good advice for keeping aging speakers working their best. Use light armor-all on the rubber and flip the main drivers 180° after many years of use so that the heavy magnet doesn't cause a sagging of the cone material. Nice guy... and great timing to have those drivers available.