Burnt smell from speaker, but it’s still working fine. Should I be concerned?

[Qbd]

I sometimes like to play loud (with concert plugs to protect my hearing). So anyway, I started blasting some Manowar, and on a fairly loud track (King of Kings) I suddenly smelled a burning smell. I immediately lowered the volume.

My nose indicates it came from the port on my right speaker. I didn’t notice any change in sound at the time nor now at normal volumes.

The volume was somewhere around 115-120 dBA, at least it averaged around 115 dBA on a previous, not quite as intense track.

So I guess my question is if this necessarily has damaged my speaker somehow, or could it be benign, and just sort of an early warning that this volume level was perhaps pushing it a bit?

The speakers are well amped, so I doubt there was clipping involved.

My equipment is:
Source: Apple TV
Processor: Marantz AV7706
Amp: Hypex NC502MP bridged (rated 1200 W in 8 ohm)
Speakers: Ascendo Immersive Audio CCRM12-P, crossed to subwoofers at 80 Hz.

 

[komhst]

What's the point to play so loud with concert plugs? Why don't you play in a lower level without concert plugs?

 

[Qbd]

What's the point to play so loud with concert plugs? Why don't you play in a lower level without concert plugs?

Well it’s like the difference between a live rock concert and using headphones. At those volumes you feel the sound in your chest, hair, and pant legs vibrating. It makes the music (especially rock/metal that’s pretty much meant to be loud) much more engaging to me.

 

[Thomas savage]

Well it’s like the difference between a live rock concert and using headphones. At those volumes you feel the sound in your chest, hair, and pant legs vibrating. It makes the music (especially rock/metal that’s pretty much meant to be loud) much more engaging to me.

Why not be true metal then and allow them to catch fire and burn !

If there's a xover in the speaker it's probably that, iv seen signs of burning on them before .

Maybe open them up and take a gander .

 

[fpitas]

At a guess the woofer voice coil was overheating. As long as you didn't fry the insulation too much, it may be fine for a while. Otherwise it will unwind in time with predictable results. I think you need more robust speakers if you intend to do that often.

 

[Mark_A]

Either the crossover or speaker has been damaged. Not really possible to know without looking at the internal parts or testing it whether it affects the sound. Since testing it is probably easier than looking inside, you might try some audio test CD's that play various frequency tones. These are available on streaming sites also. You would want to put your ear up close to each driver (left vs right) in order to tell if there is a difference (assuming only one of the speaker systems is damaged).

 

[MarkS]

I think you need more robust speakers if you intend to do that often.

That's gonna be a tall order. These are his current (no pun intended!) speakers:

CCRM12-P is a highest sensitivity coaxial speaker for commercial or home theater

CCRM12-P offers a coaxial speaker design with highest sensitivity and power handling. Natural voice reproduction intelligibility and reference level

www.aia-cinema.com

"An efficiency of 99 dB makes it dead simple to obtain a sound pressure level of a constant 123 dB."

 

[Doodski]

Frequency sweep the speakers slowly and listen for rattling noise in the woofer voice coil or strange sounds.

Online Tone Generator - generate pure tones of any frequency

szynalski.com

 

[fpitas]

That's gonna be a tall order. These are his current (no pun intended!) speakers:

CCRM12-P is a highest sensitivity coaxial speaker for commercial or home theater

CCRM12-P offers a coaxial speaker design with highest sensitivity and power handling. Natural voice reproduction intelligibility and reference level

www.aia-cinema.com

"An efficiency of 99 dB makes it dead simple to obtain a sound pressure level of a constant 123 dB."

Wow. Not sure how you burn those out without causing cellular damage to your whole body.

 

[egellings]

I'd be more concerned about hearing loss rather than speaker damage. Can't get new ears when you burn their little voice coils out.

 

[Plcamp]

Others have (apparently) used very loud speakers to constrain wives in sonic hologram prisons, without causing cellular damage!

I provide photographic evidence…

 

[Everett T]

Don't connect to amplifier again till you troubleshoot. Just my $.2 cents

 

[fpitas]

Others have (apparently) used very loud speakers to constrain wives in sonic hologram prisons, without causing cellular damage!

I provide photographic evidence…
View attachment 219034

Well...pictures don't lie!

 

[DVDdoug]

You may have come "close" to burning-out a voice coil or something in the crossover.

The speakers are well amped, so I doubt there was clipping involved.

You amp is rated for twice the speaker rating! That could be risky with what you're doing...

There's a popular myth about clipping being worse than higher power and burning-out tweeters, but it is a myth. +6dB is 4 times the power so imagine you have a 100W amplifier hitting peaks of 100W (no clipping) and a 25W amplifier with the same gain and volume setting, so 6dB of clipping. Yes, clipping does generate harmonics and the total power is greater than 25W, so it's worse than not clipping and you can blow a speaker. But the 100W amp is feeding more power into the speaker, including more power into the tweeter, so even more likely to burn it out.

...Clipping is usually caused-by the lower frequencies so when the clipping is really bad, the strongest clipping harmonics are not at the highest frequencies and you get a (relative) loss of highs. (The clipped flat-part of the waveform doesn't have any high frequency components.)

And psychologically, a "normal person" will turn it down when they hear distortion but they might turn it up if the sound is clean. ...Speakers are usually blown when alcohol is involved and "normal people" are not in charge of the volume control!

You can't always trust amplifier or speaker ratings and speaker ratings are "complicated" even when they are honest. A 100W speaker is supposed to handle a 100W amplifier hitting 100W on the peaks, with normal program material which has a much lower average level, and with even lower average levels into the tweeter. You can fry a 100W speaker with constant 100W test tones and you can probably fry the tweeter with 20W continuous tones.

There's an old JBL paper that say's you can get-away with twice the amplifier power if you have highly-dynamic music. I'm not familiar with Manowar but I doubt they are dynamic.... They are probably talking about classical music with occasional loud peaks or maybe live music where there is no compression. With highly-compressed audio or in an application like a guitar amp where it's likely to be driven onto distortion, that should be flipped-around and the speaker should have twice the power rating of the amplifier.

Well it’s like the difference between a live rock concert and using headphones. At those volumes you feel the sound in your chest, hair, and pant legs vibrating. It makes the music (especially rock/metal that’s pretty much meant to be loud) much more engaging to me.

Maybe just turn-up the subwoofers?

...To an extent I agree. It doesn't sound realistic unless the levels are realistic but I don't really like it THAT loud at home and even at a live event I don't want it so constantly-loud that it damages my ears. I'm getting old! "TURN THAT DOWN!"

 

[Qbd]

Thanks for all the input!

I’ll definitely try a sweep and listen for any strangeness, and I guess a REW measurement sweep with the mic close to each speaker could also be interesting.

I’ll also see if it’s easy to open it up. As long as the driver isn’t glued to the case I guess that should be fairly easy too, though a bit scary considering they are not exactly cheap speakers!

 

[DMill]

I know Manowar is meant to played loud, but dear God… 120dB. I bet your neighbors love you.

 

[sam_adams]

Why not be true metal then and allow them to catch fire and burn !

 

[Katji]

Others have (apparently) used very loud speakers to constrain wives in sonic hologram prisons, without causing cellular damage!

I provide photographic evidence…

I dunno, looks she followed Alice and took the pill that makes you smaller.

 

[mansr]

I dunno, looks she followed Alice and took the pill that makes you smaller.

Who said anything about Jefferson Airplane?

 

[MachOne]

I've warmed up voice coils before and they've been fine. They start to smell quite strongly before fully melting the enamel coating and can handle some high temps without damage.