anyone ever put RS-1 drivers in custom enclosures?

[postjack]

Lots of folks put HF-1 drivers and 325i drivers into custom turned wood enclosures. Anyone ever do this with RS-1 drivers? Would be expensive, since essentially you would have to purchase an RS-1 just to cut the drivers out of the already-attractive wooden enclosure. But people have done stranger things in this hobby. Anyway, I'm just curious as to how RS-1 drivers would sound in a deeper wooden enclosure.

[laxx]

I was thinking the same thing abotu RS-2's, especially since you can pick them up used for less than a pair of used HF-1's.

[postjack]

I was thinking the same thing abotu RS-2's, especially since you can pick them up used for less than a pair of used HF-1's.

Good point.

Also, I think if I took the initiative to rip out the drivers that surely someone would be willing to make some custom enclosures for me.

[en480c4]

I haven't heard of anyone doing it. I've wanted to turn a one-piece enclosure like the RS-1 for a while, but removing the driver from the plastic of a Prestige series Grado is all but impossible. I'm sure it could be done... The drivers are removed from the RS-1 for recables, so I'd guess it's not a big deal. I don't know if the RS-2 is a 2-piece design, like the prestige series, or a single piece like the RS-1. If I had to guess, it's 2-piece and they used factory 2nds of the mahongany driver enclosure for the HF-1. I've seen a ton of variation of the lip used to secure the pads on the HF-1 enclosures. But beyond that I'm not sure...

Good luck if you decide to rip apart of RS-1s... Dew iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!!! And measurements would be all that's required from there.

[hYdrociTy]

Put it in a HD650 frame. The old school grado drives paired with new age composite material based HD650 skeleton would yield the best of both worlds.

[tkam]

I think the reason you don't see this much is because of how similar the Grado drivers are through the entire lineup. Most of the sonic differences are due to enclosure type/size and driver dampening. So why bother starting w/ a $700 pair of phones when you can start with much less expensive phones and likely get similar results.

[bhd812]

oh man i was hoping to see him go and do it...

besides the dampening, dipping, voicing, and closer matched there is really no difference between drivers.

[postjack]

ehhh, its kind of hard for me to buy the "all the drivers are the same" theory. The difference between the SR225 and the RS-1 is nothing short of staggering in terms of tonality and soundstage.

[JBLoudG20]

ehhh, its kind of hard for me to buy the "all the drivers are the same" theory. The difference between the SR225 and the RS-1 is nothing short of staggering in terms of tonality and soundstage.

I completely buy it. All that can be done with just houseing modifications. Ive seen it in action with the K340.

[bhd812]

let's take one of the MANY points that will change the sound in a headphone..just one of MANY.

the enclosure.

think of the Driver being a set of speakers and the Enclosure as the entire room the speakers are in. how the speakers sit on the floor (spikes, wood base, stands,) will change the sound of the entire field (gear and room). where the speakers sit in the room will change the sound, and so will where you sit and how high your ear level is to the speakers. also note what kind of walls you have and how many corners you have will make a difference. what is the walls made of and What is behind the walls (cement behind a wall will sound different then another open room behind the wall.) how much air/ventilation the room has, are the windows open and what the size of the windows, are they covered? will change the sound. remember what a speaker and driver gives is just energy and the energy has to go somewhere eventually (a tiny sealed room will sound different then a room with one small window open would). ANYTHING IN THE ROOM WILL CHANGE THE SOUND, and i mean anything, the pair of shoes sitting on the floor will change, the glass cup on the end table will change the sound (of course how much of a change you will notice is a question but the point is anything does change the room.)

now take all of this and put it in a 1 inch enclosure.

ms-2 and silver 325's major change is the button on the back, common sense tell you that small button will cause energy to bounce back to the driver which should increase the highs. easy answer for why people complain the silver 325's have screaming highs over the ms2? maybe..probably a bit more tuning *may* go into the drivers also..*may*.

[postjack]

You make some good points, Billy. But I'm not saying that housing doesn't make a huge difference in how a headphone sounds. I'm saying it is difficult for me to swallow that the drivers from the SR225 to the RS-1 are the exact same.

As far as your button theory goes with regards to brightness levels in the 325i and MS2i: if that is the case, then the newer, buttonless RS-1 should be significantly less bright then their most recent (lighter wood) button'ed incarnations.

[aerius]

I completely buy it. All that can be done with just houseing modifications. Ive seen it in action with the K340.

I don't. I've heard HF-1 and 225 drivers stuffed into various other enclosures. The tonal balance can change as can the soundstage, but the resolution barely budges. A 225 driver isn't going to have the resolution & low level detail retrieval of an RS-1 no matter what kind of enclosure it gets stuffed into.

[aerius]

As far as your button theory goes with regards to brightness levels in the 325i and MS2i: if that is the case, then the newer, buttonless RS-1 should be significantly less bright then their most recent (lighter wood) button'ed incarnations.

The button theory is bogus, at least as far as my Grado 225 is concerned. I've pulled the button off, put it back on, and now taken it off again and the differences are so damn small that I might as well be imagining them. The highs are completely unaffected, the only change I can sort of pick up is that the headphones "disappear" a bit better and don't have as much of the drivers on the ear sound.

[philodox]

Come on people, all the grado drivers are the same, they just tweak them differently and add doping compound and a couple virgin cunt hairs to the higher models.

Still, the higher models do sound better, so unless you want to figure out how they do it yourself you are stuck paying the money... or rolling the dice on a modded pair from headphile or someone similar.

[recstar24]

I wouldn't even bother dreaming of doing something like that. Whatever they do to the drivers to make them "RS-1" able probably makes them sound good only in their mahogany enclosure. The whole RS-1 "magic" exists because all of the parts and components fit together to create that special sound. Try to recreate that magic without one of the parts and you won't get it. Even with Larry's monstrosities with HP1000 drivers I never really felt his creations could match the magic of the HP1000 sound, while good sounding they were somewhat "off" and never fully musically engaging.

Case in point - jpelg did have a set of RS-1 drivers in a HP1000 enclosure. It was never said publicly but apparently they were the shittiest sounding cans ever. Jahn told me in a PM when I asked about him that he could not believe how terrible the sound was and others felt the same way at the meet, however no one wanted to embarass him as he was a mod and was at the time trying to sell the cans. I know that doesn't quite fit your original question, but RS-1's drivers outside of that enclosure would be tough to come close to that kind of sound.

[postjack]

Case in point - jpelg did have a set of RS-1 drivers in a HP1000 enclosure. It was never said publicly but apparently they were the shittiest sounding cans ever. Jahn told me in a PM when I asked about him that he could not believe how terrible the sound was and others felt the same way at the meet, however no one wanted to embarass him as he was a mod and was at the time trying to sell the cans. I know that doesn't quite fit your original question, but RS-1's drivers outside of that enclosure would be tough to come close to that kind of sound.

This is a great point Ryan. I had forgotten about this story, thanks for the reminder.

To Ian (or whomever): Is it difficult to pry the drivers lose from the 325i shell?

Basically what I'm getting at with this thread is, come hell or high water, I will have Grado drivers inside a deep ebony enclosure recabled to xlrs. Just trying to decide which Grado drivers to go with.

[recstar24]

Basically what I'm getting at with this thread is, come hell or high water, I will have Grado drivers inside a deep ebony enclosure recabled to xlrs. Just trying to decide which Grado drivers to go with.

Hmmm...interesting predicament. You need something that you can cheaply cannablize, yet won't sacrifice some of the higher performance of the very expensive stuff. So we're obviously not going to go with RS-1, PS1, or HP1000 drivers, unless you happen to get some of those drivers for really cheap.

My recommendation based on the above criteria would be to try and snag some alessandro drivers. My gut tells me to go with some ms2/ms2i's, but I could have sworn that even the ms1 drivers receive the same exact allesandro treatment and doping compound that the upper models get. I cannot find my source but I feel really good about making the statement "the ms1 drivers are exactly the same as the ms2i and mspro drivers" - even those the same cannot be said for the normal grado line. If that were the case, or if myself or whoever can confirm that, it would only cost you $100 for the cannibalization (is that a word?) and it would be real easy to get those drivers out of the plastic enclosures. Let me know your thoughts.

[en480c4]

The driver will still be stuck in the plastic part you see when you take off the pads. I've tried (unsuccessfully) to free the drivers from the plastic enclosure... They're superglued in and won't come out. You can remove the 325i metal cup and woody the plastic driver enclosure. But no matter what, you're stuck with a prestige driver in its plastic home capped in wood. Trust me... I wish they could be freed. But I ruined a pair of 325s trying to free the driver from the driver enclosure. No need to ask me how I felt about that.

[Dusty Chalk]

What if one were to leave the drivers in the enclosure...but then put a transmission line on the back end?

[n_maher]

but then put a transmission line on the back end?

Standard or automatic transmission?

[recstar24]

The driver will still be stuck in the plastic part you see when you take off the pads. I've tried (unsuccessfully) to free the drivers from the plastic enclosure... They're superglued in and won't come out. You can remove the 325i metal cup and woody the plastic driver enclosure. But no matter what, you're stuck with a prestige driver in its plastic home capped in wood. Trust me... I wish they could be freed. But I ruined a pair of 325s trying to free the driver from the driver enclosure. No need to ask me how I felt about that.

Is that the beauty of the HF1 driver and construction, that it is capped in wood? I remember talking with Larry and he was practically salivating at the chance to modify HF1's, since it would be a "true woody" because the driver was wood capped and not plastic capped like the 225. Of course any impact on the sound is purely speculative, if the difference between the plastic and wood cap drivers is large enough to warrant taking apart a HF1.

[grawk]

Of course any impact on the sound is purely speculative, if the difference between the plastic and wood cap drivers is large enough to warrant taking apart a HF1.

I don't know what benefits the wood in the orignal hf1s make, but I know that once the shells are replaced with deep wooden cups, the sound is improved immensely, in my opinion.

[n_maher]

Is that the beauty of the HF1 driver and construction, that it is capped in wood?

In my opinion yes.

[en480c4]

In my opinion yes.

x2

It's tough to say how much of the sound of an HF-1 (versus other Prestige Grados) is due to driver tuning and how much could be attributed to said driver being housed in a wood enclosure. But I'd agree with Grawk that the HF-1 benefits from modding... More so than other Grados, IMO... I've also done 325s, 325is and 125s, and none have had as big a change as the HF-1.

[postjack]

x2

It's tough to say how much of the sound of an HF-1 (versus other Prestige Grados) is due to driver tuning and how much could be attributed to said driver being housed in a wood enclosure. But I'd agree with Grawk that the HF-1 benefits from modding... More so than other Grados, IMO... I've also done 325s, 325is and 125s, and none have had as big a change as the HF-1.

looks like i'll just have to con dpizzle or MD out of their HF-1s...