I've posted this elsewhere, but it's far too important not ot be posted here as well. I recently purchased four "Hi-Fi Tuning" fuses at an eye-popping $40 each, based largely on the excellent review these fuses received in Stereophile. I had also contacted the manufacturer, and asked whether or not I'd benefit from their performance characteristics in my Dahlquist DQ-10's, and was told that they definitely would.

The DQ-10's have a main fuse (3 amp) and a fuse for the tweeters (.8 amp), so I splurged and spent $160 for four fuses. First, I played a familiar disc without chaning anything, and carefully listened to all the detail, imaging, spaciiousness, etc. Then, I replaced the main fuses and played the same disc again. I was quite surprised at how much better everything sounded, much like lifting a veil from the speakers, providing better detail, imaging and spatial characteristics.

The next step was to replace the tweeter fuses, and the improvement in high frequency detail, pin-point imaging (especially noticeable with large choral material - you can almost count the number of singers in each section!), and an all new sparkle and smoothness, enough to satisfy, I suspect, all those who claim that the piezo tweeter should be replaced with something better. The piezo doesn't even begin to work until 12,000HZ, so the characteristic "spit" and edginess often associated with it (as when used in cheap, 2 and 3-way systems) is barely perceptible anyway, but with these new fuses, the piezos sound marvelous.

$40 for a fuse seems ridiculous, but I can't think of anything else that makes that much of a difference for so little money. Anyone owning DQ-10's (and many ST'ers do) owe it to themselves to take the plunge and get four of these babies. You won't believe the difference!

Tanx for sharing.
I believe you, because everything inside a speakers maters and also as we all know any fuse has a resistance, if you got better fuses with lower resistance the outcome result it has to be better. After all it's the Ohm law.

Btw, sometimes cleaning the fuse contacts it's enough to have a better sound.

Looking at regular fuses, the filament is tiny compared to the rest of the wiring so it has to be some sort of bottleneck. I wonder if your miracle fuses are low resistance. I also wonder if by-passing the fuse would accomplish the same thing (while saving the 40 clams per fuse).

The filament of the Hi-Fi Tuning fuses is pure silver, with gold on silver ends, with the silver filament encased in ceramic material instead of clear glass, which claims to lower resonance. I guess it works as a "purifier" as I was told by the manufacturer that certain undesirable artifacts (RF, for instance) are greatly reduced by these fuses. If that's so, and based on how good my speakers sound with them, I suspect that the fuse does a better job than just bypassing them altogether.

So far, everything I've read anywhere from people who've used these fuses states that there was a significant, and not minor, improvement with them.

I purchased mine from cableco.com, who doesn't offer a money-back satisfaction guarantee. If anyone's skeptical, then there are other sites to go to to buy these fuses, which may offer such a guarantee.

Still, it's only $40 as opposed to the many hundreds of dollars people can spend on a plethora of less beneficial upgrades.

emaidel: Interesting and informative post, thanks.

The purifier claim seems dubious but can be easily verified on a scope.

I also think a double blind -*test*-('") would settle the subjective listening.

Anyways, I am ALWAYS looking for better sound and these fuses are interesting!

I am in the process of rebuilding a pair of DQ10's including mirror imaging and re-doing the crossovers with "boutique" caps, Mills resistors from Sonic Craft and new potentiometers from Regnar. I am also replacing all the wire with Vampire 12Ga CCC as well as Vampire binding posts.
I will be taking the fuses right out of the circuit just to be sure that they don't degrade the signal...

I hope the fuses kick it over the top.

elroy

i thought the primary use for the fuses was to protect the drivers?

I thought that too, and I have to admit that I haven't tried listening to the DQ-10's without any fuses, and then with the two Hi-Fi Tuning fuses in each. I had a brief conversation with Joe at Regnar who said that a "better" fuse makes sense in terms of improving the sound, but that he ha no experience with these fuses. Hed asked that I let him know what my results were.

I wrote to him and told him of all the sonic improvements, so it will be interesting to see if he, or anyone else at Regnar, tries them out and recommends their use, which is something Joe said they might do if the fuses made an audible difference, which they most certainly do.

I feel a lot more comfortable having them in place, because there have been a number of cases (fortunately, not too many) in which the others blew, and without them in place, I suspect there would have been significant damage to one or more of the drivers.

For the time being, I'm delighted with the improvement these Hi-Fi tuning fuses make, and have to agree with the praise given them by Stereophile. Whether they "purify" the signal, or whatever, all I know is that the speakers sound a whole helluva lot better with them instead of the standard fuses, and $160 to upgrade the sound of the Dahlquist DQ-10's is money well spent.

After a google search on these fuses, I realized I may be the first person to experiment with these fuses on a speaker system, especially the Dahlquist DQ-10. Most of the users who've posted enormously positive comments on the fuses' improvements used them in amplifiers, or preamplifiers - not on speakers.

Anyone doubting the worth of these fuses need only google "Hi-Fi Tuning Fuse" and read any number of very, very positive comments on the improvement they make in a piece of equipment. Now, I'm going to look at the literature that came with my Marantz SA-8001 SACD player, Parasound PLD-1100 "Line Drive" preamp and Adcom GFA-5800 power amp to see which fuses they use, and if they're readily accessible. If replacing the fuses in my speakers made this much difference, and if even half of the positive comments online are legit, then I should be able to make quite an overall improvement on my system, as could anyone else.

What a find!

Mister Maidel touched on it, but my operative questions are
How often have you blown fuses in your DQ-10s?, and
How often have people blown drivers, and under what conditions?

It seems that replacing a single driver would cost at least $160,
and the reality in life is if something blows up once, it's pretty
likely to fry again.

I'm looking forward to hearing what you determine as far as using
these fuses in your amps and other gear.

I blew the tweeter fuses once in just over 30 years. I was playing the opening track on the Telarc disc, "Star Tracks" too loudly, and at the end, which Telarc warns against playing too loudly, they popped. Other than that time, I never blew the tweeter fuses.

I blew the main fuses fairly often when I first bought the speakers (in 1977) because the Luxman L-100 amp I was using at the time was troublesome and clipped a bit too often. I also blew a number of them recently by fooling around with the connections on my turntable, without first turning the volume all the way down. I thought I'd reduced the volume control sufficiently, but those loud sounds from loose, or bad, connections generate huge amounts of power which blew at least 5 fuses. Which drivers might I have damaged? I don't know for sure, but if they were either the woofers or the upper-bass drivers, it would have cost me $139.50 each to have them rebuilt.

BAck in the 70's, it was common for young (18-34) men to purchase 45 watt/channel receivers, use the loudness compensation buttons all the time, as well as boost the bass control, and play their music very loudly. This readily caused the receivers to clip which fried hundreds of tweeters from ESS, Infinity and JBL loudspeakers. JBL actually put together a consumer handout called, "Danger! LOW power!" in the hopes of reducing the number of tweeters it had to repair or replace.

I also somehow managed to ruin three of the four woofers in my pair of B&W 802F Specials. I was using a dbx amplifier (which most people never heard, or heard of) that emitted a loud "crack" every time it was turned on. I suspect that was the reason these woofers were destroyed, though it also could have been playing the 1812 Overture too loud and having the cannons fry the woofers.

I also thoroughly ruined the Dahlquist DQ-1W subwoofer. The connections on the rear of the Dahlquist electronic crossover came loose, and emitted the same horrible sound as do the poor or loose connections in a turntable's headshell, and in a matter of seconds, the voice coil melted! The stink was horrible!

You make a good point- but let me poke it with a stick a bit....


I'd love to run wild and nekkid without fuses, but the fear of cooking a driver- whether I've done it or not personally- will keep me using fuses when able.

A driver for a Dahlquist, or a/d/s/, are not readily available and can be expensive to source. As for a/d/s/, they can be repaired by Richard So, as long as he has the parts left. But that's still at a cost probably 1 1/2 to 2 fuses.

Vandersteen and Thiel still sources drivers, but that's gonna run you 3-4 of these fuses.

For the fella who has found a speaker he loves and plans on keeping 'em around, but would like a bit better sound, at a cost of normally $80 to $160 for a typical pair, here's a good solution in alignment with cable tweaks or tube rolling.



But I'll admit I'm feeling a bit cheap on this. If they were $10 or $20 each, I'd probably venture out and try them, as I feel they probably do work.

But they are fuses- and if you blow them, and more than once, that's heavy change to spend.

I may change my mind over time though and cough up the coin. Maybe.




One thing I won't do is run without fuses. Too many variables to deal with, and whether it's the cheaper Home Depot fuses or carved-fr-m-ivory-tusk-and-dipped-in-diamond-dust boutique fuses, there'll be fuses in my speakers....

Here's a thought... Why not just use 1 fuse inline, and bypass the individual fuses on the DQ-10's completely?

You will not only cut costs, but eliminate 2 fuses that may not be doing anything at all for your sound, yet you would still be protected. I think just about anytime that you can eliminate a link in the chain, it's a good thing. Keep it simple.

Not exactly.
Each fuse is calibrate to each driver. If you put one fuse for all the drivers possible if something wrong happens to one of them it most certainly blow all the drivers before that "main" fuse blows.