Clean a rusty Speaker Chassis

[Plattfuss]

Hello, i bought two old Speakers.
They seams to be a little bit older.
They also have white rust / patina.
I'm not sure how dangerous this is... i think it's just a optic thing.
But is it possible to clean them a little?
Is it also possible to clean the Cone more than just remove the first layer of dust?
The Speakers seames to be from the 70s (not sure).
Can i do something good for them? Put orange oil on them?
Perhaps the best i can do is better not to touch them
Perhaps someone already has experience with this?

 

[Hamer95USA]

I used to own a pair of Peavey 212MS & 412MS speakers equipped with the Celestion G12K-85 speakers in it. The cabinets were well made & sturdy. The only thing that needed repair was the casters on the 412MS and repairing the blown G12K-85 speaker in the 212MS. Looks like your speaker was in a open back combo cab that was stored in a garage with condensation/moisture in the air.

Maybe clean off the metal with a wire brush?

Guitar George

 

[psychodave]

Leave it alone. Don’t use a wire brush. And particles may get trapped in the voice coil and cause a problem.

 

[skullfxr]

Leave it alone. Don’t use a wire brush. And particles may get trapped in the voice coil and cause a problem.

This.

 

[skullfxr]

Leave it alone. Don’t use a wire brush. And particles may get trapped in the voice coil and cause a problem.

This.

 

[Plattfuss]

I brushed them with very fine steel wool and some cleaning oil.
That's worked really well but i can't reach the inside but it has to be enough...

 

[Plattfuss]

Looks like your speaker was in a open back combo cab that was stored in a garage with condensation/moisture in the air.

That's would be a reason

 

[skullfxr]

I would have used scotchbrite over steel wool next time. Glad it turned out how you liked it.

 

[Scumback Speakers]

Plattfuss:

Sorry I missed your thread, I've been busy.

1) Never use steel wool, or steel brushes on speakers. They leave fine metal particles. The magnet takes those particles and sucks them in through any opening. They attach to the voice coil, and short the voice coil, requiring a recone.
2) Speakers with vented magnet plates are especially vulnerable to #1. Your G12K-85 has a vented magnet plate in the center of the label. Many G12-65's have these as well.
3) The magnet is powerful enough to suck it through the dust cap on the cone as well.

Solution? None, you've already made this error. Sorry.

Right now I would get masking tape and rub it over every single inch of your frame, magnet plate, dust cap, cone, etc. Those fine metal particles will hang there, waiting to get in forever. After that I would get a shop vac and vacuum the entire frame and cone for any loose particles you can't get with the masking tape.

As you can probably imagine, there's a reason I know this for a fact. Once again, sorry I was busy. If your speaker survives what you did, great. But do what I've outlined above IMMEDIATELY... not tomorrow, not next week, not when you think you have time...NOW. As soon as you play it, the speaker moves in and out, and suck in the loose metal particles. They are so fine you will be hard pressed to see them. They're like volcanic dust, microscopic.

In the future, never use metal brushes, steel wool, or any metal objects etc around a magnetic speaker. Yes, I've learned the hard way...once. A lot of my clients learned the harder way, blowing up a brand new speaker (and I do mean the next day after they got it because they had other speakers to clean up), and paying for a recone or buying another speaker. Yes, it sucks.

Metal particles don't care, they attach to magnets, magnetic speaker plates, voice coils, dust caps and vented magnet plate screens.

I'm sorry, but you have all of those factors going on.

Good luck!

Jim

 

[Hamer95USA]

Plattfuss:

Sorry I missed your thread, I've been busy.

1) Never use steel wool, or steel brushes on speakers. They leave fine metal particles. The magnet takes those particles and sucks them in through any opening. They attach to the voice coil, and short the voice coil, requiring a recone.
2) Speakers with vented magnet plates are especially vulnerable to #1. Your G12K-85 has a vented magnet plate in the center of the label. Many G12-65's have these as well.
3) The magnet is powerful enough to suck it through the dust cap on the cone as well.

Solution? None, you've already made this error. Sorry.

Right now I would get masking tape and rub it over every single inch of your frame, magnet plate, dust cap, cone, etc. Those fine metal particles will hang there, waiting to get in forever. After that I would get a shop vac and vacuum the entire frame and cone for any loose particles you can't get with the masking tape.

As you can probably imagine, there's a reason I know this for a fact. Once again, sorry I was busy. If your speaker survives what you did, great. But do what I've outlined above IMMEDIATELY... not tomorrow, not next week, not when you think you have time...NOW. As soon as you play it, the speaker moves in and out, and suck in the loose metal particles. They are so fine you will be hard pressed to see them. They're like volcanic dust, microscopic.

In the future, never use metal brushes, steel wool, or any metal objects etc around a magnetic speaker. Yes, I've learned the hard way...once. A lot of my clients learned the harder way, blowing up a brand new speaker (and I do mean the next day after they got it because they had other speakers to clean up), and paying for a recone or buying another speaker. Yes, it sucks.

Metal particles don't care, they attach to magnets, magnetic speaker plates, voice coils, dust caps and vented magnet plate screens.

I'm sorry, but you have all of those factors going on.

Good luck!

Jim

I'm sorry for suggesting to the OP to scrub his speaker chassis with a wire brush and didn't know it was poor advice. Thank you, Jim, for posting some very useful information about this subject.

Guitar George

 

[Plattfuss]

Plattfuss:

Sorry I missed your thread, I've been busy.

1) Never use steel wool, or steel brushes on speakers. They leave fine metal particles. The magnet takes those particles and sucks them in through any opening. They attach to the voice coil, and short the voice coil, requiring a recone.
2) Speakers with vented magnet plates are especially vulnerable to #1. Your G12K-85 has a vented magnet plate in the center of the label. Many G12-65's have these as well.
3) The magnet is powerful enough to suck it through the dust cap on the cone as well.

Solution? None, you've already made this error. Sorry.

Right now I would get masking tape and rub it over every single inch of your frame, magnet plate, dust cap, cone, etc. Those fine metal particles will hang there, waiting to get in forever. After that I would get a shop vac and vacuum the entire frame and cone for any loose particles you can't get with the masking tape.

As you can probably imagine, there's a reason I know this for a fact. Once again, sorry I was busy. If your speaker survives what you did, great. But do what I've outlined above IMMEDIATELY... not tomorrow, not next week, not when you think you have time...NOW. As soon as you play it, the speaker moves in and out, and suck in the loose metal particles. They are so fine you will be hard pressed to see them. They're like volcanic dust, microscopic.

In the future, never use metal brushes, steel wool, or any metal objects etc around a magnetic speaker. Yes, I've learned the hard way...once. A lot of my clients learned the harder way, blowing up a brand new speaker (and I do mean the next day after they got it because they had other speakers to clean up), and paying for a recone or buying another speaker. Yes, it sucks.

Metal particles don't care, they attach to magnets, magnetic speaker plates, voice coils, dust caps and vented magnet plate screens.

I'm sorry, but you have all of those factors going on.

Good luck!

Jim

Thanks @ all you take care not to make missstakes!

My description with "steel wool" perhaps wasn't good.
I used a metal sponge u normaly use in the kitchen also for platic (pic one).
In picture two u can see the speaker before i started and the first i do was to
clean the speaker with a vaccum cleaner and a paintbrush to remove the dust and
the durt u see on the picture.
I covered the open back with tape and the inside with paper before i started.
With WD40 i make the place wet wich i wanted to clean with the sponge and used paper
to dry it directly. I take care with the WD40 to keep all place wet that no visible
dust can occure.

I have a "newer" K85 (from late 80s) i compared to this two.
The sound from the cleaned ones a little bit darker but i cann't
heare a defect or a any damage else at the moment. I hope i haven't
done damage for the future. With all these infos i wouldn't have done the
procedure but is there any thing else i can do good for the caps?
I haven't clean the inside from the basket. The picture three is after the cleaning.

Plattfuss

 

[skullfxr]

Hopefully you got lucky.

I must say that I have never felt the compulsion to clean a speaker. Lol. But YMMV.

 

[Scumback Speakers]

Plattfuss, just get a paper towel, normal surface cleaner (409 / Spic 'N Span / etc) type household cleaner. Do not go nuts. These frames develop that corrosion no matter what you do anyway, so there's no point in going crazy making them look pretty, as they're just going to do it again soon enough.

Clean off the excess dirt, dust if you want, but don't get crazy cleaning the yellow sandy colored flat disc with the ripples in it attached to the cone. If you disturb the glue there, that's a part that can cause the speaker to make rattling noises, or allow dirt and crud into the voice coil. Then it's recone time, generally. That's clearly show in your second picture you posted.

Nobody looks at the frame of the speaker, just the guy producing the notes out of the front! LOL