From: Mathew Vea <vea@spider.ece.cmu.edu>
Message-Id: <9210121714.AA02162@spider.ece.cmu.edu>
To: Harry.Bovik@k.gp.cs.cmu.edu
Cc: vea@spider.ece.cmu.edu
Subject: Stereo speaker repair
Keywords: stereo speaker repair re-foam refoam re-cone recone
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 13:14:07 -0400

Dear Harry,

I would like to give you a very high recommendation for Tri-State Loudspeaker
in Aliquippa (375-4728).  This is a one-man speaker repair shop.  The owner,
Gino McNeill, is very friendly, seems quite knowledgeable (he produces his own
line of stereo speakers, which he designed himself), and is very reasonably
priced.  He does piece repair work for both J. Rudy and Serve-U-Serve,
both of whom have been recommended to you.  His hours are limited, but he is
open on Saturdays.  Without question, it was worth the long drive (twice!) to
Aliquippa to get my speaker repaired by him.

I think my own story would be interesting for anyone looking for speaker
repair.  I blew out the woofer of my 12 year old McIntosh speaker.
Specifically, the foam surrounding the speaker became brittle from age
and shattered.  I called Listening Post (McIntosh dealer) and they said
that they would have to order a new woofer.  Cost:  $180 PLUS labor.  Time:
about a month.  They gave the names of serveral speaker repair shops,
including Tri-State.  I called both J. Rudy and Serve-U-Serve.  They
both told me that my speaker needed to be re-coned, and informed me
that nobody does that anymore "because it is too labor intensive".
When I mentioned this to Gino McNeill of Tri-State, he thought this
was interesting since both these shops sent him speakers for re-coning
on a regular basis.

Gino gave me a quote of $34 over the phone.  I brought in the entire speaker
(the woofer was glued to the housing and I didn't want to mess with it), and
Gino explained that the quote of $34 was for the removed woofer and that he
normally charged $38 if the speaker was to be removed, but he would charge
me $34 because that was the original quote (I agreed to $38 because he
was so straight-forward).  Gino replaced the foam and re-aligned the
woofer.  I picked up the speaker a week later and the speaker sounds as
good to my untrained ears as ever.

The moral of this story:  don't believe the stereo stores when they tell
you your speaker can't be repaired.  Give Tri-State a call first.

Matt Vea