Cotton Balls in speakers
 

Has anyone else run across any speakers that had cotton balls wedged behind the cone and the frame? I thought it was just weird in one radio, but I just found a third radio with them stuffed behind them.

Sounds like someone was trying to either muffle the speaker, or cure a rattle of some kind..

SR

Probably the speaker cone was damaged and buzzing, and someone MacGyver'd it.

If you have a decent speaker that just has a slight "rattle" or distortion, it will eliminate the problem. I've done it a couple of times myself in the past. You have to be careful how you place the cotton ball. Too tight and it will muffle the sound, too loose and it does nothing. I gently and carefully place one or two in the brackets at the far edge.

I repaired a radio for a neighbor many years ago. He had the radio since he was a child, given to him by his parents one Christmas. He told a story of how his dad "fixed" it for him once. He said his dad took the radio away from him because he kept playing it too loudly at night when other family members were trying to sleep. When he gave the radio back, the volume control knob would turn all the way, but only a limited amount of sound would come out of the radio. The father had "fixed" it somehow to limit the volume.

I recapped the radio, and removed all the cotton stuck between the speaker cone and the radio front, and my neighbor was glad to have it working again and at full volume.

In this case the cotton was not added to cure a speaker rattle, but to limit the range the speaker cone could move to limit the output.

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Makes sense, two of them were on the lower side of the speaker, so I can only assume it was because they were rubbing. I did have one with them all around, particularly annoying because it warped the cone.

Actually here's something interesting, one of the radios with the cotton
overpowers the small speaker in it. All of the IF transformers were tuned off peak by an 1/8 to 1/4 turn, Local stations come through very loudly. I can only assume that cotton was to continue to dampen the speaker so that the sound doesn't become too distorted/ blow the speaker.