# Another tbi review



## Hillbilly SQ (Jan 26, 2007)

I was given a set by a local to try for him since I have a fully functional system and he has a new ricemobilehe's doing performance mods on before he does a system in it. I'm going to condense this down to no fluff whatsoever because I don't like reading longwinded reviews anymore than the next person.

Build quality is excellent. Not $200 good but still it's up there.

Mounting hardware should be modified. Whatever happened to lining up the grooves in tweeter cups and twisting to lock? You have to be one brave soul to pop these things out of the cups. To tbi-CHANGE THIS!!!

Right out of the box these were the harshest tweeters I've ever heard in the silk category. Letting them play on the supplied passives for about 30 hours straight smooved them out quite a bit but still had to keep telling myself they WERE NOT aluminum or titanium or PIEZO. Mounted off axis in the kicks was the only way I could tolerate them. This way all I had to do was tame a small 10khz peak. On axis they're unbearable which is a good thing if you're going off axis with them. While impressed with their detail they don't sound graceful to me at all. They sound like those aluminum tweets you get from walmart. Before I forget altogether I crossed them at 2500 24db. They sounded best crossed here and cut out A LOT more lower frequencies than that 6db filter at 3500 that comes with them.

After evaluating these tweeters I regret to say that I wouldn't run them in my install if they were mine. Just in case you're wondering my reference track is the original version of Hotel California and the tweets I'm running are morel mdt29's. Several people have said my morels were harsh. These tbi's beat my morels BIGTIME.


----------



## rockondon (Jan 18, 2008)

Way to buck the system Hillbilly.
Cool you did this. Thanks for taking the time.


----------



## Hillbilly SQ (Jan 26, 2007)

I have NOTHING to lose by being honest. If they don't like it fugg em.


----------



## Megalomaniac (Feb 12, 2007)

hmm you def need to hear my car. i really liked the tweeters. I am running offaxis almost completely. So i dont have comments for onaxis. but to me they werent harsh but rather brighter and more detailed. The tweeters made my system overall airy. Maybe your tuning skillz suck? :


----------



## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

Shun the non-believer. Ssssshuunnnn! 

Odd. These are totally unharsh to me.  

I'd consider the Seas neo "harsher" then the TBI, but neither are harsh at all. Even before break in, they weren't bad.

The TBI isn't mellow though, so depending on what you came from, these could seem harsh at first impression. The mdt29 and TBI share a pretty similar frequency response. Harsh to me is Infinity, lol. Now _those_ are tweeters I can't stand.

The sensitivity is pretty high on these too, so levels should be set down a good ways, possibly a long ways. I don't know how the Morels do for sensitivity, but it could be something where you're setting them down 4, 6, 10dB lower. They're a couple/few dB louder then the Seas, if that's a reference.

No clue why they come with the high pass filter. I'm surprised you even used it.

Agreed on the mounting hardware. The fit is...firm...,but it's basically creating an opportunity to break them in some way. The twist lock would be, um, normal. However, it also means some added cost for the manufacture of hardware. The press fit isn't great either as it requires good tolerances that need to remain consistent.


----------



## Megalomaniac (Feb 12, 2007)

Hertz does not use twist lock on their tweeters. I had to break the cup to get the hertz tweeters I had out. real pita


----------



## 86mr2 (Apr 29, 2005)

Thanks for the review Hillbilly_SQ.


----------



## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

It's the negative comments that help companies the most. But it does help to go into good detail as to why. The sound I don't get though. I'd like to though. I don't mind ripping on something that actually sucks. Me just listening to the TBI tweeters though, I can say to myself I've heard a lot of worse tweeters then this. Any chance that the tweeters are just damaged in some way? Or something with the install or tune? It's just that nothing specific with the tweeters themselves really point to anything bad in terms of sound.


----------



## unpredictableacts (Aug 16, 2006)

Glad TBi sent me a set to try out. Luckily I am local to several audio geeks....curious....Chris did you set you levels on your amplifiers or even puill them down some on the line driver? My be the true culprit to blame in all of this.

I will be taking these tweeters to Tood Crowder to take a lsten and playt with for a few days....he does high end installs and has even done a HAT install. He sells certian brands, but loves to see what is new....anyways I am going to whore these little ****ers out....Thanks TBI and reviews will follow after each session. Dejo and Abram let me know when you guys are local.


----------



## Hillbilly SQ (Jan 26, 2007)

Nevermind. Bottom line is if I had a choice I'd spend $400 on a REAL pair of tweets over these. They're worth $50 a pair and not a penny more.


----------

