Whilst we were away for the weekend our teenage son decided to crank up the volume on our system and it sounds like he’s knackered the speakers. Watching a movie last night and the sound wasn’t right so put my favourite album on and that definitely didn’t sound right. Tried it again this morning and it sounded better but I’m concerned all is not right. The speakers are Kef Crests 2’s which I think we’re about £200 20 years ago so what would the equivalent be now?

Have you tried adjusting the balance to make sure it is the speakers and not the amp. I would have thought it odd for both speakers to blow at the same time.

If you want to stick with Kef then the Q350 is apparently pretty decent

kef q350

Then again i think id consider something from Elac here

What do the surrounds look like? They could just be unglued/torn and need replacing.

Can you define what you mean by ‘not right’?

Did he ‘crank up the volume’ momentarily, or for an extended period of time. You can normally get away with it for a momentary wallop, but if it was for a prolonged period he might have done some daamge.
If the amp was clipping for prolonged periods then he could have damaged the speakers.

Is it both speakers? If it’s only one you can swap them around to check whether the fault moves with the speaker (speaker fault) or stays where it is (amp fault).

Have any of the tone adjustment options been fiddled with, which might be making it appear that something isn’t right?

I would have thought it odd for both speakers to blow at the same time.

He (teenage son) was probably driving the speakers to the point of clipping which induces a thermal fault in the voice coil (overheating) and if the amp is of a similar age then it may not have thermal protection built in, the speakers will still play but will sound rather dull/muffled/undefined

From the quick listen I had last night I would say it sounded distorted. My son has his own system so I’ll try swapping things around at some point before I go shopping. The Marantz amp usually does mute when the sound is cranked up too much so he may not have had it turned up for too long.

Have the speaker cables come loose? Worth checking everything is tight, sometimes causes crackling on mine.

I’d swap out the amp and speakers to identify what the issue is. Sounds like you have another amp and speaker set to do that. It’s highly unlikely both are damaged. From the description though, it’s basically impossible to say.

Also give your kid a stern education in mechanical sympathy and audio quality – pushing audio gear beyond its capabilities just makes it sound terrible for not much extra volume!

What do they smell like?

I would go with somafunk and say cooked voice coil. What amp was it?

Somafunk has it. It might be that only the tweeters or woofers gave gone, and if spares are available it might be a cost effective fix, but not both.

High volume is likely to knacker both channels equally.

OP I have a pair of Ruark Icons (late 90s £375 then) to sell if you are interested. Sound great and 15L internal volume. Rosewood.

As above sounds like you have over loaded the drivers. You can probably get some cheaply on eBay or an equivalent from wilmslow audio.

Well I’ve given it a good run tonight and everything sounds fine now, tried several different musical styles and no problems. It’s hard to describe how it sounded differently last night, watching the film the speech lacked clarity, not unusual but it was also noticeable in a couple of songs they played.

IME it’s usually the tweeters that blow, and that would explain the lack of clarity. Get your ear right next to the tweeter and listen for distortion or even loss of sound altogther.

Sometimes you can pick up spare tweeters – depends on manufacturer. Otherwise, new speaker time (cough, Dynaudio)