| Search | Login/Register
   Home » Horn-Loaded Speakers» Deep End DIY - Australian take one Macondo. (88 posts, 5 pages)
  Print Thread | 1st Post |  
Page 5 of 5 (88 items) Select Pages:  « 1 2 3 4 5
   Target    Threads for related reading   Most recent post in related threads   Forum  Replies   Views   Started 
  »  New  Macondo Frame modification...  Parquet...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     46  446054  12-22-2006
  »  New  Macondo's Axioms: Horn-loaded acoustic systems..  A link to another thread....  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     120  638091  07-29-2007
  »  New  Designing and building a 5 channel horn loaded (looking..  The "old" servo......  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     73  319191  06-20-2015
  »  New  Another time aligned 5-way horn project..  Thread moved...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     189  819657  08-12-2015
  »  New  5-ways from Speedysteve7..  Hehe - no invite for you...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     23  195878  05-20-2011
  »  New  Jessie Dazzle Project..  Will this better to be auditable?...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     172  1509361  08-03-2007
04-05-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,571
Joined on 10-12-2006

Post #: 81
Post ID: 26093
Reply to: 26092
"Bass"
"Best bass" is of course a matter of opinion based on experience and expectations. The (original) Hartsfield LF driver is certainly "designed for horn loading", like the Vitavox AK-151, whereas the AK-150 and the JBL D-130 are designed to be direct radiators. I am thinking that where bass crosses over to midrange, the most natural bass for acoustic music that I have heard comes from direct radiators that by design and by default do not "plumb the depths". The original Hartsfields could play most of what was on an LP when they debuted, and IMO the originals are still better than most modern speakers. Later, JBL added a tweeter, and Classic Audio added an 18" driver to that to play more contemporary LPs. IMO, time alignment at XO is worth considering in terms of the sound (and resultant musical capabilities). Any given speaker might "gain LF" by near wall or corner placement. Typically, lots of peaks and valleys. Give it a shot.

Best regards,
Paul S



04-05-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Jorge
Austin TX
Posts 141
Joined on 10-17-2010

Post #: 82
Post ID: 26094
Reply to: 26093
Bass subdivision
I think we have to subdivide bass into upper bass from 100hz to whatever your midrange does and bass under 100hz and then maybe infrabass. Front loaded upper bass horns are fantastic and I would say if you never heard one, you really never heard a real horn system.   Under 100 hz there might be several options which may vary from back loaded horns, tapped horns and direct radiators and their importance is also vital.  The dynamics of this range can kill or make the whole system. A system that tries to play upper bass and bass at the same time won´t be able to bring out the delicate resolution on any of these combined systems, I have tried them all. The Hartsfield Top Loader, I guess you call them the "original" ones were useless, the labrynth was so complicated no sound came out of there , plus a down firing driver is never a good idea,I had them for 2 years expecting to get good sound out of them and never worked out.  The later model "coffin back" are much better but still no competition to a real front loaded horn in terms of transparency and dynamics, being able to time align it perfectly and tune it to the right frequencies make a big difference. Altec 416 direct radiators are dark sounding by comparison.
04-07-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
anthony
Posts 335
Joined on 08-18-2014

Post #: 83
Post ID: 26096
Reply to: 26094
Had a moment today...


Anthony Upperbass.JPG


First upperbass horn is up and running.  Second one is now on the lathe with hopefully a quick turnaround.  Now I have to figure out how best to tune it...
04-07-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
rowuk


Germany
Posts 438
Joined on 07-05-2012

Post #: 84
Post ID: 26097
Reply to: 26096
That is simply beautiful
I am far too impatient to keep a project of this magnitude going for this long.

As far as tuning it, buy Romy a ticket...


Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.
04-08-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,049
Joined on 05-27-2004

Post #: 85
Post ID: 26098
Reply to: 26096
Create an integrity cheat-list.
Anthony, it feels like more of less comprehensive solution. I like that you make the mid-bass horns to have the same externals profile as lower midrange horn, this is making is visually very complete. If it was mine, then I would use less gloss on fine and would stay more with textured paint, but it just my personal preference. You might here sometimes I advocate textured paint applied to mouth of the horns, but I do not have any methodological clear empirical evidence that it makes any difference and I rather take this side as “burning bush” believe system.  I am a bit surprised that you feel it might be difficulty to tune them. Started with the setting I have as a default.


http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PageIndex=13&postID=24520#24520
 
The measurements are done at the middle of mouth setting of each horn. This is good configuration in my view that doe does not take in account room or any other variable and a perfect test of amps gain and performances of the filters. Drive 1K tone (or whatever my Sansui- TUX1 outputs with own test generator) set the volume at first 4 light on your Placette. You will have a proper balance between the channels for 6-10 feet of listening distance.  Spend some time with this setting and then you can move to any other configuration you feel better works for you. I have a lot of knowledge what will happens if we move one of the channels crossovers up or down, more volume or less volume, there was a lot of time spent experimenting with all of it. If you would like to ask in a context and I will be happy to explain, whatever I still remember. Do not feel however that I feel that to change the balance that I found is some kind of deviation of normality. In fact, if I was in your shoe, I would serially experiment with it. The proposed channels arrangement is a very good starting point hewer. I do it a few times a year to assure the constancy of the whole system configuration. You will see it will run away with time and the cheat-list that I created is very useful for me. I have seen some tubes run away, the kids might touch something, drivers can get damaged or become weaker, the cleaning ladies might disconnect some cables, some mistakes might be made by myself during operation… With 14 channels we have, there is a LOT that might go wrong. To have a system integrity cheat-list I found to be a very effective tool to have.  


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
04-08-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,049
Joined on 05-27-2004

Post #: 86
Post ID: 26099
Reply to: 26090
Do not even remember what year was it....
 jeff1225 wrote:
Romy,When you say that the Vitavox 15" was the best midbass you heard, was it in a Vitavox corner horn? I'm think about acquiring or building a pair of Vitavox corner horns as I have a perfect room for them. 

Sorry, Jeff, I did not see your post. Yes, the midbass I was talking about came from default Vitavox corner horn. The owner has a few of the identical Vitavox corner horn and he claimed that they all sone different and the one that I hear was the best. I do not know if I subscribe that believe. If they sound all different ten it should be other reason for it. Anyhow, this very same “the best sounding” Vitavox corner heard a number of times in different settings, and I always was very not only not good but rathe very bad sound overall and the midbass in particularly was laughable. However, in one specific location it was beyond believe wonderful.
 
BTW, the irony was that it was completely accidental location, it was not a music room and there were efforts spent to set it up. It was in in hotel, some kind of large room that was used for storage and the speakers were connected purely for fun and thrown in the corners. It was one of the “whole shit” events! We are the idiots who always try to do something “better” but it was so good that we very much realized that we should not touch ANYTHING as the evets like this happens once a life time. I do feel that the speakers accidently hit DPoLS and we had the very same sound across the whole room but that is a different story all together.


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
04-09-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
anthony
Posts 335
Joined on 08-18-2014

Post #: 87
Post ID: 26100
Reply to: 26098
Tuning the horn
Romy, it is the UB horn that I need to first tune.  Have found an earlier post of yours where you describe your process and will roughly follow it.  First thing though is to measure an impedance sweep of the horn sitting in place to get the base line then play with filling the back-chamber to get the horn resonance frequency equal to the mouth frequency, or thereabouts (reactance annulling).  99cm or 38.5" diameter = 110Hz horn, so I will make sure I start somewhere there.

The paint used for the horns is actually textured/hammered black.  There is a slight metallic hint to the colour which is very black, much blacker than other textured paints that I found, which gives a slight tendency to reflect light.  Certainly not a gloss finish nor even satin but probably somewhere between matte and satin.  The bass cannons and amplifiers (and all my diy equipment) is matte black powdercoating which provides a subtle contrast even though the same colour.

The cheat sheet is a great idea.  Will definitely do one up once it is all set up. 
04-09-2021 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,049
Joined on 05-27-2004

Post #: 88
Post ID: 26102
Reply to: 26100
It is simple, but...
Ah, you were asking about the tunning of the uperbass horn? That is very simple. You need to make the primary resonance to hit exactly at the horn’s mouth rate. So, it is it 110Hz horn then make the primary impedance to peak at 110Hz, there are many ways to measure it by manipulating the size of the back chamber.
 
Ok, should I let it go or to be me? Ok, let to be me. With all simplicity of above there is an ugly question in it there that is VERY complex. Let say that one of your 110Hz in your specific position hit a G-spot and pick up some room gain, effectively acting like 140Hz horn. Should you set the primary resonance at 110Hz or at 140Hz? The different will be very auditable and what is “better”? This is not so simple, and I do not have a definitive answer. You can make one horn to feel “better” but then your uperbass image might be shift unpleasantly. If you have both 110Hz horns siting in acoustic G-spot and become 140Hz horns then stop building hoe and begin to buy lottery... :-)


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Page 5 of 5 (88 items) Select Pages:  « 1 2 3 4 5
   Target    Threads for related reading   Most recent post in related threads   Forum  Replies   Views   Started 
  »  New  Macondo Frame modification...  Parquet...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     46  446054  12-22-2006
  »  New  Macondo's Axioms: Horn-loaded acoustic systems..  A link to another thread....  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     120  638091  07-29-2007
  »  New  Designing and building a 5 channel horn loaded (looking..  The "old" servo......  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     73  319191  06-20-2015
  »  New  Another time aligned 5-way horn project..  Thread moved...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     189  819657  08-12-2015
  »  New  5-ways from Speedysteve7..  Hehe - no invite for you...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     23  195878  05-20-2011
  »  New  Jessie Dazzle Project..  Will this better to be auditable?...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     172  1509361  08-03-2007
Home Page  |  Last 24Hours  | Search  |  SiteMap  | Questions or Problems | Copyright Note
The content of all messages within the Forums Copyright © by authors of the posts