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Posted by Romy the Cat on
12-16-2019
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I was pointed out to Steve Guttenberg’s video “Meet Joe, and
his amazing DIY horn speakers” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFoCVw2AJRc.
I would like to provide some commentary regarding what I
observed in there. Steve Guttenberg is an industry self-celebrated idiot
who for years patronized and glorified pre-manufactured labels and I was a
surprise that he suddenly dived into DIY swamp. I do not feel that DIY solution
are necessary better than industry solution but that fact that industry pimps
begin to fish in murky DIY water I find is …. strange and boring.
Anyhow, here are some thoughts, critiques and complements to
Joel’s system, in no particular order. Under no circumstances I admire or criticize
what Joe’s is doing. This is just an attempt to do an analysis, to share the knowledge
about the terrain…
The lower MF horn.
The sera-brooks horns. This is perfectly fine tratrix horn but a word of
warning, something that many people do not consider. Be careful with wooden horns
made in Philippines and the countries alike. The average humidity in there well
over 85% and as the horns sent to countries with house average humidity under of
50 it might be a problem to the horn integrity.
The MF driver. The Classic Audio electromagnet. I know
nothing about this driver but there is something that I right the way do not
like here. I have written many time that I never heard any decently sounding current-driven
field-coil drivers. This is actually a theory that was invented as a pure theoretical
proposition right at this site. The field-coil drivers always strike me a transients
lethargic drivers. A few years back a poster at this site was debating with me
his experience and he did not share my observations. Upon further investigation
we recognized that I dealt with current-driven field-coil drivers but he dealt
with voltage-driven field-coil drivers. Upon observing the difference in sound between
RCA’s 1443 and 1428 (12V vs 120V), sound of RCA 900 line and my own experiments
with my Vitavox S2 conversion to electromagnet I proposed a notion that high voltage field-coil do not has that
transients lethargic sound that are very common in low voltage electromagnet. The explanation why is
self-evident. I did not have a change to confirm it and did not rebuild my S2
to high voltage, still I am very confident that my theory is accurate. Now. Joe
is running his MD driver at 15V that should make it challenged in transients.
This is just an allegation, below I will provide some evidence.
The tweeter TAD ET-703. The meticulously time-aligned, with
is perfect of cause. The selection of the twitter in my view is perfect evidence
of my proposal above about transient problems of the Joe MF channels. The ET-703
is reported to have 107dB sensitivity but as far as I remember when I experimented
with this driver it was actually 100dB and sonically it sounded like it was sub
90dB. That was the slower sounding tweeter as I ever heard and it is no surprise
that Joe chosen to us this tweet to compliment the his low-voltage powered MF channel.
The Quad ESL-57 have wonderful sounding but why do we need to have horn-loading
topology to imitate the wonderful electrostats sound? Another point. The tweeters us set at 10K and
shot to 40K region, explain me why we need a horn at the tweeter? Do we need to EQ the bottom knew or cap out
the upper knee? I never understood it…
The base horns. Reported 60Hz roll-off by twins of Altec
515B with Fs of sub 24Hz. Joe is correct that the driver act as a compression driver
but he is not correct that his 60Hz comes from 120Hz mouth. In my estimation
the 60Hz in this horn is coming as a direct radiator. It is very easy to figure
out by measuring the horn equalization. I absolutely insist that there is very little
horn EQ in there at 60Hz.I also personally feel that any horn that do not used HIGH-pass
filter under the horn rate is not a truly horn as it letting the LF sound to
chock the mouth that very dramatically worsen the above the horn rate sound quality.
The LF section, the twin’s double-pull sub with SS amps running
DSP. It is what it is, we all cheat in one way of other with our LF. Frankly
speaking, considering the Joe’s dedication to his project I was unanticipated more
elegant cheating and I certainly would like to see the LF section to be posited
outside of the main speakers.
Joe’s claims that all filtration is 6dB, how about the
tweeters? I do not think so…
Another interesting factor. With all efforts and pride invested
into organizing of the playback why he let one amp, and not particularly fancy
amp to run the whole system? Why not multi-amping?
Another interesting observation and Mr Guttenberg’s is too
stupid to ask it. What Joe’s does it what I call Japanize configuration. The Japanize configuration implies that MF
handled by split drives: Upper MF and lower MF and the spit happens at very high
crossover point ~5K. It is not good or bad but I always wander why people chose
to do it. Is it because the limitations of the chosen drivers or is it because any
other reasons? I really would like to hear some metaphorical reasons that would
be decoupled from specific drives limitations…
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Posted by Gargoyle on
08-01-2024
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I've come across this video a few times lately, perhaps since Gutterberg has made the algorithm.
Joe is quite proud of the extra plywood that he put on the walls and floors. A noble cause for the backdrop given he is on a highway, however I question the merit of stiffening of the floor, then adding pliable glue on top. It bothers me as an approach of pinning diarrhea to the wall, seeing what sticks.
IMO quite often it's the first surface that is the most important. Joe has a Cherry wood floor. Does it matter if he attempted to decouple it with soft glue? I am about 90% sure that floor is still nailed down in addition to the glue.
The floor is a resonant acoustic panel. Is it wise to add more tension and a stiffer propagation surface? If you're making an acoustic guitar these would be notable features.
A "silent" floor in the home construction sense means it doesn't crick and crack when you walk on it. It does not mean it is quieter, they are louder overall.
Similar to adding Roxull insulation to wall and floors to "sound proof" rooms. It works great until you put drywall on it. The sound goes through the studs, circumventing the insulation for the most part. Definitely negligible effect.
Modern spray foams on the other hand do seem to both tighten and simultaneously dampen a structure. You can feel a house that has been spray foamed.
The foam is heavy, yet not hard. One of the most remarkable and always overlooked feature of these foams is how they glue together a house on the macro scale.
Given the date of Joe's renovation, it is unlikely that Joe had his walls sprayed, perhaps he just filled the window gaps with canned foam.
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