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In the Forum: Horn-Loaded Speakers
In the Thread: Canadian Speaker Proposal

Post Subject: Some commentaries about drivers selection.Posted by Romy the Cat on: 6/25/2013

We understand that Charlus’ selection of drivers are not a selection yet but some kind of very preliminary idea of the drivers that he feels like he like. I said “he feels like he like” not accidently. I do not think Charlus, or anybody else in his place, would be able to evaluate the worth of the drivers in context of overall sound of somebody else installation. It is possible to do but only if you have a lot of experience with application of the specific driver, then listening the driver in context of alien installation it is possible to recognize it’s signature and to decipher how it was used. As I understand Charlus is not familiar with the drivers he picked and he was talking about them only because the systems that he liked used those drivers. Here is an interesting twist of the story: I can give you 95% that of the system owners of the installation that he liked did replace some of the drivers that Charlus mentioned (and made the needed adjustments of the systems) then… Charlus might still love the sound of those installations.

Anyhow, as few comments about the Charlus drivers.

de charlus wrote:
Ale Acoustics 160 Super (15hZ-1000hZ, 110db/w)15hZ - 150hZ Lower bass

I do not even want to talk about it as it is WAY beyond anything sensible at this point. It is not to mention that I do not believe in closed-bottom lower octave channels and I feel that ”lowest octave horn” is an oxymoron. I wrote about it some years back:

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PageIndex=1&postID=7213#7213

Saying all of it I have to admit that to have a midbass horn around Ale Acoustics 160 is very interesting idea. It is VERY hard to make it properly as Ale bass drivers are not suitable for proper midbass application, or at least it is very very hard.

de charlus wrote:
Vitavox AK 151 (50HZ-8kHZ, 100db/w) 150hZ - 350hZ Upper bass

This is for sure is VERY interesting idea but I would scope this driver from let say 60Hz to 500Hz. Show me the channel in which it will be mount and show me rest of the speaker that would be assembled around such a channel. If it done properly it mish be very interesting but I am not informed about the solution. I do think that to cut the driver like AK151 just at 150hZ is like to marinate $80 ribeye steak in chlorine.

de charlus wrote:
Vitavox S2 (200hZ-16kHZ, 110db/w) 350hZ - 1500hZ Lower mid

Possible but I very much doubt that one can make the S2 driver to go so much down. I would say that 450Hz is more plausible threshold. I also feel that as god as S2 at lower MF it does portray own thrill only of the same S2 driver care the upper range. If you hear the only one only 350hZ - 1500hZ channel without any complimentary upper range then you might feel that you wasted such an expensive driver to accomplish nothing.

de charlus wrote:
Ale Acoustics 45Super (500hZ-20kHZ, 115db/w) 1500hZ - 6kHZ Upper mid

It is hard to say – I do not know ALEs drivers. Hey might sound wonderful in there. A word of warning, however. All of those upper ranges GOTO, ALE, YL, Condo compression drivers have very strong magnets and very flimsy voice coil. They do 2.4T in gap and they use very light VC. They save on VC mass and they do not use formers. They wind ultra light, self-glued turns with rectangular wire and their HF VC are very susceptive to overheating. If somebody like Charlus would use his ALE driver in closet then driving it with 1.5W of type 45 might be save. However, Charlus has 42 by 24 feet room and he would need more power. There are plenty of people out there who did burn the GOTO upper MF drivers with 300B amps. So, this I think need to be taken under consideration.

de charlus wrote:
Acapella TW1S (5kHZ-50kHZ, 110db/w) 6kHZ - 50kHZ+ Tweeter

I do not buy it at all. With a good compression driver a tweeter need to just do artifacts. To cross a tweeter at 6kHZ in context of 5 way system is kind of ridicules. Do not forget: plasma tweeter (very much like ribbon) sounds worse with each Hz it goes down. Why to drive the tweeter so low? I do not. Acapella, like all other companies, advertise the stupidly-low crossover frequency in order people feel that it might be suitable for 2-3 ways acoustic system. Many people do and they end up with quite crappy sound from Acapella. With 5-way system that is under discussion there is absolutely no need to use a tweeter where it is not supposed to be used.

The Cat

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