cv wrote:

Regarding what effects the larger horn will have: my gut feeling is that the larger air mass will provide more damping anyway. It may be that there's an optimal bug screen "density" that varies with the air loading?

I have tried to increase the acoustic impedance of the bug screen by laying there the semi-transparent acoustical material. It defiantly “helped’ in some areas but at the same time it did create some damage in other areas. I think to do it properly it should be manufactured a new bug screen with twice more smaller size of each sell and perhaps twice thicker, as the bug screen also acts and a very effective defuser. I did not do it but if I come across the “ready to go screen” I would defiantly try. Another area of expiration for you if you wish is the back chamber of the S2. It is a clean metal with a lot of reflection at HF. By layering it within it’s perimeter with the 3M’s made Brillo sponge (or similar) yo0u might silently change the Sound.

Rgs,
The Cat

This is the project that I been thinking to undertake for years. I have motioned about in multiple times that Vitavox’s S2 lower region is very lucrative but unfortunately not exactly useable if the driver run all the way up, unless you are wiling to screw it up with resonance compensators. My long time idea was to use 2 Vitavox per channel: low frequency S2 before the primary resonance with old metal suspension diaphragm and another HF S2 after the primary resonance, with the plastic suspension diaphragm.  The second version I used for year and today I tried the first version.

First off all I armed the S2 with the original aluminum, metal suspension, cone and removed the phase plug. For the driver that will not work above 1000Hz the phase plug is as necessary as a helicopter propeller for to jelly fish. Then I well aliened the driver, making it sound without any mechanical resonances at 150Hz. Running this LF optimized S2 the drive I at the driver very confidently cared quite low frequency and I was able to get even 220Hz pretty clear. This was very-very good as the driver with the plug was dieing at 450Hz. So, in order to have an octave above the responsibly reproducible frequency I think I might try to load the LF part of my 2S2 tandem into 250Hz horn and cross it at 550Hz with first order. It is interesting to see what will happen and it will be fun to male all of this to work. I keep you folks posted about the successes or feature of this project.

The sad part in all of this that I would need an extra Super Melquiades channel. The positive thing that I will find if S2 lower knee will be able to compete with my current upper bass horn. I doubt but still” the best reproduced 400-1000Hz I even heard was in 2002 in CES during a privet demonstration by David Karmeli when pair of S2+K151 drove the large David’s demos room into something absolutely out of this world (I am talking only about the upperbass only). Also I would like to get more control over the range of the fundamatals….

Rgs,
Romy the caT

angelo,

I do not know what the story about the Vitavox Mike. He travels a lot and sometime he is few weeks out of county, during this time he does not retie emails.… It happened with him before. He runs a shop and you might call his ask how he is doing. Other them him I do not know sources for new diaphragms. In contrary S2 drives are readily available ands use a couple pars per month pops up here and there.  However, S2 drivers and it diaphragms, thanks to a known to me Morons from Massachusetts who believes the he is a feline, become quite expensive recently. Also if you gig them do not forger that they are 50 years old and it might be a lot with them that does not perform well. So, doing for S2 drive one might open a worm box with all possible aggravations….

Also, I would like to note that audio people always foolishly believe that “something” in playback that was “different” is responsible for “better sound”. I have seen quite a few people who were in my room and more or less liked the Sound. Then they asked me what did MF. I said that it was Vitavox S2 driver. Probably a half dozen of them then ran and bought the S2 drives. However, as far as I know today, none of them were able to successfully use it in their installations (because of various reasons). I pretty much did the same: I heard it in 2001, liked some potency of it’s Sound, and ran to buy it. Nevertheless, it took almost a year to learn how to get better sound from it and hot it might be incorporated in context of entire installations.

Rgs,
The caT

This post is split form the thread:

http://www.GoodSoundClub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=4549

http://www.GoodSoundClub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=4556

jessie.dazzle wrote:

"...I very much might try to use the metal suspension again when I will be driving the MF with a single-stage Milq, direct coupled or after I try the Duddanization of the cone. The single-stage Milq should be “a cleaner electronics” and it should be advantageous...." What do you mean by "the Duddanization of the cone"... I would guess you are referring to damping the cone via some sort of coating (saliva from your pregnant adolescent camel... You do realize she has been pregnant for a very long time...)

jessie.dazzle wrote:

"...Since you already do have the S2 driver then buy from Mike one single plastic suspension cone and try it next you original cones..." My S2s have metal diaphragms... In fact, I did not realize that it was still possible to buy the diaphragms with plastic suspension (???). Thank you for your offer to lend me a diaphragm... It would seem best that I try to buy the diaphragms that I don't have (plastic suspension)... If I heard the plastic suspension in my system, and liked it, but then could not buy a pair, I might just become and Audio Psycho...

I kind of fed up to receive those emails (I ordinary do not reply them) with questions and therefore I would a would make one atypical public statement and it will be it. I say “atypical” as I truly do not care about your purchasing habits, still sine it is Vitavox thread and my site is “in play” I think my reaction is warranted.

There is a person or a group of the people on eBay who continually (over the course of a few years) sell Vitavox S2 drivers. They have a picture of a group of the S2 drivers, mentioning of Living voice air Partner horns, kink’s to Peter Empson’s Vitavox Unofficial web site and to the sale section of my site. They tell story that the drivers were tested by signal generator at 200Hz and so on…. Also add suggests do not big on eBay but contact directly of some Google, Yahoo or Hotmail account. The seller has a lot positive feedback and good history.

Well, you need to discard this selling item. If you see it then description and the photos were taken from a legitimate eBay sale that took place 3 years ago and this action is posted under a stolen eBay account. I do not provide a link to this fraudulent item as eBay does a pretty good job to delist those actions. Still, it is posted again and again, and I presume that people do “bite”. I do not know how the rest fraudulent mechanism works and how they get money from the people (and I do not want to discuss it here). Still, if you looking for S2 drivers then beware that the Vitavox S2 drivers are on EBay’s “Naked Short List”, right along with some other items that managed to obtain the “deficit” status among the moronic audio collectors.

mark wrote:

regarding point 6)inspect the diaphragms;3 different diaphragms,metal surround(1type only?),plastic surround(2 types?clear plastic,white)the new production style please desribe in detail its physical appearance.are these new style  still available?do you use the newest style currently in fundamental and mf channel?if not what type in what channel?can you provide contact info for people to make optimal soft wood horns?i tried googling bruce edgar,cannot find email or phone.are you currently using 250hz horn for fundamentals and 550hz  horn for mf?

Mark, all those questions were discussed before, some of them in great details. If you have interest about the S2 driver them you might invest some time into reading the legacy posts on the subjects. I do not want to sound like a jerk (well, why not) but the entire idea to have the content of this site publicly available is do not have needs to write it again and again. Do your homework, after all it is your driver and your interest.

Bruce Edgar’s email is bedgar@socal.rr.com, contact him and he will give to you his phone number. However, Bruce provided multiple times his phone at AA.  About the MF, I use 400Hz horn crossed at 3200 electrically 1000Hz acoustically.  I found that 375-400Hz horn is OK setting for the S2 with white plastic suspension.

Rgs, the Cat

…. I would suggest trying to drive this driver with a single stage solution with no capacitance - you might find it very very very very very very  educational.

http://www.romythecat.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?postID=4241

http://www.romythecat.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?postID=4734

http://www.historyofpa.co.uk/pages/speakers.htm

here is also some PDF files

http://membres.lycos.fr/stephane3000/_private/frameset_vitavox.htm

I picked recently a pair of S3 drivers. Not that I need them but it was good deal – perhaps someone in UK have demolished an old movie theater and a large school of S3 drivers with original diaphragms hit the maket recently. Also, I always meant to try them for my Fundamental Channel as I was interested to see if they would go lower then S2 drivers. The S2 have ceramic magnet, so HF transients shell be too dry with my tube electronics. Still, the Fundamental Channel do not work very high, so there is a remote possibility that I will be able to go away with S2 driver for this channel.

Now, what I wonder: is anybody having the internals drawing of S2 and S3 drivers. The reason I ask is because my S2 in Fundamental Channel is time-aligned and when I screw the S2 in there then the distance between the throat of the horn and driver cone might be different. I really do not want to do re-alignment (because multiple reasons) and I would like to make the alignment decision based upon the drawing of the driver with marked up distances. I do have this drawing for S2 driver but I do not have it for S3. If someone has the S3 mount template with exact distance between the mounting throat and the tip of the cone then post it or shoot me a direct email.

I have a couple of queries relating to the transition from the mouth of the S2 driver to a horn generally, and to a 400Hz or 250Hz horn specifically. 

The profile calculator that I use for tractrix horn (horncalc) does not take into account the depth of the diaphragm of the S2 from the mouth.

I have worked out that at the base of what looks like the conical horn section the diameter is approx 30mm. With a mouth diameter of 38.1mm, the angle is therefore a constant 2.5 degrees. The flare angle at the beginning is a relatively large 6.3 degrees. With a 247Hz horn that angle would be 5 degrees.

Should this be of any concern?

I know that Jean Michel Lecleach's spreadsheet (I have a version from 2007) actually enables one to specify an exit angle. I imagine that one's answer might in part depend on how critical one conceives the transition at the throat.

Best regards
Rakesh