As some of you know I’m playing last couple days with Red 10” Tannoys from 60s. My selection of 10” was not accidental -I would like to get as less as possible of that “Tannoy bass” but I did run very far  the “Reds” turned out to have 27Hz open air resonance – juts 1Hz above the 15”…. not good...

My first reaction when I got them was my absolute thrill about the enclosure. It is 21x21x28m sealed and it made SO SMARTLY (for a sensible mind that I undoubtedly possess ;-) that I feel it find myself more to valuable the cabinet then the drivers. Yes it “responses” like a freaking shoebox or like a shattered guitar deck.  Anyhow, the subject of the Tannoys enclosure I would like to live alone.  It is another whole universe…

What I would like to share would be my negative observations about my Tannoy. Sure, there are great numbers of positive moments in the Red’s Sound. They are known for whoever is able to get Sound out of the Tannoys and I WILL NOT repeat those positive things. So, after the two days of working, trying to get the best out of my Reds, finding a very cool place for them in my room (this is absolutely critical!) I sat to listen some music. The Reds were driven by a fill-range Melquiades with plate loaded at 850Ohm. Here are some of my negative observations that I scratch in my log (my common practice) during my listening..

1) A 15W SET is not enough. Sure, it produced enough volume for my room but this SET does sound better with more sensitive load, not to mention that volume is not important.

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=3688

With my Milq’s 15W I have no problems with the Tannoy’s dynamic or compression, in fact it is exceptionally good for 93dB-sensitive speaker. However, the HF do have that “yellowness”. I call it the “fried tone of Autumn Sound” and to me - it is undeniable evidence that a SET drive inefficient load. Perhaps I need to load my output stage more and go for 500-600 Ohm on plate. I would get some power  this way and it look like the driver harmonically might handle more plate loading , however I did not try it so far. Stull, I have a feeling that a few watts more might not do the justness and to drive the older Tannoy Red with a SET and to “get the sound in the way how it should be” it might require to use an amp of 30W-40W. Here is where the transmission tube most likely should be used…

2) For whatever reason the Reds are super sensitive to the Melquiades plate. It is actually so sensitive that it was even laughable. Changing the plate current for 5mA affects sound very tangibly. I was listing it and kept wondering. Usually it happens when plate loading is way out the correct dumping and it might be the case. Well, since Milq allow to gradually loading of plate from 34:1 to 4.25:1 (thanks to LL1627) I will figure out. With 34:1 ratio I might drive that 2.5Ohn voice coil directly without any Tannoy’s transformer…. Will see….

3) The infamous Tannoy bass is freaking irritating! I never linked it and now I actually go annoyed by it. Yes, the Tannoy’s bass (actually it is not the Tannoy-only bass but the very smartly-resonating cabinets bass; some other have it as well – Vitavox for instance) is a phenomenal audio-hoax. It is superbly difficult to accomplish and it is amazingly pleasant to experience but… to see at a freak-show a woman with 4 ears or a man with 3 legs perhaps is an “amazing” experience as well, so what? With all beauty of that Tannoy’s bass and the Tannoy’s lower midrange (in original enclosure only) I felt that after a few CDs that this honey tasted bass begin to annoy me. The problem is that in some music and some recordings it “works” and in some music/recordings that bass actually sound ridicules. In fact when  this bass dose not work I instead of listening music get constant turning my listening attention of that artificial bass glorification… Unfortunately it is imposable to shut down that “honey bass exaltation” and it is unfortunately ever-present in ANY music, any instrument, any singer, any orchestra, any performing hall…. It is what I call for years as “the Dean Reed tone”. The Americans might not know this performer but he is actually an American singer…

4) In the end I did surmised for myself that from what I heard the Tannoy can not handle complex music. Perhaps, it relates to the fact that I have no power to driver  the “Reds” with my amp but so far, with complex and demanding marital (and I do not mean just volume), the Tannoys get crashed and “go shallow”. I kind of accustomed that Macondo swallows absolutely everything and the Tannoy’s frightening of “complexity” is not what I like. Tannoy acts very interesting: it is it very detailed and very precise but when a complexity grows it begins to paint the Sound with larger and larger brushes, building up more anti-detailed Sound. It is not necessary a bad thing but I am not tuned to this type of presentation. So far I feel that Reds are a good solution for quartets or quintets but even Cecilia Bartoli with a small group of barokko instruments was able to stress the Reds up to the point where speakers were slightly “loosing”…

This is all for now….

RonyWeissman wrote:

…it was very exciting to listen to the start of the Bruckner 7th, terrifying actually, but the crescendos started to sound like New Age music gone mad…. In fact if I take a look right now at the CDs piled up around the tannoy installation it turns out they are nearly ALL solo piano recitals, cupla of jazz pieces, and a few sonates for cello and piano.

Wow, Rony this is exactly how a great audio literature should be written!!! I had absolutely the same feeling and I was under impression that my little 10” Reds sink Melquiades. You have 15¨Golds and drive them with 200W SS. It is a perfect match for them but still you report the same effect. Would it be something inherent in the Tannoys drivers? I have a long and completely flimsy theory about it. I feel that ANY single point source driver chokes with “big sound”. However, when you have multiple of drivers then they form a frequency-dependant line-arrays and it virtually extends the size of the transducers, plus it has many other benefit of the cylindrical waves.

RonyWeissman wrote:

I figured I just don't have the right cabinet for the tannoy's, so I'll be watching to see if you find the solution for your REDs or if you give up.

I will not be searching any further solutions for solution for Reds. They will be in this “idiosyncratically resonating” Tannoy’s original feeble cabinet and I am not touching it. The only thing that I might play will be amplification… all the rest I will keep it as is. I found some very new and very interesting ways to USE those Tannoys but it is too new way of thinking for we I need some time to figure out what it doing on. I am sure I will be reporting the outcome. No mater what the Reds are wonderful for certain things. For instance is I want to listen some News via a republican radios stations then by playing the news it via the Tannoys the voices of the broadcasters do not sound as revolting as they usually are. For instance last night I was listening some Fox New and they proudly announced that some kind of next retard in Senate of in House poser in odder to fight with homosexual marriages to oblige all married couple to have children. … and you know what? When you hear the news like this via Tannoys then those news do not sound as idiocy but rather as a “gentle encouragement”…

Romy

i will start building my first hornspeaker, going from theory ( surfing the net ) to practice. i am not pretentious regarding the result, i am very aware of my knowledge limitations and lack of experience, as i am just in the beginning. but the way is to try things out, and learn with the mistakes, and try to do things better  next time. As i am a machine designer, i love to design, and try to come up with something, that looks good too. The subject of the selection of wood interests me. Bert from Bd-design uses plywood for his Swing cabinets, and says :

The ultra rigid construction of the SWING system is achieved through use of multiple parts, CNC-routed from specially selected plywood. Each pair of the basic SWING enclosures is made from 154 parts involving 340 holes and 138 grooves - a very complex puzzle! The resulting enclosure plays a large part in the SWING's natural tonal character without adding any disturbing "noise" to the music.

What i do not understand, if the intern of the cabinet is damped with tyrofoam panels, do these not absorb the backfiring sound and most cabinet resonances ? so how does than the cabinet still play a role of the tonal character of the speakers ?

Angelo
 

My preferred type of speaker is a full range ribbon, though I've always had a monkey/Tannoy on my back which is surprising as I don't really care for box speakers.

I've heard many over the years but I was never really that impressed but wanted a monitor type speaker with some weight behind them. Tannoys became the speaker I wanted to pursue to achieve that end.

I now have a Tannoy 2528 driver that has been re-paper coned and a Chester cabinet braced with 3/4 of an inch of oak. Recently added has been a ribbon super tweeter from Townshend Glastonbury speakers. They are a bit of a hybrid now hence the name 'Barkingside'.

Increased speed with tighter bass and a more focused soundstage is the result. I have no means of measuring them etc etc other than my own trusted ears just as I like it.

Rgds all

Actually it is good that you reminded me about the Tannoys as behind my recent paranoia with the “Water Drop” tweeter I forgot about the beauty that blessed my life. I am taking about the “older” Tannoy’s tweeters. What is magnificent sound!

I’m not an expert with Tannoys but friends on mine who are suggested me to look at the tweeters of the Tannoy’s from 60s. I did and loved it tremendously. Sure they do not have those “extrasensual benefits” that I am getting recently form RAAL’s ribbons (because Tannoy do not have a full blown midrange under them) but still the Tannoys compression tweeters do phenomenally good for what they do.

Sure, me, being me, hearing the result I was not able to help myself and I decided to look what they did. The irony is that what I saw in there made me very prod about myself – I actually re-invented some of the things they did in 2003. I have in one back-plate of my Vitavox S2 a 1/16” hole and I was trying to modify/tune the back-chamber cone damping by charging the air resistance of that hole, - I have this idea stolen from AudioTechnica headphones. Although I was able to vary the Vitavox S2 sound to great degree but I never was able to navigate Sound to the direction I intended. The Tannoy tweeter did the same only they have their cone, suspension and entire assembly initially designed in context of that semi-sealed back chamber. And they dot a very good sound out of their tweeters!!!

Juts for sake of pure audio pornography: here are my 10” Reds from 1960s in resonant sealed 6.5cub/feet. They came with a sexy front door that I removed….

starboy wrote:

… though I've always had a monkey/Tannoy on my back which is surprising as I don't really care for box speakers..