My new homemade full range front horns
I finally got myself in gear 2-1/2 months ago when the Selenium 12C01P, 12" coaxial drivers I'd been looking seriously at for two years finally came on sale at www.partsexpress.com and finally built a set of full-range (down to 50Hz) exponential bi-radial horns (entirely my own design) for my home theater/stereo listening suite. These are now finished and the room acoustical treatment also almost completed. I've been listening to them on an ultralinear P-P 6CA7 (Mullards) stereo amp I built 27 years ago that is conservatively powered for only 20W/ch. This package sounds fabulous!!! I will link to a full report in the future but here is a shot of one of the horns under construction to give you an idea what I have been up to. The completed cabinet on casters is 76 in. tall, 27-1/2" wide at the mouth and 5 ft. 2 in. deep. The rear chamber is 3.6 cu.ft. and tapered like the closed end of a TQWT but not so drastically. It is damped with fiberglass wool. The flared horn petals are molded in fiberglass, strengthened with imbedded steel hardware cloth mesh and deadened with imbedded lead shot. The cabinets are made from 3/4" MDF with angle iron along the long front sides to add strength and tapped 1/4-20 to accept the steel crossbraces which were anticipated to possibly hold vertical lens plates, not really needed. The rear chamber and driver unbolts in order to get these 300 lb. beasts down the stairs.
They sit at each side of a 6x8 foot front projection screen in a 40 foot deep room and are listened to at a distance of 16 feet. They work incredibly well as close as 9 feet.
I have a set of four Altec A-7's set atop four 816-A short horn flare bass bins (like a short A-7) and I know from experience that those A-7's DO NOT WORK in a typical living room. You need to get 35 feet out in front of them before they phase correctly. My new horns do not have this characteristic at all.
These horns are very efficient and I now wish to try my hand at a ~30 watt/ch SET amp (probably 805's) and also an OTL design with a farm of 6080's for some critical comparisons now that I have the speakers and anechoic listening suite to hear the differences.
Toobz through horns clearly rule, ...and rule clearly!
Rob
I finally got myself in gear 2-1/2 months ago when the Selenium 12C01P, 12" coaxial drivers I'd been looking seriously at for two years finally came on sale at www.partsexpress.com and finally built a set of full-range (down to 50Hz) exponential bi-radial horns (entirely my own design) for my home theater/stereo listening suite. These are now finished and the room acoustical treatment also almost completed. I've been listening to them on an ultralinear P-P 6CA7 (Mullards) stereo amp I built 27 years ago that is conservatively powered for only 20W/ch. This package sounds fabulous!!! I will link to a full report in the future but here is a shot of one of the horns under construction to give you an idea what I have been up to. The completed cabinet on casters is 76 in. tall, 27-1/2" wide at the mouth and 5 ft. 2 in. deep. The rear chamber is 3.6 cu.ft. and tapered like the closed end of a TQWT but not so drastically. It is damped with fiberglass wool. The flared horn petals are molded in fiberglass, strengthened with imbedded steel hardware cloth mesh and deadened with imbedded lead shot. The cabinets are made from 3/4" MDF with angle iron along the long front sides to add strength and tapped 1/4-20 to accept the steel crossbraces which were anticipated to possibly hold vertical lens plates, not really needed. The rear chamber and driver unbolts in order to get these 300 lb. beasts down the stairs.
They sit at each side of a 6x8 foot front projection screen in a 40 foot deep room and are listened to at a distance of 16 feet. They work incredibly well as close as 9 feet.
I have a set of four Altec A-7's set atop four 816-A short horn flare bass bins (like a short A-7) and I know from experience that those A-7's DO NOT WORK in a typical living room. You need to get 35 feet out in front of them before they phase correctly. My new horns do not have this characteristic at all.
These horns are very efficient and I now wish to try my hand at a ~30 watt/ch SET amp (probably 805's) and also an OTL design with a farm of 6080's for some critical comparisons now that I have the speakers and anechoic listening suite to hear the differences.
Toobz through horns clearly rule, ...and rule clearly!
Rob
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