a/d/s L810 cabinets

[Fast_Eddie]

Hi All,

I'm on the road with some time on my hands. Not sure I'll be on line a lot, but I've been thinking...

I love my a/d/s L810s and by all accounts they are fine speakers, but the same few complaints keep coming up, primarily in the imaging department, and the need for an appropriate stand. So I got to wondering if both of these issues could be addressed by building new cabinets. If done correctly, you could build new cabinets without doing anything that couldn't be undone should you decide to sell them down the road.

I was thinking about a two piece cabinet. A woofer section built as narrowly as the woofers would allow with the same volume as the L810 cabinets. Then a second cabinet on top of that with spikes to locate it on the first cabinet. The second cabinet would house the mid and the tweeter and have a tilted baffle face to align the drivers properly. The spikes would locate the cabinet to align the drivers with the woofers properly.

It seems this would create a floor standing speaker of acceptable size, in fact easier to place than the L810 cabinets on stands, and afford much better imaging with the narrow cabinet face and properly placed drivers. I'm absolutely sure the mid and tweeter being next to each other and the wide baffle face on the L810s is causing most of the imaging problem and properly phase aligning the drivers would make it even better.

Ok, no more projects for me, but theoretically what do you guys think of this idea? Add a killer DIY sub and I bet you'd have a set up that would be difficult to beat.

Take care,

Ed

 

[cubdog]

Did you get a saw for Christmas.

cubdog

 

[GordonW]

The main problem you're likely to run into, is the necessity to totally re-tune the crossover network... possibly turning into a total crosover rebuild, due to the different response the drivers will have in the narrow-baffle cabinet.

There is a phenomenon known as "baffle step"... above a certain frequency (which depends on baffle width... it's the frequency at which the baffle is a half-wavelength of a sound wave wide), the baffle acts as a "wall" around the driver, which increases the SPL level of the output in the forward direction. Below this frequency, the sound waves "wrap around" the cabinet, and the frontal output is "diluted" by the "loss" of the sound waves that "escape" to the rear.

Most speakers are designed with that baffle step response abberation accounted for in the crossover... however, if you CHANGE the baffle width, then you will need to SHIFT the compensation to account for the step frequency being at a DIFFERENT PLACE in the spectrum!

Once that's accounted for, though, I'd definitely think it'll sound better from an imaging standpoint compared to the original layout. It will require some tuning to get it right from a balance standpoint, though, to get to that "better" stage...

Regards,
Gordon.

 

[Duffinator]

Ed, ADS created a speaker similar to what you are talking about in the L1290. So if you are serious about building new cabinets you may want to get the dimensions of the 1290 and use it as a starting point. I just bought some L1090's and my initial impressions are quite favorable with the 1090's having better imaging, tighter bass, and a more balanced sound. But I have not given them a good A/B test and won't be able to do so for a couple of weeks. You should be able to get a copy of the crossover network for the 1290 which might give you a ballpark idea of how to created new crossovers compaing that with the 810's crossover. I believe I have the schematic for the 810 if you need it. If another member does not have the crossover schematic for the 1290 I bet Richard So does.

Good luck!

 

[soundmotor]

Hi All,

I'm on the road with some time on my hands. Not sure I'll be on line a lot, but I've been thinking...

Make them into 1230's.

I'm pretty sure I have the crossover schematic on those......somewhere.

:scratch2:

 

[ron-c]

Just buy a pair of 1290s and sell the 810s. You will be ahead in time and money.

Thanks,
Ron-C

 

[GordonW]

Just buy a pair of 1290s and sell the 810s. You will be ahead in time and money.

Thanks,
Ron-C

Either that, or find a cheap empty pair of 1290 cabinets, preferably with the crossovers. Might happen, on ye old auction site, sometime...

Regards,
Gordon.

 

[thedelihaus]

I find my Boston acoustics A150s image well, even with that big, flat front of them. Better than the L810s.

Now, the reason that the A150s work so well, I feel, is a combination of what Gordon just taught me, and the drivers all centered, and on a vertical plane.

Is the achilles heel of the L810s purely due to the horizontal plane of the tweeter and midrange?

I find my L630s to have improved imaging thn the L810s- the tweeter and midrange are vertically aligned.

Hmm... food for thought.

here's a pic of the L630s, and my A200s, similar to, just larger than the A150s...

 

[Duffinator]

Either that, or find a cheap empty pair of 1290 cabinets, preferably with the crossovers. Might happen, on ye old auction site, sometime...

Regards,
Gordon.

While the mid and tweet might fit the woofers have completely different baskets and mount differently so that may not be as easy of a retrofit as it seems.

 

[thedelihaus]

What about a duplicate cabinet with built in stands, and a re-arranging of the tweeter/mid plane?

 

[spaceman]

It's really a shame they didn't "center" the tweeters & mids on the L810s, or at least make the pair as a mirrored image of one another. I think you're definitely on the right track though, as the tweets & mids are the strong points of the A/D/S lineup. :yes: I have mine in a pair of Jensen cabs with 15" woofers, which had holes for the stock mids & tweets vertically aligned at the factory, so it was a pretty simple operation. They sound great, but it might be in my future to look into upgrading & fine tuning the crossovers. Good luck with your quest.

 

[MTY]

I agree with ron-c. L1290's or L1090's or L1590's would be the logical progression.

Mike

 

[Fast_Eddie]

Thank you guys,

I'm at Mom's for a few minutes and she was good enough to let me use her dial up connection to check in.

Gordon, I've heard people talke about the baffle step but this is the first time I've understood what it ment. Thanks for the clear explanation. Gives me some good DIY ideas.

Thedelihaus, I thought of my old Boston A150s when I read Gordon's post. Myabe build a cabinet exactly like the L810 cabinet for the woofers, or simply use the L810 cabinet and build a second for the mid and tweeter.

Soundmotor, I'll look into 1230s when I get back home. What are they selling for lately? With the prices L810s are getting it might be a relatively painless swap.

Anyone have any guess why a/d/s didn't just line the drivers up in a more conventional lay out? Seems an odd decision to me.

Take care,

Ed

 

[soundmotor]

Soundmotor, I'll look into 1230s when I get back home. What are they selling for lately? With the prices L810s are getting it might be a relatively painless swap.

Anyone have any guess why a/d/s didn't just line the drivers up in a more conventional lay out? Seems an odd decision to me.

Take care,

Ed

I don't think you are going to find a set of L1230 cabs but who knows? They really weren't all that as far as construction goes anyway. The more I think about it, the more I'd build my own better set. I am really starting to like that idea. Build an ADS "What if" with a single 10" down low to floor-couple for the bass cab and hotrodded SAT5 guts up top on the angled side baffle. Yes, I know that isn't even remotely close to what you are talking about......

:scratch2:

My guess on the L810 driver arrangement was to keep the height dimensions in-keeping with typical bookshelf speakers on the market at the time.