Can I install passive radiators into a speaker box with regular full-range speakers?

[painttoad]

Smaller midbass drivers work very well in a largish box with a passive radiator.
Look at Polk speakers like the Monitor 5jr, 7, 10, etc. I have a pair of monitor 10's with two small midbass drivers and a large passive in a big box. Bass digs down into the high 20hz range. I also have a pair of the smaller 5jr's that sound pretty good with a single 5 1/2" midbass driver and a passive radiator. The 7's use a single small midbass driver also with a larger box and passive radiator and sound very good.
Here is a picture of the 10's.

my bro had the 5jrs and the rta12s. i could have had those speakers cheap but i just don't have 250wpc to spare.

 

[painttoad]

Nice. I think I would give myself a headache trying to figure out a passive design.

bassbox 6 makes it pretty easy actually.

 

[Lavane]

my bro had the 5jrs and the rta12s. i could have had those speakers cheap but i just don't have 250wpc to spare.

The RTA's are nice. So are the Montor 11's.
The two midbass drivers are tuned differently to fix the slight combing effect of the 10's.
The 10's I have are rated for over 200 watts.
But they sound good with any of my SS or tube amps from 30wpc to 125wpc. I do have a couple Crown pro amps that can be bridged for 500 watts into 8 ohms.
I tried one in two channel mode for 275wpc and it did push the Polks nicely.

 

[Mohammad Ali]

Thank you for the replies everyone. I think it's safe to say it's a risky endeavour so I've decided against it.

 

[jazzmans]

My .02c... I really like PR speakers.

I've still got a pair of Infinity RS525 that I bought new back in 1993, I'll never understand why they didn't put an EMIT tweeter on it instead of the polysphere tweeter, because it's got such a great punchy bass/midrange.

But, you gotta maths to get a PR right, and it's slightly more expensive then a ported or sealed design.

Paradigm used PRs, Klipsch did with the chorus line, etc etc. I like PRs. To my ears, when done right, they get the best of both worlds, sealed, and ported.

 

[Lavane]

My .02c... I really like PR speakers.

I've still got a pair of Infinity RS525 that I bought new back in 1993, I'll never understand why they didn't put an EMIT tweeter on it instead of the polysphere tweeter, because it's got such a great punchy bass/midrange.

But, you gotta maths to get a PR right, and it's slightly more expensive then a ported or sealed design.

Paradigm used PRs, Klipsch did with the chorus line, etc etc. I like PRs. To my ears, when done right, they get the best of both worlds, sealed, and ported.

I tend to prefere a passive over a port myself.
But that's been a fairly recent thing for me.
I've always preferred a ported speaker over sealed designs for the most part, but once I bought a pair if speakers with passive radiators I noticed a few things I was missing with ported designs. Like better impact and a more controlled, tighter bass response.
There are a few pros and cons to both designs, but over all passive radiators sound better to me.