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improving bass on Cornwall II ?

Yes, I think that the Dynaudios appearing to have more bass even though they're only rated down to 48Hz, is a clue. There must be something up with the wiring or crossovers in the Cornwalls.

Thanks again, everyone, for the input. I will get around to dismantling them at some point: many projects on the go atm
 
Place them in a corner and then move them in an out on a line bisecting the corner angle. We could get Cornwall I & II to reach 32 HZ that way.
Not Real strong 32 but it was adequate for most recordings. Of course my Concert Grands and Line arrays reach a lot further down and that does make a big difference. Of course you can't have a noisy rim drive turntable in your system either. I guess if you want to reach 20 HZ and want Klipsch I am sure you can get a discount on a pair of Jubilees. JBL makes some dual 18 inch subs you could add that are flat to 20 HZ, but you will need 6 db more power to make up the the efficiency differences. If you were using 50 watts for each corn wall then you would need, , 400 watts for the subs. But they are rated at close to 1000 watts so no big deal.
 

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Yeah, my first thought is the room is absorbing the bass from the Cornwalls. I have Cornwall 1s and the bass, where appropriate digs deep down so that you feel it in your chest. My wife and step-daughter couldn't help themselves once because BTO Not Fragile came on the radio, and that was impressive. It got even better when I pulled out the album. I'm using a McIntosh MC2205 to drive them.
 
Have you entertained the notion of trying a pair of Crites woofers in your Cornwalls?

I found them to be night and day lower. Instantly noticeable.

I tried the Kappa 15Cs as well, because I had them already, and preferred them over the K-33s in the Cornwalls as well as the La Scalas I bought them for.
 
Thanks for the suggestion!

Step 1 will be checking out/rebuilding the crossovers. They may not have been rebuilt, or there may be wiring errors. I have a bunch of other stuff on the go though, so it'll have to wait.
 
geoff.27 said:
Have you entertained the notion of trying a pair of Crites woofers in your Cornwalls?

I found them to be night and day lower. Instantly noticeable.

I tried the Kappa 15Cs as well, because I had them already, and preferred them over the K-33s in the Cornwalls as well as the La Scalas I bought them for.
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Which Cornwall network?
 
geoff.27 said:
Have you entertained the notion of trying a pair of Crites woofers in your Cornwalls?

I found them to be night and day lower. Instantly noticeable.

I tried the Kappa 15Cs as well, because I had them already, and preferred them over the K-33s in the Cornwalls as well as the La Scalas I bought them for.
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I really liked the Crites stamped woofer (1526) in the Cornwall, so much so that I did all six of my Cornwall Is using those woofers.

HOWEVER - a note/warning on the Eminence Kappa 15C as that does NOT have sufficient xmax for use in a Cornwall. It works well in a horn loaded cab like the LaScala/Belle/Klipschorn because the horn loading makes for much more consistent pressure on both sides of the woofer within the horn - you can crank the bejeezus out of that woofer in horn loaded cab and it barely moves. In a ported speaker at high volume it's probably going to exceed its xmax, which is shorter than on a K33 or 1526. In addition, the Eminence Kappa 15C needs to be installed into that horn with an extra gasket layer so that the woofer's edge does not make contact with the edge of the opening where the woofer mounts. I have an Eminence Kappa 15C in my Belle Klipsch and it works really well, BUT with those caveats.
 
Audible Nectar said:
I really liked the Crites stamped woofer (1526) in the Cornwall, so much so that I did all six of my Cornwall Is using those woofers.

HOWEVER - a note/warning on the Eminence Kappa 15C as that does NOT have sufficient xmax for use in a Cornwall. It works well in a horn loaded cab like the LaScala/Belle/Klipschorn because the horn loading makes for much more consistent pressure on both sides of the woofer within the horn - you can crank the bejeezus out of that woofer in horn loaded cab and it barely moves. In a ported speaker at high volume it's probably going to exceed its xmax, which is shorter than on a K33 or 1526. In addition, the Eminence Kappa 15C needs to be installed into that horn with an extra gasket layer so that the woofer's edge does not make contact with the edge of the opening where the woofer mounts. I have an Eminence Kappa 15C in my Belle Klipsch and it works really well, BUT with those caveats.
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Since I was the first to "discover" the Eminence Kappa 15C about 14 years ago, I ONLY recommended it for LaScala or Belle Klipsch an none of the other Klipsch speakers. You get the extra 4 db output at 400 Hz. which really gives new life to female vocals, sax, guitar, etc. After all PWK said "the midrange is where we live!" I would add the Midbass into that saying also. If you want low end extension, even a cheap subwoofer from Parts Express will do the job just fine if set up right.

The Xmax restriction is just another part of the equation in a Cornwall, along with the fact that the Cornwall box AND the Port are both WRONG for that woofer and the Crites has the same specs as the Original K33 it was designed for. The very best of the two Crites woofers, is the Cheaper, stamped frame one, which simulates better than the cast framed one in my Cornwall cab model. Ignore these facts at your own risk.

As to the gasket thing, it's a waste of time, since the excursion at 120 db output in Khorn, LaScala, and Belle is never more that 1.5 mm at that output. The gasket only becomes necessary when someone add too much bass boost to try and get things flat to 40 Hz. After all, a Belle of LS stop behaving like horns below 100 Hz. anyhow, so why push it to high distortion or damage level when a sub will solve the problem much better?
 
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ClaudeJ1 said:
The Xmax restriction is just another part of the equation in a Cornwall, along with the fact that the Cornwall box AND the Port are both WRONG for that woofer. The very best of the two Crites woofers, is the Cheaper, stamped frame one, which simulates better than the cast framed one in my Cornwall cabs
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You can go "outside the box" (pun intended) with your woofer choices from other brands, but they will, at the very least, require a retuning of the port to work optimally. I helped a guy from Europe retune his Cornwall port by adding one piece of lumber to tune it lower for an Acoustic Elegance TD15M (about $1,000/pair) woofer which is superior to Klipsch K33 or both Crites in every way, but diminishing returns kick in while "bang for the buck" is lost.
 
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What are you powering the CW's with?
and how efficient are the other speakers you are hearing more low end with?

I have always used a sub to integrate with speakers, whether my CW's, or Polk & Elac towers with bass down to 30-35hz.

Room, placement, treatment etc (like someone mentioned before) is huge as it relates to frq resp in the listening position.

I have the IV's and they are great, but they are not full range (below 40hz is not there)
 
You have to remember except for Violin and Pipe Organ most of the fundamentals of music are below 1000 Hz OK I'll conceed, 2000 HZ. And most music acoustical in nature is built from the bottom up and not from the top down or from the middle out both directions. So with Klipsch Cornwall speakers the woofers have to do a lot of work if they are crossed near 700 Hz. So asking a 15 inch woofer to reach that high then wanting it to reach 30 Hz is a strenuous challenge at best. My stereo speakers the woofers only have to reach 250 HZ crossover point. So them reaching 20 HZ is more doable. The poor mids have to extend from 250 to 2500 HZ, and the tweeters only to 18,000 HZ because I can't hear anything above 17,000 HZ any more. Yes, I will admit I need 6 db more power due to less efficiency, but the speakers produce down to and below 20 HZ quite easily. So while you are listening at a one watt I maybe listening at 4 watts at 15 feet. Though I prefer 6 to 12 watts. It gets really loud playing 10 db louder than that for me. 100 to 104 db is about it for me any more.
 
If you have your "poor mids" down to 250 Hz. you must be using a really big horn with a really big driver, or a direct radiator to get that low of a crossover. Either way, it's not a Klipsch Cornwall. When I spoke to Gary Gillum, Klipsch's former Chief Engineer (long retired) about 14 years ago, he thought that using the same horn as the Heresy in a Cornwall (700 Hz.) was a crazy move. I suspect it was driven by corporate bean counters if they sold off the tools. Since then, Bob (RIP) and Michael Crites (son) purchased the molds for the K-400 (Khorn, LaScala) and the K-600 (Cornwall). The K-600, with Crites name on it, was selling well in Japan, according to the last conversation I had with Bob a few years back before he passed.
 
I am curious, what was the timeline of Klipsch's loudspeaker development? I went to wiki but it only had info on the Klipschorn. Was the Heresy before the Cornwall?

Thx!
 
You will have to excuse me I thought everyone new about my story with Klipsch. My room mate in college Had Cornwalls. Which were great for college parties we had in our Man cave back in the 60's. Not liking big horns on the La Scala and Corner horn and as there wasn't such a thing as voicing of speakers yet I had traded my Carmel Altecs in on a pair of Bozak Symphonies which I built from kits. When I wanted to extend the bass lower Klipsch didn't offer anything at the time in 68 and I still didn't like the horn sound so I purchased a pair of Concert Grands and Bi amped , lowering the crossover to 250 hz and adding Celestion super tweeters as Bozak tweeters start rolling off 12 Khz. When Mc came out with speakers in 69 and 70 I had to admit the bass was a bit better but because the mid range was on the floor and the tweeters were barely 25 inches off the ground and were point source speakers I stuck with my Concert Grands. Starting in 70 I was working part time for a sound company along with a radio station doing remote recordings After school and office job I detested I went to work for the Sound company doing out of town designs and installs and transferred to the professional department. So I Installed a lot of Klipsch in homes and commercially in clubs, churches and small discos. When Line arrays came Along it was all JBL, Renkus Heinz with a little EV. Working for a sound company let me audition a lot of different equipment. And even though horn speakers are not my thing Klipsch Cornwalls voiced properly are very enjoyable except for the bass below 100 H or so. Kind of soft and mushy. But then ported and horn loaded speakers tend to all be that way. I retired full time in 04 but did consulting work till 08 . As we use to travel 240 two 270 days a year starting in 04 updating the stereo was put on hold. We found a HT electronics we liked in 08 so the Concert grands were supplemented with low boy symphonies and B-313's for an all Bozak HT system and the rear channel Hersey were sold to a church for Choir room system. Leaving no amps or speakers to update the Stereo. Having sold and installed Bozak with the line array of tweeters and liking the Mcintosh line arrays two years ago I completed the stereo system. I purchased some pre-owned XRT 28's Mcintosh line arrays and some larger amps and a room Equalizer. Being highly directional in vertical plane the line arrays have a bit to forward sound. So the EQ was necessary to voice the area from 800 to 2500 hz. Because the room is not symmetrical the left channel filters had to be used to touch the bass response to match the already very flat right channel. I don't like an overly bright sound so the region from 9 Khz to 18 KHz was toned down just a bit. If I sit in my listen chair facing south ward I am the ideal position for the 7.0 HT system. Then if I rotate the recliner to the west I am in the perfect position for the Stereo system, which is all Mcintosh, The HT system is all Mcintosh , too. Line arrays give the definition of a horn system whether your sit or stand while keep ing the important sound s above 250 hz off the side walls floor and ceiling. All speakers need help from the room to get best bass performance. What I like about line array even more is they don't have predominant horn sound from manufacturers crossing the midrange horn an average octave lower than they should and the discontinuity of going from a ported woofer to a directional horn. Thats why I want to hear the Jubilee with its low crossover point and time corrected arrival times for the bass horn and HF horn. The idea of using two 12 in woofers in a tuned ported box feeding the large horn is a very clever way of getting the bottom octave or two other Klipsch Heritage speakers cannot reach! IMG_2485.jpg DSN_1544.JPG
 
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twiiii said:
You will have to excuse me I thought everyone new about my story with Klipsch.
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You mean, your story with Bozak, not Klipsch. As off tangent as possible on a Klipsch Cornwall OP.
twiiii said:
But then ported and horn loaded speakers tend to all be that way.
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Yeah, sure, a valid opinion still looking for factual backup. The $750,000 Wilson Audio Chronosonics use ALL 6 of Ported drivers (tweeters sealed), which would relegate your comment to just "another invalid opinion."
While I find your story interesting, and your opinion as valid as any other, I see zero relevance in helping the OP with all of your texts. Opinion based of factual observation and identification. But who cares as long as your stuff sounds good to YOU.
 
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Thats why I much prefer Magico loudspeakers over Wilson.

But back to Klipsch they do what the do very well at a relative moderate price compared to other brands of speakers. There are very very few speakers that can produce 110 db at your listening position with out requiring you to brake the bank for the speakers and necessary very large power amps. Cornwalls are a definite bargain even at todays prices. If I were starting all over with a budget the first speaker I would choose in some of the earlier Cornwall type I. Then a Nice Integrated NAD with a DAC if available with a Sony universal player and Thorens TD 125 TT with SME arm. There isn't really anything else out there to compare at pre-owned prices. My first accessory would be a good room EQ. That why I support folks who own or want to own Klipsch. When I heard the new Cornwall IV driven by a Mcintosh MA 252 integrated amp with tubes it was like finding an old friend that had been fully restored and updated and was to be admired and cherished all over again as I did my roommates Cornwalls in the 60's. The dynamics created by those Cornwalls at 18 ft or so with a 50 watts would compress your chest if you wanted like no other speaker for the price and giving that kind of quality. My Altecs, Fraziers, Bozaks, etc never could. Now the line arrays can and do much more, but now we are talking big bucks, room equalizers, and big amplifiers. So that isn't a fair comparison. So Klipsch owners don't despair or get your feathers ruffled because I support you fully in choosing Klipsch.
 
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