USparc
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M00n,
I used cat5 ftp wire. Why?? It is cheap and has good qualities. I use braided cat 5 ftp(shielded utp) for connecting the speakers to the amp. You can see them in the background of the RF3reloaded.jpg . The braiding consists of 3 ftp cables. So in total I have individual 24(8x3) wires. The 12 colored ones are for + , the 12 white are for -. I have them biwired (In total 6 ftp cables to one speaker) It has almost the same construction as a kimber 4TC cable and is shielded. It also performs like a kimber cable at 1/40 of the price. Very dynamic and natural.
I actually posted a while ago about my rewiring. So since I use it also outside the speaker it was obvious to use it also as internal wiring.
Besides, why did klipsch upgrade the RF-3II with monster cable. The originals have just standard electrical wires (Rei Hsing AWM1007).
Sunnysal,
I dont dismiss the comments made by others. It is very obvious I changed the speaker. The internal volume is a little changed (even not to mention in such a large volume) , the dampening material, the wires, . I did this all for the better and it is. Klipsch designed the RF-3 in a certain budget. If you remove the drivers of an original RF-3 you will notice that what you find inside is far from perfect. The original foam is almost thrown inside, differs among RF-3s and is not fixed. It is even differently placed among the RF-3s. The wires of each driver are running like spaghetti.
Some RF-3s are missing bracings on the sides where two panels are joined (my Rear RF-3s). Oeps different volume!!??
Jef already indicated that the volume is calculated to work together with the port. That port is heavily depended on the room response. I think that this one overrules the almost neglectable internal change in volume. Besides you can even try to alter the volume of your speaker by bringing a bag of sand in it to improve the room response. So dont think it is al perfect when a speaker is placed in a room. There is still a lot of tweaking to have a good room response.
A speaker with a vibrating enclosure will do more harm to the room response than changing the internal volume a little.
But Hey, I am happy that an already good sounding (probably due to the drivers) speaker in its price range can be lift up to another class with some good tweaks. I think that this can also not be dismissed.
Anyway, Thanks for the replies so far.
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Ok, here is it for everyone.
Material used :
1 MDF panel of 122cm x 61cm 12mm thickness.
polyurethane construction glue.
eggshell foam of 30mm thickness.
There are 3 horizontal and 3 vertical panels.
The horizontal panels are 18cm x 32.5 cm. The panels can be inserted in the cabinet via the woofer holes. They are as wide as the inner wideness of the cabinet.
There are many holes drilled in to the panels to let the air pass through. The first two panels are placed just above and under the first woofer.
The 3th panel is placed a little further then the bottom of the second woofer.
These panels are connected with the vertical panels in different depths.
The first vertical panel is at depth 12cm, the second at 20 and the third at 15 cm.
Just see that the drivers can be placed back!!
The length is defined by the placement of the horizontal panels. They are also 18cm wide.
I will not give detailed figures because it depends from speaker to speaker. The only brace in the original RF-3 cabinet is differently placed among the RF-3s. Because of this you will have to change the placement of some panels. You have to build around the original brace panel. This can be very hard, but it is possible.
The panels are glued step by step with polyurethane construction glue with the help of supporting braces. Don't forget to cut and place the eggshell foam in the different chambers on the inner side of the cabinet. Some places are hard to reach when some panels are glued. Those supporting braces are cut out of the same MDF panel.
Be careful with polyurethane. It glues everything in matter of minutes and is very strong. I want to say that ones glued there is no step back.
Happy tweaking
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Can you see the woofers woof realy hard. They should move in a 8mm range -4/+4.
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Ok, That is about the size of my room (13x21). You are talking in feet I hope, not in meters. I don't think you have to worry about blowing them.
Besides, a clipping receiver can do more harm to the horn then your amps running clean power. Unless you want soundpressures of over 120dB.
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The dvd-player downsamples on the digital output. There is probably some setting in the dvd-player that sets the output format for the digital out: PCM or the 96khz signal. Some receivers can't handle the 96khz.
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I dont think the RF3IIs are fused. The Rf-3 s definitely not.
But blowing them? Now I have to ask. How big is your listening area ?
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Ahm, The volume dial are normaly in db. It is a relative number.
You can calibrate your receiver at 0db to produce 75db pink noise to set the THX reference volume. I had to set the 75db pink noise to -10db on the receiver because the correction doesn't go that far to reach the 0. (Actually it does but the correction is set at the max of -10db)
The watts that your receiver is using to drive the speaker at a certain soundpressure depends on the sensitivity of the speakers itself. In case of RF-3's 98db/1W. The volume dial just gives you the added soundpressure relative to the reference. If you set the volume 3db higher on the receiver (-20 to -17) the amps have to dubbel the wattage. It follows a logaritmic curve.
Starting from the sensitivity of 98db/W we can find the needed power.
98db - 1W
103db - 2W
106db - 4W
109db - 8W
112db - 16W
115db - 32W
118db - 64W
121db - 128W
124db - 256W
As you know that THX specify that a system must handle 105dB with peaks of +10db
(115dB), klipsch RF-3's have enough with 64W.
So the wattage dubbels each time you add 3 db on your receiver.
If you have an SPL meter set 1 m in front of the RF-3 and measure 98dB.
You know at what setting the receiver sends 1W to the speaker.
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Yep, some people dont get it.
The cabinet design and construction directly affects sound quality, especially overall clarity. The materials determine how free the cabinet is from unwanted resonance. MDF (medium density fiber board) is preferred because of its high density, the thicker the better. This is particularly critical on the front baffle where the drive units are mounted. Internal bracing also plays a vital role in controlling resonance, smoothing out midrange response and reducing box coloration. The sound is generated by the drivers, not coloured by the cabinet. All high end speaker designers are trying to achieve this!
Besides, what is the function of the cabinet:
When a speaker moves forward, air in front of the cone is compressed. At the same time, air in back of the cone is rarefied (stretched). If there is a pathway for the compressed air to get behind the cone, it will do so. This process reduces the amplitude of the soundwave. It is therefore necessary to use some type of enclosure, in order to keep the soundwaves from cancelling each other out. That is the task a cabinet has and certainly not to produce sound.
Hey, I just try to improve things. This is definitely the way to go.
More power or/and larger woofers in a larger unbraced and therefore not rigid enclosure will result in even more cabinet coloration. The cabinet sound will be smeared all over the place which compromise clarity and detail in the sound.
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No, I didn't. Mail should be arrived by now.
Happy tweaking.
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Easylistener,
Yes, the bass (if there is) can hit me (really hard and tight). With some records (with really low frequencies) I can feel the bass right under my sofa (listening position) going through my chest. I was nailed to the ground when I first listen to my new RF-3s. There is no comparison to make with the original RF-3 not even with the RF-7 for that matter.
You are questioning if the RF-3 are braced. Yes, they are. There is just only one brace in the middle connecting the side panels. Nothing more. Take a look at the RF3orignal.jpg picture under odds and mods. You can see that brace just at the top of the second woofer.
If you have the chance to listen to more expensive speakers like the B&W nautilus or Sonus Fabers or maybe the heritage of klipsch ( didnt hear them up till now) you will know just as I did. But those are very very expensive like the klipschorn.
Mmm, svs. You use a sub. Well I have the KSW-12. Good for HT, less for music.
My RF-3s will blow away that sub. By the way, a sub is very difficult to integrate into a stereo setup unless you use it as a discrete channel as for ac-3 (dolby digital).
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Hey dougdrake,
I was originally involved a few years back in the FTTH project at alcatel. Fortunately it was stopped. Probably to soon. To much copper under the ground and too few fibers.
Solution: ADSL or VDSL.
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No No, I didnt say that I dont like the NADs. They can be even better than my pioneer.
Probably they are in case of difficult speakers.
Yep, but expensive amps like sunfire, Krell, must boost a lot of power that is clean to drive large and difficult speakers that are in a larger room. I think that such an amp would be overkill for the RF-3s. For a B&W nautilus 800 it is a different story. The drivers in that speaker are very difficult to control, specially the woofer which has a lot of phase shift. Most amplifiers will break turning the volume with such a phase shift. There are many 3D graphs in magazines showing the voltage output in function of the load and phase shift at a specific frequency. Those graph should be flat. Before I purchased my pioneer I looked at such a graph and it was as near as flat. Sure there are better amps. I dont see my pioneer drive a nautilus 800. LOL
But still the speaker should be of the same class.
(I auditioned the RF-7 at my local dealer. They were each connected to sunfires. Dont know the model. Well, the RF-7 are not bad at all, but I could here the cabinet vibrating. This definitely alters the sound impression of the recording. The bass (it was a recording with deep bass) is very boomy. The sound was smeared around due to the panel vibration which results in a less localisation of the instruments.)
There are other factors as well. The speaker wire is certainly very important. It can ruin the damping factor resulting that bass and mid are out of control.
Maybe I will try a separate amp (rotel RMB-1095 or the 2 channel versions).
I like my system simple though. Because the more equipment the more problems like ground loops causing humm, connection problems, .
About the bracing.
No panels removed and no nails used.
The woofer hole in the front panel is just as wide as the inner cabinet wideness.
So each panel could easily go through the woofer hole. It was indeed a puzzle to get all the panels in place. All the panels (in total 6) are glued together with high quality polyurethane construction glue with the support of fine braces on each side of the panels.
Very solid. I could lift the hole speaker by just holding one of the panels.
So you can not see any difference with an original RF-3 on the outside. Only when you lift one or let them play you will notice the difference.
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Frzninvt,
If klipsch done this with the RF-3 it wouldnt cost 600euro but over 2000euro each.
Bracing a cabinet is not easy for commercial speakers. It takes time and can not be easily automated. It involves a lot of hand work to do this and that is very pricy.
What if I tell you that RF-3s are not equally braced. The placement of the only brace (along the side panels) can vary in height quiet a lot. I have 4 RF-3s. 2 of them have consecutive serial numbers where the difference is minimal. But the other 2 .
The bracing and foam has a minimal impact. Besides it is an open enclosure.
The foam is only used for eliminating standing waves inside the cabinet and does not eat up air volume. Moreover the original foam is not that good. The RF-3II might be better. You see, klipsch tries to improve things but is limited because of the price tag of the RF-3.
The cabinet of a speaker is the most important. It should be very solid so no vibration of the panels can occur otherwise the frequency response of the speaker is totally influenced. The cabinet must be DEATH --> kill the vibration please!!!
I say: If it ain't broke, fix it anyway.
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LOL
You are really funny.
Do you all really think I have a fiber link to have access to the internet.
I have cable --> coax cable.
I mean that my pc is connected to my pioneer with a 10m fiber link for the sound.
My motherboard has an optical out (ABIT BE-7RAID)
"Don't confuse the simple digital optical links used in DVD and Home Theatre with the optical fiber systems used in the Internet. They are very different technology implementations. "
Indeed they are!!!
Im in the DSL business -> Alcatel!!!
ADSL or VDSL are solutions to use the mass copper under the ground for broadband access. All those ADSL and VDSL connection are multiplexed on to a fiber link.
Over a few years you will get the fiber directly to the home. What do you think of a 155Mbps link!!
To go back to the topic.
There are for both pros an cons. It depends all on the quality of the connections itself for fiber and shielding for coax and how they are used.
Just listen and decide for yourself.
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Well the braces are glued with high quality polyurethane construction glue, no nails and a lot stronger!!
For tight strong bass you need a good braced cabinet. You will hear this also even at low volumes.
Also to me they were always a little lacking in the mid and lows. (Specialy when hearing B&W nautilus 803 and Sonus Faber Guarneri) But now they are of a different class. (Even higher than the RF-7) Even the highs are more accurate and very revealing. This is has something to do with the separate enclosure the horn has now.
Off course you need some powerful amp. But the rated power of the amplifier doesn¡¦t mean anything. An amplifiers output voltage should remain flat in its operating frequency range( 5 -100kHz for the pioneer). Some amps can according to the load and phase shift drop in output voltage. I found denon always to bright with klipsch. (A college changed its denon for a marantz 9200SR to drive his B&W nautilus 803, what a difference in the lows he said)
Onkyo was Ok. Pioneer is even better. Maybe the NAD¡¦s ¡K. º
But still you may throw all the power to a speaker. If it is not braced well the cabinet will vibrate. Some frequencies are absorbed other (unwanted from the cabined) are send into the space.
Hey why bridging. Try to do bi-amping with those NAD¡¦s.
Just enjoy the tweaking.
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I read this http://207.228.230.217/info/NAD_2200.pdf
Impressive though. But there might be more at work here. Cables?? Damping factor
This damping factor can be influenced by the cables.
For the denon lets say the output impedance is 0.08. That is a DF 100 for an 8 ohm speaker.
If you add the cable resistance to the output impedance you get a lower DF. Cable resistance is 0.05 (which is already very low). DF is 61. This has its inpact on the bass and midrange.
Maybe with the NAD bridging this effect is minimized.
I have some doubts about The bass and midrange is so much tighter and defined since my last project with my RF-3s. Read in Odds and Mods the topic Unleash the power of RF3 and RC3. The RF speakers are original not able to produce really tight bass. Moreover a lot of the lower frequencies are absorbed by the panel vibration of the cabinet itself. You can hear sound coming from the cabinet which compromise the overall sound.
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Good thinking.
Same fronts is good for the timber matching.
I do not know about the RC3 as surround, but it is a speaker and think it will do fine.
Maybe look for other RB5's and sell the RC3. You will have a fully matched speaker setup.
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If the connection on both types is good there will be no difference.
The connections of fiber could be less then that of the coax.
Fiber optic is better to separate the components electrical. Like dougdrake said to eliminate humm caused by ground loops.
My dvd-player is coax connected. My pc is fiber optic connected.
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Ehm, 10 foot that is 3.048m
3 foot is 0.9144m
I would suggest leaving that cable intact.
What type of cable is it. If it are fancy cables they should be handling lengths of over 10 foot.
Shortening those cables would not improve a thing if they are really good.
There resistance should be very low.
10 foot cable you can always use, but 3 foot is really short.
It would be a waste I think.
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Nice setup. Moving the speakers forward should indeed improve things.
It depends off course but -11 db would be indeed very loud.
My receiver is calibrated at -10db for THX reference sound pressure.
That is 75db on the pink noise for all channels!!
So is it not possible the speaker is moving something nearby hanging lose??
Try what m00n suggested.
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Take a good look at the difference between RF3original and RF3reloaded pictures. Don't you see the bracing panels with the holes.
There are 3 levels of horizontal bracing panels and 3 levels of vertical bracing panels.
Also for the RC3. In the RC3original picture you can see the bracing panels next to the cabinet of the RC3.
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from the site : http://www.audioquest.com/theory/theory5.html
Biwiring: Many of today's speakers can be biwired. This type of speaker has one input for the woofer and a separate input for the upper frequency ranges. This often leads to the question "is biwiring so important that I should spend twice as much on cable?" Maybe it is worth spending twice as much on cable in general, but that's a separate question. Biwiring is a way to save money, to get higher performance for the same price. The biwiring question is not about how much money to spend, but about how to get the most performance for one's money. Biwiring is done in order to substantially reduce the distortion caused by speaker cable. In a biwire set-up the cable feeding the higher ranges no longer has to handle the large magnetic fields caused by the high current needed to produce bass. The bass fundamentals are not affected by biwiring, but the treble signal now travels a less distorted path. A little like the difference between swimming through waves versus through smooth water. The bass will sound better because bass difinition is in the midrange and higher. It is worthwhile to take advantage of the benefits of biwiring when the speaker manufacturer has gone to the extra expense of including this capability. At the very least, please connect a single set of speaker cables to the treble input, and then use even a modest cable like AQ F-14 to jump down to the woofer. Please replace the jumpers supplied by the speaker manufacturer. These are self sabotage, by the speaker manufacturer and by any listener who uses them. Just like better electronics do not come with poor interconnect cables, it is best to pretend your fine speakers did not come with stamped metal jumpers. When biwiring, the two cables used must either be identical, or have essentially identical designs. If the cables have different inductance or capacitance, they will cause different amounts of phase shift. The integrity and coherence of the speaker will be compromised.
I couldn't more agree.
Another one:
<[ The best theoretical explanation I have come across of this (provided by Hitachi, as I remember, who own the patent for bi-wiring in Japan, when trying to sue Linn). When a current is pushed forward by the amplifier through the voice-coil in the magnetic field of a loudspeaker driver, the voice coil and attached cone move forward - the electric motor effect. However, the voice coil moving in the magnetic field generates a back voltage - the electric generator effect. In a perfect driver, the back voltage matches the forward voltage, giving rise to the driver's dynamic impedance. In the real world, the back emf is distorted by nonlinearities in the magnetic field etc giving rise to harmonic distortions and so does not exactly cancel the forward voltage. These harmonic products from one driver's terminals end up across other drivers in the loudspeaker if they have common terminals and can cause further muddling of the sound. By connecting each driver through separate leads back to the amplifier, the distorted harmonics generated by each driver can be short-circuited by the low impedance output of the amplifier. Whatever the theoretical explanation, bi- and tri-wiring can make a big difference to loudspeakers and can be the most cost effective improvement you make to your system.
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This is also a very nice one.
So we have already eliminated 2 effects.
Conclusion: Just listen you will hear the difference.
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Indeed bridging receivers??? I was also wondering.
clipping lights???
A receiver of the class denon 4802 has plenty of power to drive klipsch.
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What about a Pioneer. In USA the elite ones THX ultra.
My findings where the same when I looked for a receiver.
It was back then a denon or an onkyo. denon to bright indeed. I went with the onkyo(676)
Now it is the Pioneer. Sounds very musical --> MOSFET amplifier.
klipsch speakers don't like agressive amps. It is the same with some denon dvd-players which sound harsh, bright and not musical.
But indeed just listen and judge for yourself. Klipsch speakers are very revealing.
Unleash the power of RF-3 and RC-3
in Technical/Restorations
Posted
prodj101,
Yes, off course there is a lot changed. The soundreproduction of my RF-3 is indeed changed. ( I never said they where still the same) .That was also my intention. Removing the colouration of the cabinet resulting in tighter bass and detailed highs. Hey the case dimension and the drivers are still the same. There is still somewhat left of the RF-3, but you are right. In my place and with my ears they do sound a lot better and can not be compared with my other (rear) original RF-3s.
Besides, klipsch has improved the original RF-3 to an RF-5 with the same woofers. Wel I can do the same. Klipsch doesnt have my room and my ears. It is al trial and error. I will once measure the room response as soon as I have my SPL meter.