Marvel

We haven't heard anything lately from the guy who bought the commercial models for his HT. There were some issues with quality that he was trying to get addressed by Klipsch and he was pretty upset that it wasnt' moving. Bruce

Okay, instead of trying to steam out the dents (which is what the staples have done) read the following. I found this on the Lansing Heritage forums (you use methanol and water, and no steaming): To All: In a properly ventilated area, with latex gloves, its soooo easy to swell the veneer. I assumed everyone would have the proper respect for solvents and treat them accordingly. However on the tech side, while yes you have to be careful, I used methanol-water (about 10% water/90% meoh) and light swipes to swell the wood grain prior to sanding this week. It worked so well I lightly swelled all sides, then sanded with various grades of wet/dry sandpaper. It made for a set of beautiful enclosures. It really brought out the burling in my speaker enclosures. If its not your gig, so be it; but I've been a polymer chemist for 27 years; and it worked for me. I have no fear of solvents; as I use them all the time in a GMP environment. You just have to avoid dangerous vapor concentrations/conditions. In a previous life I had used tung oil on my L100's. Here I've had to use "lab blend", which contains a lot of acetone. I can post the mix later. It too with slight added amounts of water can swell the wood easily . However, a "neat" (undiluted) application easily stripped the tung oil and all surface finishes--waxes etc, with a little elbow grease. It quickly dries without damaging the veneer adhesion; literally in a matter of seconds. Prior to solvent re-application, I waited 30 to 45 minutes to avoid any chance of delamination. Here I used gloves specifically recommended for acetone, and did the work in my ventilated garage door up, side door open. The acetone-lab blend when applied removed ~90% of the water stain I had on the top of 1 enclosure, light sanding got the rest. Perfect job on my wife's 20 year old water stain!! While some (on the forum) might recommend against it; it worked beautifully for me. A caveat..my L-100s were in immaculate condition except for minor scratches. They have no veneer damage or lifting after ~32 years. After treatment I sanded with 220/320/ 400/600/0000 steel wool. The L-100s were then smooth and ready for Watco. On the top edges and side edges, I clamped 2" ash stringers (after felt lining the wood surface that went against the box (3M 77). The felt lined surfaces went against the box, and lined up with the top edges. In that way, the sanding block did not creep over the edge and sand (ie round over) the veneer edges. Worked for me; just remember If you're a smoker..not while you've got the solvents out. In writing this post, prior to knocking it; remember the paint removers you've used in the past. Far more nasty; as this doesn't require methylene chloride like they use. BTW, the amount of time per speaker enclosure from swell to sand 220/320/400/600/ 0000 steel wool? <2.5 hours per enclosure to completely scratch free; ready-to-stain. The Watco oil finish will take much longer to get an even, fully saturated application. Great results seen on an enclosure in one evening! ======= Elsewhere in the trhead, guys used this technique on deeper dents as well. Bruce

How much would it cost to ship the HK to N. Georgia? I might take a whack at it.

Gotta love those tweeters in the L222 and L220! Sweet, but that price IS too high. Bruce

thebes, The HK may be a winner. Check this out: http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampstran&1136768989 Bruce

I love it! Different music will compress differently than others. Some will sound great when ripped to MP3 format, and 320kbits almost always gives me good results. But in many respects, I'm not that picky about it. Some might say that you should have used real music to test this with. [] Good orchestral music might be a challenge, as acoustic instruments can be hard to record to begin with, so compressing the audio can be difficult to do well. My thought is if it works for you, enjoy it. It works for me on a lot of material, and depends on where I am listening. Bruce

I'm still not sure I accept the idea, but that's okay. [] Bruce

Below is a post from Pete Fowler, who did the mods on scratch built cabinets. And a pic from another poster who built cabs from scratch (bass bin only, shown on its side with Oris Horn on top). My buddy Thermio and I both scratch built a set of LS bass cabs and he did the djk mod to them. He took measurements on one cabinet as the mods progressed. Here is the data: 200 160 125 100 80 63 50 40 31 25 20 HZ 77 80 79 73 72 78 68 60 61 52 51 dB Stock, mouth braced 76 78 78 73 69 75 65 60 66 56 52 4.5 cuft, no ports 76 78 77 75 74 80 70 60 68 54 54 Two 4"dia 10" ports 76 79 78 76 75 80 71 60 68 54 53 Ports cut to 7" The interesting thing with 10" ports is the boxes went deep, but the snappy, fast horn sound was lost! Cutting the port length to 7" brought the snap and speed back to same as stock, plus the lows remained, esp. at the 31Hz box tuning point. This data is with K33E driver and light stuffing. We think a K43E in this box would be superb, but haven't tried it yet. I'm going to try the mods using two 4" ports with both ends flaired (Thermio used 4" PVC). Flaring is supposed to reduce distortion and possibly increase the gain. Parts Express sells the kits. Neither of us is going back to stock. Pete

Michael, You just need to try it on a pair. It is reversable too. These might wander a bit: http://forums.klipsch.com/idealbb/view.asp?topicID=36054&forumID=68&catID=19&search=1&searchstring=&sessionID={BFBBCFBD-74CC-4815-870C-D89BB808B72B} I just removed two of the old links as they eventually time out. Sorry. You'll have to read through these, but the info from djk is in there. As I recall, the box to place under the LS is ten inches high. The two ports are 4 inches in diameter, 10 inches long. You can get pvc at Home Depot or Lowes, with the 4 inch inside diameter, very cheaply. As djk says, the K43 works the best, the K33 is okay. No one makes a comparable speaker, especially for the money. I will point out that I don't have any LS. Marvel PS Old text from DJK, so read at your own risk: I dearly love K-horns. And for most people they are too much work to build for a 50hz horn.57 trapezoid shaped boards some with compound mitre angles.About two gross of screws and nails on edge sometimes at an angle into 1/2" plywood.A LaScala is 3/4" butt-jointed.The front 'V' can be done with a $20 brad nailer.I have a mod for LaScalas that with the stock K33E woofer will give -3dB at 31hz.With an EV DL15W a -3dB of 28hz is possible and it will be an 8 ohm load for SET fans.With the K33E it will be a C6 with less than 1dB of ripple or with the EV DL15W a maximally flat B6.The mod can be done to a stock Klipsch LaScala with no externally visible changes.I have a tweeter that fits the K77/EV T35 footprint that is +/- 2dB to 20khz instead of -5dB at 17khz.I also have a 2" throat mid driver that has 1/10 the distortion that the 5/8" throat drivers have.Any or all of these changes may be done to a stock unit. The taper rate of a LaScala is 100hz,The mouth area is good for 125hz.Below this it is a big woofer in a small sealed box.If we plug the T/S parameters for the K33E into a box program we will see that the Qtc=.85, the Fc=82.5hz, and the F3=70.9hz . If we close in the back of the high frequency cabinet and open the woofer rear chamber up into this volume and fill with fiberglass we now have Qtc=.577, Fc=58.2hz, F3=73.6hz .Bessel=Qtc.577=D2 gives the best transient response and the least group delay of all the sealed boxes.At 30hz the Qtc=.577 has 4.5dB more output than the Qtc=.85 .Compared with sealed enclosures,the transient performance of the best vented enclosure is worse than the best sealed box enclosure.Since we have made great gains in performance some may elect to stop here.But please read on.The next step is to port it.The K33E is not the optimum woofer for this but it works pretty good.With the box size optimized for a D2 we can port the stock woofer to an SC4.The transient response of an SC4 while not as good as an SBB4(more on this later)is better than the more common QB3.Unequalized the F3=49hz and has 3dB more output at 30hz than the D2.The response curves are parallel with the D2 the only difference being the Fc being a half octave lower with the SC4 and the output being 3dB higher from 30~70hz.The output of the SC4 does not drop lower than the D2 until you go below 17hz.Again this may be a stopping point for some.But by adding a simple two pole high pass filter ahead of the power amp we can now have a C6 with a -3dB point of 31hz.Since this is the Fb of the system there is no increase in cone excursion or distortion.The filter consists of a cap an inductor and a pot.The pot allows adjustment at Fb of +/- 3dB.This is similar to being able to change the Qtc of a sealed box from .5~1.0 .If you think about it we have the choice between a D2,SC4,and a C6 in the same box by plugging the port and/or bypassing the eq.If you have a SET amp or simply want to get the most out of the LaScala you will want to upgrade the woofer to something with a lower Qts.The Klipsch K43E does the trick,as do the EV DL15W and the JBL 2205.The EV and JBL drivers require some minor network changes.The lower Qts drivers allow for an SBB4 alignment which has the best transient response of the vented alignments.With no eq they have 3dB more output at 30hz than the stock woofer.With eq we have a maximally flat B6 and the F3 of the system is 27~28hz.If using a solid state amp with the low Qts woofers a small resistor must be added in series with the driver to have the same Rg as the SET does.This mod can be backed out of a stock LaScala with no externally visible changes if you don't like it.No one has ever gone back to stock after hearing this mod.Paul Klipsch was violently opposed to the venting of horn speakers bassed on his experience with venting the K-horn.In retrospect it is easy to see why.The 12" Jensen field coil woofer he was using had an Fs of 60hz and a quick calculation of the vent area vs the Vb based on the photographs of this experiment looks like an Fb of ~80hz.I am sure this sounded horrible.Paul Wilbur Klipsch is a giant in audio.If I appear to see farther than PWK it is only because I am standing on his shoulders. None of the stock Eminence Delta,Kappa,etc series drivers will work.The K43Es that I have measured has Fs=31hz and Qts=.25,the TS parameters that Klipsch hands out are bogus.The EV DL15W has an Fs=30 and Qts=.23 and the JBL 2205 has an Fs=30 and Qts=.21 .After taking into consideration the dc resistance of the woofer inductor and the output impedance of the amplifier the optimum Qts for the vented LaScala would be .312 with a Vas of 10.5 cu ft and an Fs of 30hz. I'm looking for a total net volume of about 4.8 cu ft. I figure the stock back volume is about 2.25 cu ft. Call it an internal height of about 9" (22.5 X 22.5 X 8.70 = 4404 cu in = 2.55 cu ft). Two 4" ID by 10" long ports displace about .15 cu ft so 10" outside is close enough.

Jeff, It is possible that those staple dents could be steamed out. You need to talk to a wood repair guy someplace, but someone on the JBL forums had dings that he used alcohol on and steamed them to rainse the dents back up. He had pics of the work, but I can't find them now. It was amazing how well it worked. Bruce

JJK, They still look very nice. Here's hoping you won't have to ever do them again. Michael, The kitchen in our last house had the knotty pine paneling. Makes for a very cozy room. Costs a fortune to buy that stuff now. Is that a new pic of your house after you've been cleaning up? [] Bruce

His text indicated a BIN of $375, but it isn't showing. That would be a reasonable price. Bruce

jjk, You have to use the 'file attachment' window on the bottom of the posting page. Browse to your images there, and it will insert them. The insert image points to your hard drive, meaning you can see it but no one else can. Bruce

This is what I sez too!

It has been a great day! The steroids are working wonders for now, keeping the swelling in her brain down. We actually have three kids. The one coming home from school (he's on the shuttle from Nashville as I type this) is the youngest (20). The next is a member here, Invidiosulus (24). The oldest, our daughter (26) is taking off all next week, so she can help ferry the youngest around (can you believe he's 20 and has no drivers license?) and be with her mom. We have great kids. Plans are for getting with some other relatives at Thanksgiving. None of the other treatments were anything that would cause hair loss, but the radiation certainly will. She's ready for it. There are a couple of other things that we might try, but she doesn't want to do any of the harsh treatments and be whacked out from them. Later guys

I know this dates me, but I used to have issue # 1 of Zap Comics. Those were certainly some goofy days in my life. I'm not sure how I survived them. Bruce

Although quite opinionated, the Jon Risch pages give great information on making your own cables, plus a lot of info on different cable types and part numbers. He suggests the twinax cable as well. Only problem is the twinax he recommends is $1.80 /ft from digikey, and that is in a 1000 ft spool. I would have to go into business to do that.[:'(] Bruce http://www.geocities.com/jonrisch/index.htm

Is that supposed to be funny? I know a lot of folks with SS gear listening to their CDs on heritage stuff. And it sounds GREAT! Duke's JBL gear is pretty heritage as well. [] You can ship some of those to me Duke, or the Altec 19s. Those are gorgeous speakers. Bruce

The motorboard is the front of the cabinet the speakers/drivers are attached to. The front would be flush with the sides, and not recessed at all. Bruce

Since Barbara had been Stage I for 4 1/2 years, and had kept up with all the research going on, the sudden leap to Stage IV melanoma was itself a surprise. One checkup to the next, with no indication anything was going on. Since she jumped to Stage IV in July, we knew this day would probably come, and have just done what we could along the way. It doesn't make it any easier, of course. The standard treatment of IL-2 only had a 16 percent chance of being effective. The clinical trial had shown to be more effective, and someone has to try these things. We didn't feel we should just stop trying. The shock is wearing off a bit. She has already outlived her statistical lifespan given what she has. Could we try other experimental drugs? Sure, but at what cost? Emotionally and physically draining, and all of those 'quality of life' issues start coming up. Some of the treaments put your body through hell, and that isn't what we want to do now. There are, of course, all kinds of 'alternative' treatments. Helpful friends have told us of some, but we have tried to keep current and know what really has been effective and what has not proven to be any help at all. Some of those treatments actually have helped some, but they aren't 'the' cure for cancer. Melanoma is a particulary difficult cancer to fight. It, compared to many other cancers, doesn't play by the rules at all. Some do, so you know exactly how to fight it and have a pretty good chance of surviving a long time. As my wife has put it, life is a death sentence. No one gets out alive. Some just have an easier time than others. Our faith is strong, we know in whose hands she rests. This isn't meant to sound fatalistic. It is not in the least. As a good friend on this forum told me, we wouldn't always choose the road we go down, but God has us go down that road to be the person He wants us to be when we get to the end of it. Enough preaching. I love you guys (warts and all!). I am sure that as I spend more time here at home, I will be able to get on here. After all, there is only so much laundry to do and so many dishes to wash. Bruce

Mark and Shawn, I understand about not needing a signal on both legs to get the CMRR, but I'm not sure I get the 30db NR in the unbalanced to balanced just by having the twisted pair (like a low Z mic cable) with the rca end tied to the shield. I'm thinking you could tie the one line to the shield on the XLR end and have it be the same, even if electrically they are. Nice Powerpoint presentation even if it does sell the Jensen products. Bruce

Many of you have been praying and sending good thoughts our way as my wife Barbara has struggled in her fight against melanoma. The first standard treatment wasn't working, so we stopped that. In the six weeks she was on it, she had lesions show up on her spine, in her liver and lungs. Her brain was clear. She was then admitted to a clinical trial, to test a new drug. No placebos, she would be getting something that they hoped would work. Everyone had a surprise this week. On Wednesday, the doctor's staff thought that Barbara was too fatigued to receive her infusion of depsipeptide and they decided she should go ahead and have a CT scan and MRI. The radiologist saw several lesions in the brain. There were too many to do surgery or gamma knife and he recommended to begin whole brain radiation. Barbara was admitted to the hospital on Wednesday night and given a steroid to reduce the swelling in the brain tissue. The steroid showed some improvement on Thursday afternoon and she was released to come home. Whole brain radiation will begin on Monday morning at Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga. Barbara should receive ten radiation treatments over two weeks. The radiation expert at Emory, Dr. Peter Johnstone, said the radiation is not expected to shrink the brain lesions but to cause them to become stable and could provide long term stability. Hair loss is expected but regrowth is possible within three months. Some of the new lesions are quite large, and we know at this point that all we are going to be doing is to make her comfortable for the time she has left. I thought I had been dealing with this pretty well. We have received much support, from family and friends, including you folks here on the Klipsch forum. But I guess I'm not dealing with it very well at all. . Even though we are taking it a day at a time and trying to enjoy what we do have, I also have to make decisions and think about life without the love of my life, the joy of my youth. [;-)] Thirty plus years of good times and hard times. It makes a lot of the petty crap here seem pretty trivial. I just wanted to vent/rant/let go a bit. Got to go. It's a sunny day

Michael, I had a 730 for about a week, gotten for a friend of mine. It seemed to me that the receiver portion was weak on it as well. Everyone says the 430 has great sensitivity, but I didn't see it with the 730 model. Bruce

Mark, If pin 1 (ground) is tied to either pin 2 or 3, is is no longer balanced, because it is the 180 degree phase difference that makes it balanced (along with impedance) and offer noise rejection. If they aren't out of phase, there is no benefit. With one of the signal lines tied to ground it simply becomes an unbalanced. circuit. Bruce btw, that's how Cat5 network cable works. Each pair feeds a + and - input. If it didn't, the fast rise time of the signal (square waves) would shunt to ground due to the capacitance of the cable. Wouldn't get very far through the cable before you had no signal at all. That is the other benefit of balanced lines in audio if going long distances. High impedance audio cables tend to lose the high end over long cable runs.

The m00n is often full of himself. Jeff, One of the priests at my church is French. The sermons always sound like I am listening to Inspector Clouseau. Except the sermons make more sense.[] Bruce