Curious_George

I read the town somewhere recently, can't remember, but China though. They are not rebranded Shuguang either.

I don't think MDF or any type of wood is absorbing reflected sound waves. The sound waves will bounce around and eventually make it outside of the speaker enclosure through a speaker cone or by vibrating a panel (in other words; bounce around until they are attenuated so low they are not effecting anything). Absorbtion and attenuation are totally different things.

Every HiFi speaker I have even taken apart or looked inside (regardless of type: transmission line, sealed, reflex, horn, horn/reflex) had some type absorbtion material inside it to reduce reflected waves, except a Heresy and LaScala. I've never seen inside or taken apart a k-horn.

It is funny how ideas and perceptions change isn't it?

Hopefully, recent events will convince Americans that we need to be self-sufficient and produce everything we need domestically. Yes, prices would be higher, but I’d support that.

I’ve been collecting (hoarding as my wife says) tubes for 26 years. I’m good for the foreseeable future.

Yep, PP definitely should have a low impedance power supply. I know you don't care for the Ultra-Linear amp config, but my pair of Williamson clone mono-blocks use SS rectification and they have a very solid bottom-end.

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Of the three ways to attenuate (standard rotary l-pad, l-pad made from 2 discrete resistors or autoformer), I prefer the autoformer or discrete solution, until the design is finalized or it is a loudspeaker I am going to constantly tinker with. Why? The autoformer allows you precise steps and you can easily set the two channels at the same level. Same with a 2 resistor l-pad. The rotary l-pad has no detents or references and it is difficult to set each channel to the same level unless you take a lot of time and make measurements and reference marks on a faceplate or such. Those marks may not be too precise either.

If the brand of capacitor is not known, it could be a crummy Chinese cap. I'm not openly disparaging the Chinese, but they are well known to release inferior products that do not last, especially capacitors.

An audio question seldom gets an easy “yes or no” answer.

Yep, Cathode Stripping, biggest urban myth there ever was and people are still defending it today on the Internet. It's like my other favorite urban myth, putting a vehicle lead-acid battery on your concrete garage floor. A lot of people believe there is some mystical property in the concrete that will suck all the energy out of that battery. However, if you put the battery on a 2x4 propped up off the floor, the battery will not get drained.

What is an expert? Someone who knows one more thing than you! I used to have an associate say that all the time. It was funny in most business circumstances.

I concur. I was just relating my observations.

I've heard yes and no. I would personally like to A/B WE 300B's with a good alternate brand, but I have not had the opportunity. Judging from what I have heard in the past 40 years when comparing amps, tubes, topologies, etc. I'd be surprised that a real WE 300B is that much better than a good alternative. New modern 2A3's blow away old RCA 2A3's that are selling for stupid money. I have heard the difference with these tubes, which is why I can't believe the 300B would be much different. But hey, I'm just telling you what my ears hear and I am far from deaf.

I have used the 1N series forever for audio projects and never had any issues. I compared 4007's to the fast recovery in an audio circuit and there was no difference in listening or measuements. Perhaps in some "audio" circuits people actually had an improvement (measureable) noise wise, but I have not.

Ironically, Crites uses them in a lot of stuff. Crazy money for distortion generators!

It doesn’t look like those RCA’s and speaker wire are doing any justice to the Mc equipment. However, great find!

If you are very happy with the LaScala's, my advice would be to get a nice subwoofer to compliment them. The new k-horn is nice, but they are going to sound entirely different than what you have setup now. And the cost to upgrade is significant. If you are not happy with the results down the road, that would be a lot of money to burn. Of course try and listen to the k-horns in a nice audio salon first and make sure they are want you need / want.

Yes, it is. However, the short part of the horn that has been enclosed is still fairly short and to realize full performance, you would still need to have the k-horn close coupled to a wall length. It would be nice to see perfect and less than perfect frequency response graphs of the new speaker in various room configurations.

Those K-Horns in that picture were staged for marketing. A close coupled corner is still needed and would yieled the best sound.

I hate drilling too, but I hate paying money out for something as mundane as drilling. I just take it slow and turn my brain off and before I know it, it is done.

I've been using a punch set for about 20 years. At first, the set may seem expensive, but the final cosmetic results will be worth the price of admission. It makes perfectly round holes and zero burrs. I also use a "Unibit" for other small holes typically 3/4" and less. The punch set has worked well with just about all tube sockets, but you do have to be selective of the socket(s). A little creative thinking will usually get you past any roadblocks you encounter with the tube socket hole being the correct size.

The piece of equipment clearly states it was designed for Allison Speaker systems, not LaScala’s. You can experiment, as you indicated, but the LaScala will not benefit from that low of boost. Try it and report back what you observed.