Dave A

Got to demonstrate "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" to a guy from Bucksnort TN yesterday. Always funny to watch peoples faces. With music here sometimes the hair stands straight up on your arm or shivers run up and down your spine. One day after I got them dialed in right I was playing Time by Pink Floyd. All of a sudden I look at my arm and all the hair was standing straight up. I look over at my buddy and he was staring at his arm too for the same reason. However I have it from a good source that I do not care about how things really sound.

Yes. Sad but true and iPhones and ear buds are good enough for most.

That's what is funny with your response. I never said this directed towards you but you assumed I meant people like you so therefore the hilarity ensues. How does one get golden ears anyway? Is there a course on this or is it natural ability?

So are you accusing me of being an unattentive listener? I find that very hurtful and triggering. I can go to Audiogon if I want to be treated like this.

Golden ears have more ability then mere mortals can possess.

My main reason for going to Audiogone, way gone that is, is for the priceless satire masquerading as serious thoughts. Seasoned all knowing "audiophiles" lay down the righteous laws of audio only they can fully understand as they leave their price tags discretely displayed on their audio gear. Being a dirt behind the ears kind of dude I have had fun over there at times poking the pretentious with my fine zip cord cable management and Crown XLI trash commercial amps that I so arrogantly claim are worth while. As a bonus you also get people over there who think bags of tumbled Tourmaline affixed to your cables make your setup sound better. I have heard a lot of systems and elect to stay with the right choices of economical gear and build parts of my systems since I can't buy what I want. As crazy as it may sound I have a a fair number of repeat visitors here to listen to the Super MWM's. Zip cords sprawled on the floor and big ugly duratex coated boxes and no fancy electronics except the Xilicas. Hearing is believing though

OK I have more freebie old capacitors if anyone wants them. I also have two KP320 cabinets with no drivers or passives free to a good home. Cabinets are pickup only and no there are no pictures. They will be in the speaker graveyard in the sky next weekend along with the caps if no one claims them. Caps are free plus shipping only or pick them up and come listen to S-MWM's for a while. Always make time for visitors.

No I think it is 3/4" fir plywood under the fiberglass.

Got around to taking pictures today for Craigslist and figured I would post one of the finished slants here. Really clean cabinets and normally I am used to more damage. Oh and they sound nice too!

Rule #1. Klipsch gear is almost never next to you for pickup. Like all things MCM 1900 if you search for a year or two tweeters will show up or you can rig something up.

I have only been asked twice about these and the first time it was not real clear to me what I was dealing with. The second time around is a different story. As we can see there are studs mounted into the motorboard which has an undersized cutout and is thinner to boot at only .5" thick. So this required a rework of the design and machining to first off match the larger hole size needed for the studs. Note the larger outer holes vs the inner. And then the basic depth of the boss that goes through the hole is cut 1/16" smaller left to right and top to bottom and reduced to 1/2" in depth to match the 1/2" plywood used. The basic cavity shape is preserved as the overall depth is not changed. I have the first set going to Italy so it might take a while to confirm all is well with the stud spacing. The problem with older Klipsch speakers like these KHorns is they are hand routed and if the jig or operator is not right on every time then what I have to deal with is a compromise to try and cover as many of the variables as I can. The KHorns and La Scalas are the most variable of all the Klipsch speakers I have tinkered with where tweeter replacement is concerned.

I think that is a great idea and I would love to see a picture of your system too. You mentioned owning some LSI's the other day and i always like pictures of one of my favorite speakers.

I don't know for sure but I suspect changing electrical values as I normally don't have speakers turned up loud enough to vibrate variable L-Pads. It seemed to me that the coils and the arm that went (great techno speak I know but not going to bother to look up correct terms) to them would have a hard time staying put. Always had drift and balance from left to right was also an issue caused by drift. I could fiddle around and really get things sounding good and after starting things up the next day have to do it all over again. I am now firmly in the fixed resistor camp for L-Pads and will only used variable ones for quick down and dirty sound tests from now on. Now saying that I think at times those variable L-Pads are the way to go for easy matching of DB efficiencies as long as people understand you wont get the very best results that way. You still can get better results then not using them in that case. Those variable L-Pads would eventually settle down and remain in place and my complaint was with a really good set of speakers it was not the exact place I wanted it to be. I am still going to recommend the variables for the MAHL tweeters in cases like the Fortes because the db mismatch is fairly large. I never disliked those variables with the Fortes and this problem only reared it's ugly head when I was dealing with a speaker with much better definition then the Forte 1 and 2 which is all I have had to play with.

See you should have sold those to me years ago when I bought those KP-250's from you.

Well I admit to downloading a copy of Hunters emails but it stays on the house PC. No telling what garbage might be on that.

It has all my design data and machining files and I avoid problems by just staying offline with it. I have not had malware for years but it never hurts to be safe. There is an added problem in that I stopped maintenance on all my software three years ago. What I have will work just fine as I have permanent licenses as long as I don't upgrade past the ability of my programs to integrate with MS products. Things like SQL server and Excel are powerful tools used by all high end design programs and you can only go so far before an update one day will stop your program from working. I assume the same is also true with machining programs.

Right. So did you even have a look or just bored and looking for goofy things to say?

Today I found out about this program that will hook you up to radio stations around the world of many different genres. Now my shop computer where all the good speakers are fed from is not allowed on line so I have no idea of the quality. I can say though that I tuned into an old timey blue grass station and I just might get another PC that will be allowed on line to feed my shop speakers from. You can also record what you hear.

I have never seen this before and had no idea that Klipsch did this. I guess the oldest Klipsch speaker I have had was some H-700's from the late 70's. OK I forgot that but until I had a picture in front of me today I either did not remember if you sent me a picture or if you just told me that, and I did not have a clear understanding of what you meant. KHorns are a nightmare of variables followed by La Scalas where K-77/EV-35's are concerned. Thanks for the info guys.

Yes indeed larger brings far more authority and presence to the same frequencies.

I have a guy sending me pictures of the tweeter and 1/2" motorboard on a KHorn. It looks like studs or a bolt from the outside going in and 1/4" thread size with the holes in the K-77 flange drilled out larger. Is this how Klipsch did it or has something been done by the owner?

I listen at lower levels now and this is based on using a DB meter not the volume control. And I find more and more long time listeners I know doing the same when this topic comes up. As I succeed in weeding out poor quality recordings it has been my observation that in order to really hear the music with the spatial "like I was there" sound I want I can't turn it up loud. It is like there is a certain point where db level exceeds the ability of my ears and the environment to allow you to hear all there is and then things begin to devolve into what all goes boom boom and the subtle things go away. I still turn some things up when I want percussion to slam me but at that point I am not seeking fidelity anymore.

Can't help you on WAF and your only recourse is to be tough and say you have the rest of the house and I am going to have these and weather the storm. Or sell them off and find something that keep the grumbling down. I suggested the autoformer as a possibility since you had mentioned taps I figured you wanted that solution. Recently I have had to rethink my position on variable L-Pads as they seemed to drift on me and once they found a spot they would stay at it was not the spot that sounded best. And yes .5db is clearly audible so that drift was a big problem. I ended up using a two resistor fixed L-Pad and once the right values were found it sounds really good and does not drift and I don't have left channel right channel gain imbalance. Now the variable L-Pads are much better then nothing but they were not precise like I wanted for this set of speakers.

OK I fall in the SS camp and use a Crown XLI 800. 200 watts per channel not because I need them but because that is what their smallest watt rating amp comes with in this particular line. I never considered nor used a tube amp after reading of all the expense and tinkering that seemed to go with them. That Crown runs $285 now and is dead quiet and plays any genre of music with great fidelity. This is the consensus of the many visitors I have had here and not just my opinion. As an aside here with the minority of my repeat visitors who have said they had cables or tube amps that would sound much better. I have told them to bring it on and they never do. They come back to listen but somehow the miracle stuff never comes back with them. Regarding Chorus 1's. I keep the Crowns set at half output levels. I then use my PC sound card for further adjustment. I rarely go above 50% on the sound card volume and the Chorus speakers are plenty loud at that point.

Crites sells an autoformer with 12 taps in 1db increments that will cover your Klipsch needs.