HDBRbuilder

I'm moving to somewhere that I will have room for them to be outta their boxes. That's part of the plan I have...they will then go to my nephew who will soon be in college...but they will actually be custom Heresys. He'll also get an H/K 430 to go with them! After they get beat all to hell while he's is in college, and he gets settled into a job somewhere, THEN I will build much nicer custom boxes for him. 😉...OR it they are just mildly beat up, I will veneer over the damage for him.

JIM, Please find a way to delete all of the argument about materials used from this thread! It has nothing to do with the museum, OK? Thanks! Andy

You're just wasting your time with this troll. And if he actually cared about anything at all other than spouting off stuff, he would never have invaded the MUSEUM section of the Forum with this kinda crap! I sincerely hope that JRH sees to it that all this argument gets deleted from this thread, myself! Then he will have to go spouting off elsewhere!...hopefully, OUTSIDE OF THE MUSEUM SECTION! GEEZ!

One time my kid brother was asking my father about relationship advice. Dad just looked at him and matter-of-factly stated "Sometimes I worry about you, son...and sometimes I get REALLY WORRIED about you...like NOW!" My brother said, "What is THAT supposed to mean?" Dad just calmly told him: "Pay attention to me, son! Don't you know anything? You just asked ME, OF ALL PEOPLE to give you relationship advice! I'm a man who has been divorced twice! The first time I got married it lasted for ten years, but she decided I was not up to her standards anymore, and wanted a divorce. Then I married your mother...that marriage lasted for 16 years, but she wanted a divorce for the same damned reason, then I got married again, to the FIRST WIFE!, your stepmother. How the hell can you POSSIBLY THINK that I might have any GOOD ADVICE TO GIVE TO YOU ABOUT RELATIONSHIPS, SON?!?! You better find SOMEBODY ELSE for THAT!" I laughed my arse off!

HOT, huh? Try Kuwait summers...120 degrees F to 140 degees F for around 8-9 months of the year, MEASURED IN THE SHADE! I was there for 2.5 years straight, too!😉

My sublines have been reset a number of times back to zero since I joined the forum in the late 1990's. It has something to do with their making changes to the software on the form on an occasional basis, from what I have read. My post count is fairly accurate, I think...but I have never tracked that stuff closely because it is no big deal to me. I presume your1984 "baltic birch" Cornwalls were not factory built. That wasn't the standard material used for Cornwalls. if they were factory-built and they came from the factory with black walnut veneers finished in oil in 1984, then the substrate would have been poplar lumber-core plywood...and NOT baltic birtch...until they started using MDF, years later. I left Klipsch in October 1983. it was a few years after I left before they went to MDF in the panels. The MITERED CABINETS were still being assembled using chain corner clamps to secure the glued panels tightly while being constructed. The Cornwall side panels were too long in length to use pneumatic-box-clamping methods to build them successfully on a regular basis. They would bow inward too much and a good tight miter-joint would not be achieved. It was a number of years after I left before they went to that kind of clamping for the construction...although they had already moved to using that system for the building of mitered Heresy speakers well-before I departed.

Lesson 1: DROP TESTS on box-type loudspeaker cabinets are conducted for a number of reasons, ONE of the MOST IMPORTANT REASONS is to test the bonding of the adhesives used in the construction of them and to determine if it is truly bonding well at points of panel joints. It can also be used to determine the superiority of different joinery types in order to make final production changes. The entire concept is to have the box joints come apart, for one reason or another, and to note at what height of drop it finally did so. At this point the strength of the box-build can be used for comparison purposes. As for bonding strength of the adhesives used at the now-broken joints, the breaks are analyzed to determine how well one panel bonded with its adhesive to another. If the break is a clean break, then the bonding was not very good. OTOH, if part of one panel is still stuck to the other panel, then the adhesive was able to make it into the fibers of both panels, prior to the adhesive completely curing....and a much better adhesive bond had been achieved with that particular adhesive and panel material type. SInce the adhesive bonding ability is the goal, it can be compared to other adhesives and or other panel materials and the results of their drop tests. This allows for the ideal material to adhesive combinations to be determined. But, it also allows for determinations of which combinations still bonds well at a lower production cost for adhesives and/or panel materials. Many other things can be determined, but these are considered two of the most important things gleaned from drop tests.

Then you will never know if I was the builder, will you? I built the vast majority of all the Cornwalls from 1977 until fall of 1983....FWIW!

No worries, I was just thinking that others had not noticed the original thread was from 2003...and were posting to that section...maybe expecting replies from some people who haven't been on the forum in many years and may not even be alive anymore. As for "an MDF fight"...again, no worries...some people like to troll others, but they end up becoming ignored sooner or later, get frustrated, and eventually look for somewhere else to play their games. Otherwise they get banned and are forced to leave! It is what it is.

That depends on the model. I most likely built them. What is the model? It is written on the labels! If CB(X) models, then the panels for the cabinet were custom-laid Georgia-Pacific 7-ply plywood. If they were veneered in fine veneers, then the substrate under the veneer is poplar-lumber-core plywood....also custom laid up and finely-veneered by Georgia-Pacific...those will have mitered corners where the box panels meet each other. The motor-board was still made from that birch plywood though.

Too bad he doesn't have a pause or stop button! My father sure knew how to pause and stop things!...He would just look over his glasses at you, act like he was getting out of his chair, as his right hand headed for his belt buckle...at that point you had better have already paused/stopped or the rest of the routine would not have been a pleasant experience for you!!! Trust me!🤣

Don't worry about me, I can spot a "know it all" troll a mile away! He's just another one of them!....wandering around trying to spout off all of his "knowledge" about things!..and trying to pick a fight over dissenting opinions! They are like bulldogs...once they get your leg in their jaw-grip they just WILL NOT let go! And must follow you around holding onto you and fighting you the entire time, because they NEVER LEARNED HOW and WHY and WHEN to JUST LET IT GO! I tend to hope that they eventually learn, and put a lot of the blame on piss-poor parenting and lack of discipline in their lives while growing up! Just gotta talk back...don't they?😉 Just gotta have the LAST WORD, every time!

Like I said...you get what you want to get, and I will get what I want to get...some of your points are at least partially valid, while others show a lack of real knowledge or advanced experience in woodworking to include certain tools, techniques, power tools, necessary jigs and such that most people don't have or have never used to make things easier/quicker to do while woodworking. IOW, I AM NOT TELLING YOU what YOU SHOULD DO...so do as YOU PLEASE...just don't attempt to enlighten me on what I already have lots of experience in doing unless you really know something I need to know. Your tirade has NOT shown me that! All I see is your OPINIONS and an attempt to prove it with salesmanship techniques represented as facts to support your OPINION. You apparently don't even understand much about adhesives in woodworking, to include how they actually bond and what materials they work best with! MDF sucks bigtime when adhesives enter the picture! It is the WORST for effective bonding strength of adhesives! It is adhesives that ARE SUPPOSED TO hold things together well..not fasteners. Drop tests also show that MDF sucks...especially in corner or edge drop tests! MDF is almost impossible to repair, too! If MDF is so good, then why isn't it used much in home construction?? Because it has no STRENGTH on its own! It cannot bear loads! SO, do as you want to do...and stop with the continual tirade here to ME! You will never convince me of its "superiority" as a wood-working material!

Thanks for the better information.. with corrections, JIM. I sometimes (more often than not nowadays!) seem to mix things up a little...braincell damage, I guess...or just my age showing up! Especially about things so long ago! Maybe it was Bob Moers, himself or Don Keele with the camera taking pics when the damaged stuff returned to the plant...long time ago, and I'm getting old...LOL! Inside of at least one of the cabinets was charred wood surfaces adjacent to where the internals had been mounted....I noticed it. One of the other guys from the cabinet-shop was standing beside me and said, "did they decide to use them for firewood after they destroyed them, or what?" when he pointed out the charred wood. The equipment was unloaded and opened up just inside of the front loading dock doors of the cabinet shop not too long before the end of the work-day. It was just after quitting time for the day, when Everybody in the cabinet shop stopped by for a gander before they went out that door to head home.... and just stood there sadly slowly shaking our heads back and forth! We had busted our butts getting that stuff built for the event in order to get up there in time... and WERE NOT AT ALL HAPPY to see what happened to all of that hard work! The "power that were" in the bean-counting part of the company had insisted upon a "paid in full" status for the stuff by the event organizers PRIOR TO us even starting to build them...and that didn't occur until it was almost impossible to do and get them up there in time for the set-up prior to the event-start! Or at least that is what WE WERE TOLD in the cabinet shop when so many of us had to drop whatever we were doing to make that happen! It was kinda strange that we were working so much overtime just to get that done, when it was generally historically supposed to be a "slow time" at the plant! None of the Woofers survived the pre-event fiasco...the voice coils were completely blown out of most (if not all) of the woofers! Ripped cones on many if not all of them, too! Yep...they were three-ways! Very early ones. Well, Jim... At least it led to a project or two that kept you pretty damned busy right after you arrived, didn't it? Bye the way, Jim...What WAS that cone driver originally used on the MSSM...and its diameter...wasn't it something like a Cetec 8" or 10" driver?? You outta know, since you were involved with that thing!

So here is the situation. I am seriously considering up-grading my Heresy II speakers to the internals of the Heresy III in the near future.! Keep in mind the following: 1. The cost if the factory internal upgrade kit is around 500 bucks or so, which I CAN afford when I go to do this. 2. I have ZERO invested in these speakers (so far, because I won them in a contest on THIS forum almost twenty years ago!) and they are HWL models in GENIUINE like-new condition, considering they have seldom been out of their boxes. 3. They were made at the turn of the 1990's to 2000's decade, which SHOULD mean that there will be no need for any motor-board modifications for the new internals to be mounted...or so I have read! 4. I really like the HIII performance much more-so than the performance of THESE PARTICULAR HII's! That's the MAIN reason, along with space available for them, why they have SELDOM been out of their boxes! I use my old original HDBL's, instead! So, I am interested in feedback from those who know about this upgrade! Will they perform pretty-much identically to the HIII's once upgraded? Is there anything I need to modify to the speakers to make the upgrade work, considering when they were made? I basically just need to know how much extra hassle will be involved along with the performance comparison....before I go and drop a half of a grand on this project. I prefer to get feedback from those who have done the upgrade to them before....and any good viable options/suggestions...to get these to at least perform MUCH CLOSER TO the HIII's EDIT: And NOW, for the rest of the story (plan)!....IF I go with an upgrade in the (currently) Heresy II's, I have a plan for the ever-so-slightly-used HII guts: I have a nephew from the Philippines side of my family who recently arrived in Canada where his mother has been working for about a decade. He is currently a Junior in high school, and I have great affection for him and pride in him! Before he graduates from high school, my workshop will have been completed and I will have already been able to do build a second pair of Heresy boxes out of Baltic birch for his use while away at college, and give them to him, along with an H/K 430 twin-powered receiver, for his high school graduation gift. At the same time, I will still have a like-new walnut veneered pair of Heresys which have been upgraded to HIII's; While laying out only a little over a half a grand for the entire deal. This is a possible win/win thing as far as I am concerned. It's either do it this way, or do the eBay/Crites/ etc. thing for parts to build his speakers! One way or another, he will get HERESY speakers! But if the upgrade thing gets my HII's to sound like HIII's, I prefer to go that route. I'm sorry that I left this out in the original start of this thread! The main thing I need to know is how close to the Heresy III performance the upgrade will actually be, and how much hassle it is to do it! I'd rather kill two birds with one stone, if that is possible. But either route I use to accomplish getting him his speakers is OK by me...the out-of-pocket expense will be about the same. Thanks! Your turn!

Looks like "beautified" originals to me. That vertical strip is most likely there to conceal previous damage to the "peak" of the "roof" of the doghouse section of the bass horn lens. Whoever did the beautification of those basic LaScalas did a very good job of it, from what I can see. Congratulations!

A decent shape H/K 430 twin-powered receiver and a old pair of Birch Heresys is all it takes with your budget. PLUS, you can watch that smile of his get bigger and bigger! Once you see that big smile, break the news to him: The H/K 430 is JUST rated at 25 WPC!

What do you do for a living? You sound just like the MDF salesman! Expensive refers to more than just the material itself...labor time to putty up voids and other things requiring a bit more labor time. cutting tools changing, lots of things. SONICALLY, Baltic birch PW is about equal to MDF! I've only been a wood-worker for 50 years or so and I've used pretty much everything during that short time...I choose Baltic birch...you get whatever you want! You haven't convinced me of anything other than you just DO NOT have a clue!

You ain't got me fooled, yer just wanting to get into my pants!🤣

Those things you mentioned is exactly WHY I put this into the equation: And think about THAT for awhile while enjoying your current relationship with the person....it all depends on how you want to have to start out every day for the rest of your life...eventually you will know! Beauty is just skin-deep! But the deeper inside one goes, the more one can REALLY see things....it takes time to see all of the things! Have you ever woke up and looked at a beautiful partner and thought to yourself "GAWD, she's gorgeous, but do I want to deal with this (take your pick, one or more: unpleasant, stupid, bitchy, not al lick of common sense, un-caring, self-absorbed, etc.) woman today? Its too damned early for this to start, I'm going back to sleep!" Eventually you found out, didn't you?

MDF vs. Plywood...the decision matrix between the two is primarily based on budget/production costs, in almost all cases. PERIOD! GOOD Baltic Birch has just as good of a sonic quality to it as MDF, and will hold up better for a lifetime when compared to MDF...but it is much more expensive! Pretty much everything else between the two gives the nod to Baltic birch, hands down.

WELL....Floor speakers tend to be standing on the floor, right? Whereas all the other stuff you mentioned tends to NOT be on the floor, right? Ok, we agree on this. Gooood! So...SOMEDAY, when you come home after being away, even being away for a short time, only to find that a washing machine or faucet flexible water line burst while you were away, or somebody flushed the toilet and left the house quickly after doing it, without ensuring it totally successfully flushed, and it ended up not flushing and over-flowing instead... trust me! YOU WILL KNOW THE ANSWER TO YOUR OWN QUESTION!... And don't even go there on braided stainless steel flexible water lines, because they can do it too! Trust me! Sooner or later, it WILL HAPPEN! And when that water gets to carpet, it spreads rapidly and just sits there...slowly soaking anything on the carpet...and MDF sucks it up like a sponge, too! MDF also swells up with that water like one of those dry sponges do when you put them in the water! Trust me! And after that happens to MDF it is impossible to repair! There is a REASON that wall electrical outlets tend to be installed at least a few inches up from the floor! Trust me on that, too! Sometimes problems come searching FOR YOU! The best way to deal with problems which come looking for YOU is to do your best to keep them from happening! But if something CAN HAPPEN it probably WILL HAPPEN! It's called MURPHY's LAW! BEWARE OF MURPHY'S LAW! And no matter how well-prepared you think you are, Murphy will find a way to eventually get you! Trust me on that, too! Any more questions??

Actually, the current Cornwalls very much out-perform the earlier versions!, IMO! And I've heard them all! I still wish they were veneered plywood though! I would just be afraid to see a kitchen leak or other event, which could happen and that would turn MDF substrate into oatmeal consistency...along with the additional hassle of having to have new boxes built at my own expense!. Certain materials can be relatively easily repaired, others NOT! Y'all keep in mind that this entire thread was very old and just brought back to life the other day...I still don't know why, though!

rHaving just finished about six years with a bunch of college kids at my job prior to retirement...some of whom wanted my advice about "getting married" and such...I would always reply with this: Marriage is SUPPOSED TO BE a LIFETIME AGREEMENT between two people. For myself, I have come to the conclusion that one of the very best things to do when thinking about marrying somebody is this: Look at that person's face as it is RIGHT NOW, and Totally ignore everything else about the rest of the person's current appearance..Just that face, but washed completely clean...no make-up, hair disheveled, the whole "he or she just woke-up thing"...then close your eyes and ... picture how it will look decades from now when you see that face .JUST THAT FACE! ...Picture it older, fatter, wrinkles, more gaunt and haggard...every possible Negative thing which COULD POSSIBLY HAPPEN to THAT FACE! Everything else on that person's body will change, likely quite drastically!! You will see that face every morning for the rest of your life, God willing! YOU WILL HAVE TO WAKE UP TO THAT FACE FOR THE REMAINDER OF YOUR LIFE, whether it has a happy expression, a sad expression, an angry expression, o any other kind of expression...you will have to wake up to it! And think about THAT for awhile while enjoying your current relationship with the person....it all depends on how you want to have to start out every day for the rest of your life...eventually you will know! For ME, picking out a veneer choice for a speaker, it is "that face"...no matter what else happens to the changes in your environment that contains those speakers ...room size, furniture choices, etc. Do you REALLY want to have to look at "that face" for the rest of your life?? If you intend to "date around, anyway and not stick with" the speakers, it is no big deal, IMHO!

I DUNNO ABOUT THAT! Having been here for most of almost two decades, from what I can tell there are a number of FORUM MEMBERS who must have gotten pretty damned warped in a relatively short time, considering their ages!🤣 It took far longer than that for my own warpage to fully manifest itself!🤪