k-horns weak in the bass department

[Marvel]

and what does in phase mean.

If all drivers are in phase, the first part of a wave form (let's just say one cycle) is positive and will make all the different diaphragms/speaker cones, etc. move toward you. The second half goes negative and will pull the different diaphragms/speaker cones, etc., away from you.

[cjgeraci]

It's a different kind of bass, amazingly natural but never overblown. It may sound lacking compared to a direct radiator bass especially if you like slamming rock & roll. If you love pipe organ & orchestral music , Khorns are king of the hill in bass.

I think that this sums it up. It's dependent on the type of music you listen to...

I've never listened to rap on Khorns, but I would imagine there are better speaker choices if this is your musical preference.

However, orchestral and organ music sounds awesome (my father in-law loves listening to this music on his).

Agreed. If you love classical or organ music, the bass of the Khorns cannot be beat.

As a rock lover, I found the Khorn bass to be lacking a certain "slam" as compared to some of the direct radiators or even as opposed to the Lascala/Belle bass. As a result, I had to supplement my Khorns to get me where I wanted to be.

I expect that a tighter and/or more impactful bass sound with the Jubs is what many have commented so favorably on. I will confirm that once I hear a pair.

Carl.

[KdAgain]

I'm still hoping to find a way to confirm that all my drivers are in phase since conceivably at least one could have it's +- marking reversed.

Seems that I remember something from about 50 years ago that you could momentarily touch the leads from a dry cell to the speaker leads. With + to + the cone should move out and by reversing the battery the cone would move in. Now that could work for the khorn woofer (is it safe?) but I don't think you would see anything on the small mid and high drivers.

As I'm thinking about this, the bass weakness would be due to the woofers, which we could see by opening the access port. So if the battery test is safe, we could at least confirm the phase on the woofers. Is it safe?

Any ideas out there? Bob Crites maybe?

Thanks,

Rod

[BEC]

You can do that. Use a 1.5 volt battery. The woofer cone should move out when the battery is connected positive of battery to positive of woofer, negative to negative. In fact, make that easier if you want. Just disconnect the wires from your amp and use the battery right on the crossover input. That would let you see if anything was reversed anywhere between the woofer and those input terminals.

Things get more difficult checking the midrange or tweeter. I don't think there is any way to do that without taking the drivers apart and you risk damaging the diaphragms just doing that. Wouldn't be surprised if one or more of the K-77 tweeters is wrong internally. That happens very often.

Bob Crites

[The Dude]

and what does in phase mean.

If all drivers are in phase, the first part of a wave form (let's just say one cycle) is positive and will make all the different diaphragms/speaker cones, etc. move toward you. The second half goes negative and will pull the different diaphragms/speaker cones, etc., away from you.

now i know what your talking about the same as on my subwoofer 0 or 180. sometimes i think you all talking technical stuff i dont understand not this time,hahaha. I dont know were i am going with this hope i didn't get of subject.

[JJkizak]

If you have good equipment you can pump up the low end about 10 to 16 db and the slam will throw you through the wall into the street.

[KdAgain]

You can do that. Use a 1.5 volt battery. The woofer cone should move out when the battery is connected positive of battery to positive of woofer, negative to negative. In fact, make that easier if you want. Just disconnect the wires from your amp and use the battery right on the crossover input. That would let you see if anything was reversed anywhere between the woofer and those input terminals.

Things get more difficult checking the midrange or tweeter. I don't think there is any way to do that without taking the drivers apart and you risk damaging the diaphragms just doing that. Wouldn't be surprised if one or more of the K-77 tweeters is wrong internally. That happens very often.

Bob Crites

Bob,

Thanks for the confirmation on the battery testing method - and cool idea to do it at the crossover. I'm a little boggled that I remembered that method from truly 50 years ago, yet sometimes forget something I heard an hour ago. I've heard this happens!

Interesting that you find some of the tweeter mismarked. Since I have your new ones that shouln't be a problem - right!

Rod

[LarryC]

Things get more difficult checking the midrange or tweeter. I don't think there is any way to do that without taking the drivers apart and you risk damaging the diaphragms just doing that. Wouldn't be surprised if one or more of the K-77 tweeters is wrong internally. That happens very often.

One more thing -- if your woofs are out of phase, then logically one of your woofs and its companion midrange are also out of phase with each other. The bass and midrange would fight each other. If you reverse the "wrong" woofer leads, you might end up with bass and mid out of phase with each other on both sides. I suggest you check that possibility, as well. Hopefully the battery test will assure it's all OK.

I check phasing by ear. I've heard my share of out-of-phase drivers or speakers and can usually ID it right away.

[KdAgain]

Good points, Larry. So this gets me back to finding a way of testing phasing on the whole system. In the past the method I have used on a variety of speakers is to put the preamp to mono. The sound should appear to come from the center of the two speakers as you move your head from side to side. So I guess that we could disonnect to mids & tweets and use this method on the woofers first. This would give proper phasing between L & R. Then do the same for the mids and the tweets.

What the above would accomplish is to know that the left and rights are in phase. But still don't know how to know for sure that the drivers within one Khorn are all in phase.

Any other ideas out there?

Thanks,

Rod

[colterphoto1]

physically check the wiring, is the only way I know how. You'll never see the mid diaphragm 'pop' at 1k.

There are test discs that display in phase and out of phase. 'you should hear a dog barking from midway between the speakers'. 'WOOF' Thank you Ralph ( the dog's name is Ralph).

[LarryC]

But still don't know how to know for sure that the drivers within one Khorn are all in phase.

Rod, I suggest you check out phasing between one K-horn's drivers with the same head-movement technique except vertically -- turn your head sideways between one of the bass horn mouths and the midrange horn. I've done that any number of times with confidence. Do the same between the tweet and MR mouths, on both K-horns of course.

[KdAgain]

I finally got some time to fiddle with this and here's what I did. Downloaded the free SweepGen software and installed it on a laptop. Hooked the laptop audio out to my preamp and was able to dial in any frequency for testing purposes.When I dialed in a low frequency that only drove the woofer I noticed the base was very weak when listening between the speakers, and strong on far left and far right. (I had noticed this before but attributed it to the Khorn extension along the wall.) But now I became convinced that I had a phase problem. The software has a selection for 180 out of phase which made it easy to reverse phasing from left to right without changing wires. When I selected 180 out - wow - we now have some low end at the sitting position!

There was more to do though since I didn't think that one Khorn was out of phase with the other. My hunch was that only one woofer was out of phase and all the other drivers were okay. Here's how I worked it out. I dialed in a frequency that only drove the midrange and confirmed by moving side to side between speakers that they were indeed in phase. Then did the same for the tweeter using a higher frequency. (Was careful not to have high volume with this test for fear of damaging one of the tweeters with a continuous sine wave.) This test confirmed the tweeters were in phase.

Now to check the phasing between mids and tweets within a cabinet. With the preamp balance turned to one speaker I selected a frequency that would fairly equally drive both the midrange and tweeter. I moved my head between the mid and tweet and it seemed they were in phase, but it was a little difficult to be certain. I then reversd the wires on the tweeter and did the same. There seemed to be more of a dead spot between them, so this confirmed that they previously were in phase. Put the tweeter wires back where they had been. Did the same for the other cabinet and confirmed that mid to tweet phasing was okay.

I know knew that one of the woofers was out of phase since the mids and tweets were in phase between cabinets and within each cabinet. To determine which one I did a test similar to the one used for mids and tweets within a cabinet except I used a low frequency that fairly equally drove the mid and the woofer. By moving between the midrange and the lower side panels I could check the phasing. I reversed woofer wires to confirm what I was hearing. Sure enough the woofer in the left cabinet was out of phase with it's midrange!

After reversing the leads on the left woofer I sat down for some serious listening. The Khorns now sound as I have always expected them to: Deep, powerful lows that envelop you but don't boom or seem muddy. My only regret is waiting all these years to really delve into it!

So thanks a lot bigblaze for starting this thread. Did you manage to get some low end improvement in your Khorns? And thanks Colterphoto for suggesting phasing. Thanks to Larry for the suggestions on how to listen for phasing. Sorry this post got so long but thought it might be helpful to someone.

Rod

[colterphoto1]

excellent detailed sleuthing. Glad to help.

[Audio Flynn]

it may seem simplistic, but are we IN PHASE?

Happens occassionally.

=================

could the crossovers be out of spec? how old are they? k-horns in
good corners have really good bass in my experience. not bloated but
good. tony======================

Crossovers and corner sealing are frequently overlooked.

[Audio Flynn]

Nice troubleshooting.

Good music takes patience!

[garyrc]

• Yes, do check to see if they are in phase
• Is the floor springy or solid? Stereo Review reccomended putting a Stonehenge-like lintel on posts and piers across the joists in the crawl space to increase bass if the floor is anything but rock solid. We did this in our former house, and the bass increased substantially.
• Have you moved your listening position around to see if you can get into a bass zone, rather than in a null?
• Have you run a frequency response test (caution, use low volume, of you will lose at least your tweeters!) on the Khorns? The cheap Radio Shack meter is O.K. in the bass, IMO, Since the K-Horns have so little distortion in the bass, compared to many other speakers, sometimes people miss the distortion that fills out the bass.

[jdm56]

bigblaze, I think that, assuming polarity checks out OK, you're looking at a room problem. That's an Achilles' heel of the k-horn - they are almost totally at the mercy of the room, because when you put a speaker hard and fast in the room corners, every room mode will be excited, which is great -in a great room, but not so great in a bad room because of the additive nature of room modes. You end up with very rough bass response, and depending on your seating location, possibly extremely weak bass. I'm not saying your room is bad, but it may be bad for bass. What are you room's dimensions?