Improvements to the Khorn design

[ClaudeJ1]

1) Go back to the original throat size - 6" width.

2) Use a woofer with a very large Xmax, 23 Hz or so Fr. Use EQ below 45 Hz.

3) Use a constant directivity midrange operating from 200 Hz - 2000 Hz.

4) Use a constant directivity HF operating from 2000 Hz - 20,000 Hz with CD comp EQ.

5) Tri -amp with at least 24 dB/oct. slopes. Time - align all drivers.

6) Stiffen front and sides by using 1" or thicker material.

7) Brace top and bottom of woofer chamber ala Speakerlab.

As an owner of the increddible Peavey MB-1 Constand Directivity midbass horn, I concur with Don's advice here. Mine runs from 150-1,000 Hz., so it's in the same ballpark. The JBL 2360 runs from 1K-6Khz. with a single cap and naturall rolloff into the B&C tweeter pairs.

Looking at the raw dirty curves from a Khorn, because of all the twists and turn, things gett pretty funky, sonically speaking, above 225 Hz. I had Khorn bottoms crossed at 180 Hz. to my MB-1 and they sounded simply amazing that way.

Greg, you are already on the right track (no pun intended) in offering your V-trac upgrade with a 300Hz. crossover. You would not believe the difference in detail when you go even lower than that with a STRAIGHT AXIS horn that gets to 150-200 Hz. I might even suggest a Community M-200 driver for the same reasoning here or a good 10-12" woofer with minimal compresson ratio and a phase plug (see the EAW designs).

Let's face it, 20-40, 40-80, and 80-160 is already 3 ocaves out of 10, so, IMHO, a perfect 3-way sytem with EQ would be 3 decades per driver. 20-200, 200-2k, and 2k-20k, all tri-amped for relative gain control. I get as close to that ideal without digial EQ in a 4-way and let the Audyssey do the rest for me.

JC has made his own tractrix horn with Dual 12's and he's good down to 70 Hz with it. I would suggest a large tractrix with a cutoff frequency about 2X LOWER than your V-trax (X or Z trac???). The key is to have straight axis horns to go as low as possible without too much size penalty. I think a straight axix 150-125 Hz. horn would be ideal.

[ClaudeJ1]

Greg, I would try hooking up your MCM 1900 stack's midbass horn (MSSM?) to a Khorn and see how much better it sounds and prove me right.

[Edgar]

Okay, now I'm really confused.

Greg, originally I thought that you wanted to custom-build an all-new design that fit in the KHorn footprint.

Later, I thought that you wanted to modify existing KHorns for better performance.

But Wrinkles just commented about building improved KHorn speakers from scratch.

I'm not certain which of the above is really what you're trying to do. But Wrinkles makes some really good points, and I have fallen on the side against people cloning Klipsch products in the past. So I must be more cautious when/if I post any further comments on this topic.

Greg

[Rudy81]

Yes, Dana's horns are the Jamboree's, and they are the nicest sounding bass bins I own. There is a patent on them, but I've talked to Dana about that, and he's open to letting me build and sell them for a nominal fee per pair. I may use them someday, but for now, I'm concentrating on the Khorn design.

I think there is enough room for improvement in the design and construction of the Khorn bass bin, that the gap between a typical Khorn bass bin and the Jubilee/Jamboree can be closed significantly.

Greg

Greg: As you know I have been pursuing comparrisons between the Khorn, Jub and Jamb bass bins. I am curious as to why you wish to focus on the Khorn changes if the Jub or Jamb bins are better? I have tried to follow your many posts on the subject and IIRC, you liked the Jamboree performance the best. I would think the Jamboree, if it sounds the best, is also the most practical solution since no corners are needed.

Why the search to improve the Khorn design vs. using the other, newer bass bins. I'm most confused.

[Invidiosulus]

Also wondering how this thread fits in with regard to this thread here,

http://community.klipsch.com/forums/t/116878.aspx

-Josh

[greg928gts]

Greg, I think you should graciously bow out of this thread and threads like this.

When a hobby becomes a competing business to produce a better product whether the patent has run out or not, then it is just not right to be mining the great minds of this forum so blatantly that could cause in effect harm to any Klipsch products or their selling potential.

Your comments and your desire about your building a better Klipschorn may be true. But you are in essence advertising on the Forum about your business. And right now it appears one of your business avenues is to better the Klipschorn. By your comments on this forum, you may be helping to reduce sale of the Klipschorns while guiding prospective buyers to your website.

I am not suggesting you cease your designing, building and selling a better mousetrap, I am only suggesting you take this thread to a non-competitors website (Audio Asylum as an example, there are others or have your own website).

Being very facetious, maybe Klipsch can start a new category called "Competitors Corner" where competitors can expound on their opinions of their perceived Klipsch weaknesses and why they think their products sound better and are cheaper, etc.. (I know, what a smart a$$)

Is what you are doing legal, sure it is.

Forum rule under Advertising
2. Advertising
All manufacturer's representatives and competing brand personnel must identify themselves as an employee of said company in each post on the forum.

Only listing a website probably does not qualify.

Greg, you may not fall into this category yet since your business presently is for upgrades and enhancements, many of which I have admired. Apparently you are within the forum guidelines until you produce your first "CUSTOM HORN LOADED SPEAKER". Then you'll have to make some changes.

Good Luck with your company.
This is my opinion.

I understand your point Wrinkles, but if Klipsch doesn't want this thread here, they have the control to take it off. Amy knows how to get in touch with me, I've spoken with her before regarding the advertising policy.

I do agree that there will come a time when I'm considered a real company, producing speakers and this kind of thread will be inappropriate.

Greg

[greg928gts]

A couple of you are confused about what I'm doing. That's probably because I have not clearly written about what I'm doing. I really didn't want to talk about the sales part of it, so I posed the question the way I did to get specific information. If you're confused about what I'm really looking for, please go back and read my first post.

I am sorry if I've overstepped my bounds. I have enjoyed including forum members in on my progress of speaker restorations and upgrades over the years, it just seems natural to me to include those same supportive members in a re-design of the Khorn.

Greg

[Edgar]

I am sorry if I've overstepped my bounds. I have enjoyed including forum members in on my progress of speaker restorations and upgrades over the years, it just seems natural to me to include those same supportive members in a re-design of the Khorn.

This stuff is so much fun that it's easy to get carried away. I apologize, as well.

Greg

[ClaudeJ1]

so, if you could start from scratch, what would change to get rid of some of the compromises and improve on the overall design? Cost no object by the way.

Is the footprint allowed to grow a little?

[greg928gts]

so, if you could start from scratch, what would change to get rid of some of the compromises and improve on the overall design? Cost no object by the way.

Is the footprint allowed to grow a little?

Yes.

Your comments before and recommendations on the mid-bass horn didn't fall on deaf ears. I've been thinking of that kind of setup for a future speaker.

Greg

[ClaudeJ1]

Your comments before and recommendations on the mid-bass horn didn't fall on deaf ears. I've been thinking of that kind of setup for a future speaker.

Greg

Good. You won't be sorry. Thanks for the acknowledgement.

[DrWho]

Let's face it, 20-40, 40-80, and 80-160 is
already 3 ocaves out of 10, so, IMHO, a perfect 3-way sytem with EQ
would be 3 decades per driver. 20-200, 200-2k, and 2k-20k, all
tri-amped for relative gain control.

I would somewhat
agree with the notion of dividing the frequency ranges equally if there
was no limitation on speaker size, but a full sized horn at 20Hz is
pretty insane. If one reduces the bandwidth covered at the lower
frequencies, then the IMD's will improve...allowing the speaker to get
smaller for the same IMD performance.

I also think there is some merit to crossing at 80Hz, especially
in light of how movie (and many music) studios tend to be configured.
If you go that route, then 80-800Hz is one decade and 800-8kHz is
another decade. Extension to 20kHz is just over an extra octave to be
handled by the tweeter, but that last octave seems to be much less
important than the 800-2kHz range. I would much rather push the
compromised range to the extra top octave. Compression drivers also
come with their own phase plugs, whereas one would need to be
fabricated for extending the midbass to 2kHz.

I'm not saying
equally dividing the bandwidth is a bad thing, but I think shifting the
bandwidth around a bit could be advantageous in systems with practical
limitations.

[Edgar]

Let's face it, 20-40, 40-80, and 80-160 is already 3 ocaves out of 10, so, IMHO, a perfect 3-way sytem with EQ would be 3 decades per driver. 20-200, 200-2k, and 2k-20k, all tri-amped for relative gain control.

It's an attractive idea, except for one unfortunate problem -- that 200 Hz crossover is squarely in the vocal range. If there are any anomalies in the crossover, they tend to be very obvious.

The key is to have straight axis horns to go as low as possible without too much size penalty. I think a straight axix 150-125 Hz. horn would be ideal.

I agree. Remember the rule-of-thumb, though; a horn typically has to be at least a quarter-wavelength long to be effective. A quarter wavelength at 125 Hz is a little over 2½ feet. Add room for the driver, and it's a 3 foot horn. Not huge, but getting there.

Greg

[Amy]

Just a gentle reminder (thank you, Josh, for linking back to this post):

Advertisements ... and solicitations
are inappropriate on this forum (Garage Sale section not included for personal use)

While
we value and support all our long-time forum members, especially those
who run reputable businesses helping others with our products, I have
noticed some blatent advertising and soliciting which violates our
Terms of Service.

I recognize the difficult times we are in,
and appreciate that everyone needs to earn a living. However, I would
not like to see this forum become a battle zone for competing
businesses.

Greg,

I know we've discussed it before, and I'm not necessarily targeting you, but just a reminder. There is a fine line that is sometimes difficult to see.

Thanks all!

[ClaudeJ1]

Let's face it, 20-40, 40-80, and 80-160 is already 3 ocaves out of 10, so, IMHO, a perfect 3-way sytem with EQ would be 3 decades per driver. 20-200, 200-2k, and 2k-20k, all tri-amped for relative gain control.

It's an attractive idea, except for one unfortunate problem -- that 200 Hz crossover is squarely in the vocal range. If there are any anomalies in the crossover, they tend to be very obvious.

The key is to have straight axis horns to go as low as possible without too much size penalty. I think a straight axix 150-125 Hz. horn would be ideal.

I agree. Remember the rule-of-thumb, though; a horn typically has to be at least a quarter-wavelength long to be effective. A quarter wavelength at 125 Hz is a little over 2½ feet. Add room for the driver, and it's a 3 foot horn. Not huge, but getting there.

Greg

Every crossover point to a lower or upper midrange horn (in my case, both) lie squarely in the vocal range of 80 (male bass) to 1.2 Khz. (female soprano). The KEY to the best sound I have ever had in my home is this MB-1. At 150 Hz., it's really a lower midrange horn rather than midbass, which I consider to be more in the 80-150 range. There is a heck of a lot of music and power between 40 and 80 (a whole octave). But most of the music is above 100 Hz., centered at 400 Hz. Swithing my MWMs in and out will verify that quickly and reaveal the sound from 150 on up to VERY thin and tinny sounding. We are talking about 2-3 octaves between 20 and 150, so it's important for sure, but I don't agree about the vocal thing. My horn Voice coils are aligned with slow sope networks and it's the best vocal detail (male or female) I have ever had

My MB-1 is 3 feet long, but with the driver stuck in the corner, it's still way shorter than the MWM bins, which sounds as good or better than a Khorn to me because the bifurcated mouth spacing is even tighter than a Jubilee. Plus it has a larger throat than either corner horn and only 2 folds vs. 3 (more like a big La Scala, which is really only a midbass horn anyhow).

[ClaudeJ1]

Let's face it, 20-40, 40-80, and 80-160 is
already 3 ocaves out of 10, so, IMHO, a perfect 3-way sytem with EQ
would be 3 decades per driver. 20-200, 200-2k, and 2k-20k, all
tri-amped for relative gain control.

I would somewhat
agree with the notion of dividing the frequency ranges equally if there
was no limitation on speaker size, but a full sized horn at 20Hz is
pretty insane. If one reduces the bandwidth covered at the lower
frequencies, then the IMD's will improve...allowing the speaker to get
smaller for the same IMD performance.

I also think there is some merit to crossing at 80Hz, especially
in light of how movie (and many music) studios tend to be configured.
If you go that route, then 80-800Hz is one decade and 800-8kHz is
another decade. Extension to 20kHz is just over an extra octave to be
handled by the tweeter, but that last octave seems to be much less
important than the 800-2kHz range. I would much rather push the
compromised range to the extra top octave. Compression drivers also
come with their own phase plugs, whereas one would need to be
fabricated for extending the midbass to 2kHz.

I'm not saying
equally dividing the bandwidth is a bad thing, but I think shifting the
bandwidth around a bit could be advantageous in systems with practical
limitations.

Getting to 20 Hz. really is a job for a tapped horn sub below 40 Hz., IMHO. But for music, I'd go for the Brad Litz modification v3.0 of the Danley LAB horn. good from 30-150 Hz. solid. outdoors in 1/4 space........it's a smaller foot print than an MWMs when laying down and twice as long of a horn(12 feet)......YES. It does require time delay from a digital Xover, however, but that is not a problem these days.The box is 45x45x22.5". The measured response matches the Hornresp Original LAB vs. LAB v3.0 plot shown here.

So you would have roughly 27 Hz.-210 Hz. +/-6 db, then 150 Hz.-1.2 Khz. then with CD EQ on a large format horn, about 1K-18 Khz. With a modern digital Xover , that would be an amzing combo and where I'm headed.....smaller footprint than MWMs, lower bass, and elimination of super tweeters. I'm almost there.

[msutton]

one of the suggestions mentioned here was increasing the throat size from 3" up to 6", like was used in some of the earlier khorn designs.can anyone comment on how this would change the sound of the khorn vs the 3" slot design? it would seem the 3" would sound better since PWK decided to stay with that design but i have often wondered how the slot size changes the sound of the horn.

also, can anyone comment on the sound of closing in the backs of the khorns, ala 60th ann khorns. it would seem this would lengthen the horn making the bass bins play to a lower freq? and with the closed backs do you still keep the crossover point at about 400hz or should that change any

[Don Richard]

The 3" throat was to improve response in the 250-400 Hz range. The larger throat has lower distortion and higher LF output with the right driver. There is no advantage to using the smaller throat with a midrange crossed @ 250 Hz or lower.

[greg928gts]

can anyone comment on the sound of closing in the backs of the khorns, ala 60th ann khorns. it would seem this would lengthen the horn making the bass bins play to a lower freq? and with the closed backs do you still keep the crossover point at about 400hz or should that change any

I had a unique opportunity to listen to identical Khorns, fully upgraded, with one of them having the backs closed in. Here are the webpages www.dcchomes.com/GRKhorns.html my own Khorns with V-Trac/BMS midrange, Beyma tweeter, ALK crossovers, Crites woofers - and www.dcchomes.com/FLKhorns.html Mike Lindsey's Khorns that have the same upgrades, but with enclosed backs.

I thought the same thing as you, that I would hear stronger, deeper bass, and when I first switched out my Khorns (in my living room) and put Mike's in the corners, that's what I was listening for. I noticed a significant difference between the two, but I couldn't figure out what it was easily. I ended up switching those fricken Khorns in and out of the corners several times before I finally figured it out. My back wasn't feeling too good, but my ears were some impressed!

The real difference is in the tonal quality of the bass. I didn't notice deeper bass, or more bass with the enclosed backs, but bass clarity, tightness, and tonal characteristics were much improved. Sort of like the bass coming into focus. It's a great mod, and I highly recommend it. As part of my restoration of Mike's Khorns, I think I spent 15 hours on the job, and probably $100 in materials.

I also recommend the Crites cast-frame woofers. They do not make a big difference, but after they are broken in, they offer a bit more bass (about 2db more efficient than the K33) and I think a little bit more deep bass. It's a small change, but any little bit extra from the bass bins in my living room was welcomed. The cost is reasonable.

Greg

[John Warren]

The plot below is interesting. It is the impedance modulii of the K33e (1980s vintage) in free air (hanging from a wire) and the same mounted in the folded unit with the folded unit tucked into a basement corner (all three sides poured concrete). The beneficial effect of a concrete corner is signficant. The radiation resistance provided by the horn is at a maximum when placed in a location like this. The loading provided by 2x4 studs + blueboard + plaster veneer is not as good as shown below. Note that the horn likes to work into the 100-200Hz range(!). The unit that was used in the measurements is one that allows for changes to the throat opening. The slot was a 3" wide one shown in the pics.

So the takeway here is that the Klipchorn works best in a concrete corner.