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Fortes - no bass


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I picked up a pair of '90 Forte IIs. In Ok shape save that the base on one was destroyed due to bad packing.

On the one hand these speakers are very impressive. In the last five years I've owned over 20 speakers many over the $10K point. These speakers are remarkable clear and coherent in the midrange and treble.

However, and this is surprising, the bass is quite poor. It sounds as if they have little energy below 50 Hz. I also have a pair of Fostex backhorns using the 4.5" driver which are solid to 40-45 Hz - these have subjectively "more" bass than the Fortes.

Is this normal? The speakers are only 6" from the front wall, firing straight ahead. I have not tried corners yet but I know it isn't going to make a huge difference.

As they stand, for rock at least, a would be required.

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Paul,

I have a pair of Forte's placed about 10 inches off the corners toed in only about 8 degrees and to me the bass response is incredible. One thing I will point out is that they are in a large tiled floor room which will enhance the bass(reflective) to some degree. I have powered them with many different amps including a Denon POA-1500(150w/ch), and Acurus A150(150w/ch) and currently a Denon PMA-1080R integrated(105w/ch), all which have no problem making those 12 inch woofers thump.

Bill

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6" is way too close to the back wall. A rule of thumb I've read is try and equal the distance in inches of any rear ported or rear passive speaker from the wall. So a speaker with a 15" rear passive should be around 15" from the rear wall.

Corner loading will help but just as a comparison I have my Forte II fronts toed in so that the outside edges of the speaker cabinet is about 15" from the rear wall and the inside edges are about 12" and they have astounding bass. In fact I normally don't use my sub unless I'm watching a movie. My speakers aren't anywhere near a side wall either as I have them set along the long wall in my room. The nearest side all is probably 4-5 feet from the right speaker.

What to you mean that the bass on one was destroyed? Was it the rear or front woofer? Is it fixed?

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I said the "BASE" was destroyed - the stand - this has nothing to do with the problem.

Yes, I know that 6" is too close, but that would serve to increase bass output.

I can't believe it's a problem with the speaker since it would have to be both of them. I think my expectations were just too high. I see that many people do use a sub or subs with Fortes so they like do have little output below 40 or even 50 Hz.

A factor is that my room is *very* large. Open-concept house.

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Dennie, you could be right with the phase.

The forte and forte ll should go down to 32Hz.

I picked up a pair once and both had no bass, I thought I messed up buying broken speakers. I removed the passive radiator on the rear and started checking connections, they were all tight. As a last shot I turned them on and started removing the wire from the bass driver as I was just looking for anything. As I wiggled the connection trying to get it off and it got louder for a second, I cleaned off the connections and never had a problem since.

It was hard to believe because the connections were very tight but somehow not making enough contact to fully work, it was like they were muted 75%. Both speakers were the same, I have no idea what caused that, I thought the drivers were ruined or the crossover was messed up.

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6" is way too close to the back wall. A rule of thumb I've read is try and equal the distance in inches of any rear ported or rear passive speaker from the wall. So a speaker with a 15" rear passive should be around 15" from the rear wall.

Corner loading will help but just as a comparison I have my Forte II fronts toed in so that the outside edges of the speaker cabinet is about 15" from the rear wall and the inside edges are about 12" and they have astounding bass.

ahhh, you guys HAVE been paying attention all this time, haven't you? [;)]

The real 'Tech Tip' (stuff I started coining when at Klipsch Tech Support) is "a starting point should be with rear of speaker distanced from front wall the sum of diameter of rear ports or passive radiators. Seems to have worked well for a lot of guys. My forte II's in corners are about 14" from the corner which equates to about 2-3" between rear cabinet corner and corner of room.

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Dennie, you could be right with the phase.

The forte and forte ll should go down to 32Hz.

I picked up a pair once and both had no bass, I thought I messed up buying broken speakers. I removed the passive radiator on the rear and started checking connections, they were all tight. As a last shot I turned them on and started removing the wire from the bass driver as I was just looking for anything. As I wiggled the connection trying to get it off and it got louder for a second, I cleaned off the connections and never had a problem since.

It was hard to believe because the connections were very tight but somehow not making enough contact to fully work, it was like they were muted 75%. Both speakers were the same, I have no idea what caused that, I thought the drivers were ruined or the crossover was messed up.

I thought about that to Dtel. That ol' Oxidation can really foul things up. When we start playing with 20 year old speakers, we sometimes have to become sleuths and check out everything. If someone blew a woofer and installed a new one, did they wire it correctly?

I'm hoping it is something simple like that and Paul gets his bass back!!

Have the capacitors been renewed? That made a major difference in the bass for my La Scalas.

Dennie

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If your fortes were dropped hard enough to destry the base you may have another issue. The woofers have large magnets and they are very sensitive to damage from being dropped. I have seen several examples with the magnet barely hanging on to the basket. You could only determine this by a physical inspection of the woofer.

One thing I have never heard a colpaint of was the bass of the forte...

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You guys are right - I need to look inside and see if something was damaged.

However, it's not liket there's NO BASS (sorry if I said that). There is decent bass to 50 hz or so. Since the woofer crosses at something like 650 cycles, if the woofer magnet was sheared or the crossover inductor shorted/broken the speaker would have NO BASS, and NO LOWER MIDRANGE either! It would be completely unlistenable.

They're not like that. But I should probably open them up and check.

The seller is thus far ignoring my emails about the damage due to his very poor packing. There was one layer of bubble between the bottom of the speaker (base) and the box!

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You guys are right - I need to look inside and see if something was damaged.

However, it's not liket there's NO BASS (sorry if I said that). There is decent bass to 50 hz or so. Since the woofer crosses at something like 650 cycles, if the woofer magnet was sheared or the crossover inductor shorted/broken the speaker would have NO BASS, and NO LOWER MIDRANGE either! It would be completely unlistenable.

They're not like that. But I should probably open them up and check.

The seller is thus far ignoring my emails about the damage due to his very poor packing. There was one layer of bubble between the bottom of the speaker (base) and the box!

Yeah, pull the passive radiator out and take a look. I think placement can really change the bass response. It seems like I've seem a few threads on this subject and that is often the case.

That's a shame the seller is ignoring your emails. I hope he went out of town for the day and you'll hear from him soon.

The "Base" is also referred to as a "Riser" and that can help the people who think the person can't spell the word "bass" correctly. [;)]

Keep us posted Paul,

Dennie

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I've heard that the riser is very susceptible to damage in shipping. I actually shipped a Quartet that has a similar riser upside-down and had tags all over the box indicating which end was up so that it didn't get dropped riser-side down. It made the journey across the U.S. without any damage.

Little tip there for anyone who is shipping a speaker with a detachable riser.

Paul, I hope you get everything dialed in correctly. Forte IIs are amazing speakers. There's only a small handful of speakers I'd ever consider getting to replace them.

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I've got Fortes and I have had to turn the bass down so I would not make my neighbor the sheriff mad![8o|]

Check everything out for damage and make sure the speakers are at least 1 foot from the wall and should have bass down to 32 hz.

How big of a open room do you have?

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Make sure your cabinets are sealed. You can lose a lot of bass if they're leaking. They have to be air tight.

Right. I would really hope that wouldn't be an issue but who knows.

So basically you guys are all saying that the Forte II should be solid down to the low 30s? If so then yes I am a long way away from that.

A complication is that if a UPS claim is filed they will take the speakers.

My room is around 25x25 with a sloping 8-15' ceiling. Big.

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Carefully push in on the woofer and watch for the passive to extend. The passive should hold out and stay extended for a few seconds anyway. IF NOT, check for leaks.

Your room size shouldn't be an issue for the Forte IIs.

Amplification??

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AHA - the damaged speaker's woofer is dead! It will not move at all - I have never seen a driver in this state like this. I removed it and the cone has no give whatsoever from either direction. The other is fine.

Problem solved! Thanks to all of you.

My amp is a First Watt F3 - a single-ended class A transistor amp that is quite amazing.

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Glad you at least found the problem. You can always post a Wanted to Buy ad in the Garage Sale section of the forum for a K-25-K woofer.

If it were me and between the damager to the riser and the broken woofer I'd be more inclined to make the seller take them back or at least refund quite a bit of money to pay for the new woofer and then some.

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