JohnJohn Posted April 3, 2002 Share Posted April 3, 2002 Can someone tell me the correct way to bi-amp a speaker. I want to use a ss amp to power the woofers and use two tube mono-amps to power each tweeter. Any suggestions? How do I connect this set-up through my pre-amp without destroying anything in the process? This message has been edited by JohnJohn on 04-03-2002 at 10:56 PM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnA Posted April 4, 2002 Share Posted April 4, 2002 You need an electronic crossover. It goes between the preamp and the power amps. You should use the same crossover frequency and slopes in the original crossover. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ray Garrison Posted April 4, 2002 Share Posted April 4, 2002 John's answer assumes that the speaker was not designed for bi-amping. What kind of speaker are we talking about? ------------------ Music is art Audio is engineering Ray's Music System Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnA Posted April 4, 2002 Share Posted April 4, 2002 Well, he didn't say "passive bi-amping". JohnJohn, you might try Harrison F-mods on the inputs of your amps for the crossover. They are only in 12 dB/octave and in discrete frequencies, but you can get high and low pass at the same frequency. John This message has been edited by John Albright on 04-04-2002 at 01:12 PM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJohn Posted April 4, 2002 Author Share Posted April 4, 2002 The speakers are a pair of Monitor Audio 1200s that are about 14 years old.I have them bi-wired at the present time to a Hafler 500 amp along with a Hafler 110 as a pre-amp.I thought that I would try to connect two McIntosh MC-75s to the tweeters but since I have a couple of Eico HF-52s that I am not using, maybe they would be a better choice. I am using the MC-75s in another system for Jazz which sounds wonderful through an old pair of Advent speakers!(well I like the sound) The Monitors are used mainly for Clasical Music in the "living area" of the house. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ray Garrison Posted April 5, 2002 Share Posted April 5, 2002 JohnJohn, If I understand this correctly, you currently have a Hafler 110 preamp. This is driving a Hafler 500 stereo amp. You have biwired the Monitors by running two sets of speaker cables from the amp to the speakers. You want to continue to use the solid state Hafler to drive the bass sections 'cause you're happy with that, but you'd like to experiment with using tubes, with the Mac 75s or the Eicos driving the upper range. Okey dokey. The biggest challenge will be the difference in gain between the Hafler and the Eico or Mac. You need some way to adjust the input level going into the tweeter or woofer amp so that the output levels are balanced. (There may be a host of other issues you'll need to deal with, but if you can't get the output levels synchronised then everything else is pretty much moot.) I can think of at least two ways to do this. The most correctest way, and the one with the highest likelyhood of success, is what John suggested, getting an active external crossover. Check out http://www.snippets.org/filters/crossover.htm they have some very interesting kits. A cheaper alternative that might work and would be a lot simpler would be to put a passive attenuator between the preamp and whichever amp turns out to have more gain. That is, if the Hafler's power output level is much higher than the Eico's at identical input levels, put a widget like the Marchand Electric ATT46-2 (see http://www.marchandelec.com ) in front of the Hafler. If it works okay, this would be a lot less expensive. Once you get the relative output levels *NSYNC with each other, you'll probably find you've got some other issues to deal with. For example, the two amps might not track exactly the same way - that is, the relative gain at an input level of 0.1 volts might be different than at an input level of, say, 1.0 volts. If this is true, I don't know how you'd fix it. I'm sure other posters will chip in... hopefully someone who's actually TRIED this, rather than someone (me! ) who's just going on baseless speculation... Ray, never afraid to offer advise in areas he has no expertise in... ------------------ Music is art Audio is engineering Ray's Music System Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJohn Posted April 6, 2002 Author Share Posted April 6, 2002 Thank you John And Ray for your replys and links. I searched several links last night and realized I must have opened Pandora's Box by mistake! Jeez, all I wanted to do was to improve on the natural sound of vocals. I didn't think I would get into trouble with Ohm's Law over this!! I might fry a couple of tweeters in the process by mistake. What encouraged me to take this path was the experience that I had listening to a system which had been bi-amped. This guy had wired two McIntosh MC-60s to his tweeters and had used a Mark Levinson ss amp to power his woofers. Well, that was the start of a quest to find "THE PERFECT SOUND"... kind of like the HOLY GRAIL. That was over seven years ago but the guy moved before I had a chance to ask him how he had wired everything. I suppose he must have used a cross-over in his system. I wish I could describe the detail in that female's voice as she sang her jazz piece..it was from an LP but I can't remember the kind of turntable he used. It probably isn't as important as the fact that he had found the sound that pleased him and it was a combination of tubes and ss that worked well together. John This message has been edited by JohnJohn on 04-06-2002 at 03:19 PM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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