mark1101 Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 Al, what you need to develop is a device to hold the listener's head in exactly the right position so the time alignment is always just right. I envision something like those halo devices for when someone breaks their neck. Perhaps it could have a drink holder or ash tray mounted on it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Klappenberger Posted February 11, 2011 Author Share Posted February 11, 2011 Mark, Yeah! I bet you could get one of those at you local hospital. They use them to keep a patient's head still during brain surgery! [:$] On second thought, loudspeakers are just too much trouble. Everybody needs to replace them with headphones. They don't have all these problems! Al K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deafbykhorns Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 I just bought one of these off Ebay after reading this thread. However, I made some modifications and fix mounted it to the couch so I can slip right in and the wife can bolt me up. I think the vertical braces need some sort of acoustic treatment. You fix one problem and creates another! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 The Danley Synergy Horns (SH series) integrate the tweeter with all the other speaker's drivers (midrange, woofer). Maybe there is good reason to integrate them into one horn? The delays have to be made correctly (according to Tom Danley). Chris Well it certainly helps with time-alignment in all directions, but at the expense of extra distortion and some time smear. Definitely an interesting approach. I would like to see something like this a bit more large scale to take the place of line arrays. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djk Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 " I would like to see something like this a bit more large scale to take the place of line arrays." http://www.danleysoundlabs.com/pdf/JH90%20spec%20sheet.pdf http://www.danleysoundlabs.com/pdf/GH60%20spec%20sheet.pdf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris A Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 ...but at the expense of extra distortion and some time smear. Could you explain this comment a bit more? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 The sound from the delayed drivers travels in both directions when it enters the horn, so you get a delay off the throat....as well as a reflection off the adjacent side of the horn. You've also got the diffraction slot happening and an impedance mismatch until the wave fills the horn. There is also the behavior where increasing the bandwidth for a given cross-sectional area increases distortion...essentially the high frequency content gets modulated by the low frequency content and tbe clip point of the throat will be sooner. The tweeter diaphragm is also going to be modulated slightly (like a passive radiator) by the focusing of the low frequency content in the throat. I am sure Danley is aware of these issues and has tried to minimize the audible effects as much as possible, but it's just the nature of the beast. One benefit for Danley is that these artifacts don't show up in the popular measurements, so the marketing material can look really good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ClaudeJ1 Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 I am sure Danley is aware of these issues and has tried to minimize the audible effects as much as possible, but it's just the nature of the beast. One benefit for Danley is that these artifacts don't show up in the popular measurements, so the marketing material can look really good. Perhaps this is true, however, like the Quad ESL 63, being able to pass square waves over a full decade 250-2500 Hz in "the most important midband" make a speaker truly "phase coherent" by definition. I have heard the Quads and they are amazing in detail and imaging (from the sweet spot), but with severely limited dynamics. I think Danley is on to something great and I would love to have a go at his Synergy Horns with my test CD's.......the same material Klipsch engineers use to voice their speakers. Theory is fine to a point, but how does it SOUND. Recently, I have enjoyed listning to Open Baffle loudspeakers (think Linkwitz) and they have incredible depth of imaging.....unachievable by any horn I have heard or owned. But, at 90 db efficiency, you need quite a bit of power (300-500 WPC) to get the dynamics out of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris A Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 The sound from the delayed drivers travels in both directions when it enters the horn, so you get a delay off the throat....as well as a reflection off the adjacent side of the horn. Does the fact that, except for the tweeter, the rest of the drivers being within 1/4 wavelength of each other and close to the throat of the horn--have any bearing on the throat delay/bounce comment?You've also got the diffraction slot happening and an impedance mismatch until the wave fills the horn.I'm still not sure about the impedance mismatch issue (I think that I understand, but I'm not sure -- it would be nice to understand the concept of the dynamics that you're envisioning).There is also the behavior where increasing the bandwidth for a given cross-sectional area increases distortion...essentially the high frequency content gets modulated by the low frequency content and the clip point of the throat will be sooner.Clearly, FM distortion is the trade-off or downside of co-axially aligned or full-range driver systems that must be offset by other performance improvements gained by using those design approaches. Using horn-loaded drivers minimize the needed displacements of the drivers' diaphragms, thus minimizing FM distortion (i.e., this is PWK's argument--in fact he said it would decrease FM distortion by 25 dB over a direct radiator's FM distortion, but you already know this argument). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudy81 Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 Not to change the subject, but any reviews on the new Eliptrac horn? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Klappenberger Posted February 12, 2011 Author Share Posted February 12, 2011 Rudy, I'll probably be posting some polar plots next week. The news now is that Dave has finished the 2 Inch to 1.4 Inch to 1 Inch adapter. It separates near the middle where it fits a 1.4 Inch driver. The ends reduce from 2 Inch down to 1 Inch. The neat thing is that it's true round Tractrix expansion all the way to the 2 inch diameter and continues elliptic on to mouth of the Eliptrac horn. It provide the correct mounting flange for each driver size . There is no jury rigging of any sort. Al K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudy81 Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 Al, you guys are all over this! Great job. I am really curious as to the potential benefits of this horn vs. standard horns or in my case a CD P. Audio horn. For those of us who are much less knowledgeable, can you explain what the theoretical benefits should be? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Klappenberger Posted February 12, 2011 Author Share Posted February 12, 2011 Rudy, I am no horn expert by any means. I'm really not the guy to ask! As I understand it, the advantage is in the termination of the mouth to the room. The abrupt transition is greatly reduced. Transitions like that cause reflections back to the driver. The Elliptic idea simply expands the area of the mouth so that it's big enough to support a cutoff low enough to work down to 400 Hz where the Khorn needs to be crossed over. A round Tractrix is just too big to fit. In the case of the Edgar type horn the transition is smooth in the horizontal plane only. The exponential horn has an abrupt transition to the room in every direction! The round tractrix mouth is smooth in every direction. The Elliptic is simply the best compromise. Al K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudy81 Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 Thank you Al. You certainly are know more than I do about horn acoustics. I have been reading about the differences in horn design and your explanation makes sense. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudy81 Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 Al, are you aware of any round horns designed for a 2" driver? If one were not concerned with fitting the horn in a top hat, the round horn seems like the ideal way to go. Reason I'm asking is that one of the best systems I have ever heard was a pair of Oris horns with Lowther drivers. The imaging and spaciousness of the soundstage was as good as I have ever heard in any system. I am looking around right now, but other than the Oris horn maker, I have yet to come upon a round horn made for a 2" compression driver. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Klappenberger Posted February 13, 2011 Author Share Posted February 13, 2011 Rudy, No, but I would think a 2-inch round Tractrix should be easy to find. I would be surprised if they are not available, but I never looked. I'm quite sure Dave Harris (Gothover) could make you a set though. The computer program I wrote to design the Eliptrac horn will do round horns too. Sample below. It would be 13 diameter mouth. 10 1.4 Inch long and cut off at about 328 Hz. AlK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Klappenberger Posted February 13, 2011 Author Share Posted February 13, 2011 And, just for laughs: Al K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudy81 Posted February 13, 2011 Share Posted February 13, 2011 Al, thank you again. I looked for quite a while yesterday afternoon and there are not many round horns available. I found this site: www.bd-design.nl which has the Orphean MKII. Otherwise, I could not find a single soul that sells such a thing. I found that interesting since based on this discussion it seems a round horn has the least compromise. Is my understanding correct that a round horn would be optimum? I have already contacted Dave and we'll see if he can gin something up for me. It would be very interesting to compare the performance between a round horn and an eliptrac. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Klappenberger Posted February 13, 2011 Author Share Posted February 13, 2011 Rudy, " Is my understanding correct that a round horn would be optimum?" Actually no! A round horn is only optimum for reflections off the mouth and probably diffraction too. BUT: It has no dispersion control. It has the same directivity pattern horizontally and vertically. You would like the horizontal dispersion to be wider than the vertical. I think the Elliptic is the best compromise. Lee Clinton said he would be doing both horizontal and vertical polar plots on the first Eliptrac 400 prototype and HF200 driver next week. That should illustrate the point. Al K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seti Posted February 13, 2011 Share Posted February 13, 2011 Al, thank you again. I looked for quite a while yesterday afternoon and there are not many round horns available. I found this site: www.bd-design.nl which has the Orphean MKII. Otherwise, I could not find a single soul that sells such a thing. I found that interesting since based on this discussion it seems a round horn has the least compromise. Is my understanding correct that a round horn would be optimum? I have already contacted Dave and we'll see if he can gin something up for me. It would be very interesting to compare the performance between a round horn and an eliptrac. Did you come across stereo lab? http://www.stereo-lab.de/EN/spheric-wave-tractrix-horns/index.html I've read reviews where the horns aren't very acurately made but I'm not sure if that is still true. I like the design of Dave's horns better. The quality also seems better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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