Splitting a center for better fit? 2 ideas

[mustang guy]

For a better fit where you don't have room under a TV for the entire speaker horn type tweeter speaker. What if you removed all the components of a center speaker with two woofers and a horn tweeter horn. Then you made three separate enclosures for them. For instance, look at the Academy. The horn is vertical, which narrows its horizontal axis. Laying it on it's side would do two things. It would broaden the horizontal axis, and it would make it fit in less than 1/4th the height. The two woofers could be mounted on each side of the screen in boxes exactly 50% the volume of the whole speaker, and with half the port. The crossover would feed each component as they were in a single box.

Another idea would be to build a new enclosure which has all the drivers of the original speaker, the same volume and ports, but the overall height is the absolute minimum. The minimum height is the actual height of the woofer frame itself. Why have 2 extra inches above and 2 extra inches below the woofer? The volume would have to be made up for by making the new speaker wider and/or deeper, although it seems wider would be preferred. It seems like you could make any center speaker shorter this way.

[dimanata2007]

what kind speaker exactly are you talking about? academy center?

I'm no profy but to me separating drivers looks like a bad-to-worse idea. placing drivers on the left -right of the TV would destroy center channel idea and would bring 5.1 set up closer to 4.1 with no center.

I had two SS.5 used as a center for a while, had no $$ for decent center and didn't wanna buy c-1, c-2 or c-3. it was better than no center at all, but sound was too wide, mixing with L and R channel and was not detailed at all. it just didn't sound like HT should. single B-2 placed under TV sounded much better and RC-62II simply put my HT on completely different level.

building new encloser with different dimentions but the same volume might actually fly.

what about moving/lowering TV stand shelf or placing speaker above the TV?

[ZombieWoof]

I built a horizontal CS-1.5 & it worked great

I am now building a horizontal CornScala with Dave's Eliptrac horn

as long as you get the drivers to fit the motor board you can make up lost cubic volume by extending out the back of a speaker

IE : by making the cab deeper & having the smallest square inches in area for the motorboard that just fits the drivers

ports can placed there as well as you can go round ports & tune with the lenght of the tube

Dave worked out the port tuning for me with 2 3" ports that are just below the horn

you can do that with a CornScala design as there is no need for a folded horn center in a HT system this set-up will/would work great with Khorns or any of the folded horn Heritage speaks

[mustang guy]

Dimanata, I thought about the above TV but having the speaker closer to the level of the mains seems like it is better. Splitting the woofers to each side of the TV would cause comb filtering on bass frequencies, so I think your hunch is right. I think they need to be within 5' of oneanother.

Fastslappy, That's cool that you are doing that. I think you can shrink the height of a center to less than the height of the woofer. You know how speaker size, aka 10" speakers are measured from the edge of the frame, and the actual surround starts about an inch inside that? A 10" woofer is actually 9" from the outside edge of the suround to the other outside edge. I could cut 1/2" off the top and bottom of the frame and mount that driver in a 9" cabinet. Normally a 10" woofer would be in a minimum 12" cabinet. Look at this rudimentary drawing:

[vnzbd]

Here is a picture of an Academy with a reworked motorboard to turn the tweeter horizontal. Much improved off axis responce. I kept the tweeter a bit higher to help with the comb filtering although I can't say that I noticed it before the change. I did the same thing to a KLF-10 with favorible results. I do like the idea of the shorter cabinet as well.

[RRFL]

Here is a picture of an Academy with a reworked motorboard to turn the tweeter horizontal. Much improved off axis responce. I kept the tweeter a bit higher to help with the comb filtering although I can't say that I noticed it before the change. I did the same thing to a KLF-10 with favorible results. I do like the idea of the shorter cabinet as well.

In my opinion for when you must have a centre speaker the MTM format is a great option.

Last year I set up a 128 seat cinema the room 40'by40' with a pair of cinema Jubilee for left and right and the KPT-4350 flying above the screen for centre.

There is also a live stage in front of the screen so the LFE had to go on a shelf above the screen.

I experimented with this setup for and entire day, learning, what was possible.

In this case with 3way Jubilee, I used an Allen & Heath iDR8 10 channels in and out, with the OPPO Blue Ray driving the iDR8.

For my home system, Jubilee 2way, I will be using an Ashly NE8800 8 channels in and out to drive the amplifiers with the OPPO same same.

The point is:- I did not actually need the centre speaker. I created a "Virtual" Centre speaker in the centre of the screen by routing the centre channel into both the left and right Jubilee with a -3db gain reduction since there is two speakers rather than just one playing centre channel in this case.

With the iDR8 and NE8800 and input can be routed to any output via the central matrix. Each configuration can be saved as a preset and recalled at the touch of a button for endless A/B comparisons. They include crossovers, time alignment, EQ, level matching, whatever.

This was my plan for home and I had the opportunity to experiment with the Jubilee in corners 40' apart on either side of the screen.

The result was simply "Exquisite".

I blind tested all this on whoever was available and the virtual centre was the clear winner. Full Panavision Audio from invisible speakers. The soundscape extended out past the width of the Jubilee as if there were no speakers.

I reckon proper corner placement of your main left and right and creating a virtual centre has the advantage of simple room treatments as there are less sound sources causing complex reflections and impeding your sound scape.

I reckon a awesome home system does not need a receiver and has a speaker in each corner plus a LFE. That's 5 point sources which provides a completely effective triangulation for placing a virtual sound anywhere into the room.

To include more channels causes more unwanted room reverb and diminishing the systems potential.

[bobdog]

Here is a picture of an Academy with a reworked motorboard to turn the tweeter horizontal. Much improved off axis responce. I kept the tweeter a bit higher to help with the comb filtering although I can't say that I noticed it before the change. I did the same thing to a KLF-10 with favorible results. I do like the idea of the shorter cabinet as well.

I have read that an exponential horn actually throws sound wider when positioned vertically. It seems counterintuitive I know. My brother did the same to his Academy wishing he had not later.

[vnzbd]

Interesting thought on the tweeter vertical vs horizontal. I can say at about 12' from the speaker horizontal is my preference. I now give my kids the center of the couch and I am about 5' off of center, no complaints. As far as cutting into the Academy, I wasn't crazy about doing that. centainly not going to help resale. Hindsight says I should have just built a new cabinet.