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KLF 30 Mods


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Here is a list of all the Mods I have made to my KLF 30s. Take it for what it is. I will update it if I make any changes but at this point I don't think there is another sound I'd like to hear coming from them.

1. Removed feet and stuck flat onto a piece of carpet. I have hardwood floors.

2. Covered Mid range horns with 2 layers of gutter seal. 1/8th inch by 4" got it at Menards.

3. Stuck 1/4' weather seal foam onto the inside woofer spokes.

4. removed port tubes.

5. Removed all foam from inside of the cabinet, cut a piece of (factory) 1" foam to fit in the top and stapled it in. cut one 3" wide strip and put it down the inside of the cabinet on one side only up against the motor board. Put a piece of 1" foam on the bottom of the cabinet from the bottom of the port holes to halfway to the motorboard.

6. Reversed the wires on the Mid horn.

7. Set speakers off the wall 8.5 inches off the wall and turned inwards and placed so that the distance between the horn centers is twice the distance of the horn center to the side wall.

8. Put pieces of 14"l x 4"w carpet in front of cabinets and behind the cabinets.

9. At this time I have a piece of 2" foam spanning from above the port holes to the wall behind the speakers. It's ugly but I think it sounds good. yes I know it sounds odd and I agree that it is. But it is what it is.

10. Removed metal jumpers from terminals and replaced with 12 gauge stranded copper.

Edited by cradeldorf
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Can you do a modified vs stock comparison on how it sounds? Is the sound different in subtle ways, or did it make a big difference overall?

I like to do listening tests on all small changes, but it sounds like you did a complete makeover at once. In particular, I would be interested to know if your speaker still beams, or did the weather seal give you a wider/taller sound stage?

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Actually they are a cumulation of many, many, mod attemps, try it, listen for awhile either approve of it or change/remove it. As far as difference I'd say they went from unlistenable, to very pleasing to listen to. They do not beam at all now, and the actual soundstage enlarger was the reversing of the mid wires. The weather seal on the inside of the woofer spokes really helped the beaming more than anything believe it or not. The removal of all the foam and the rearranging of it and the removal of the port tubes made them ring out just right during dialog in movies and music.

 

Here is a picture showing the foam on the woofer spokes and on the inside of the cabinet side. And a shot of the outside. I told ya it was ugly.

post-57173-0-36380000-1402802094_thumb.j

post-57173-0-36580000-1402802647_thumb.j

Edited by cradeldorf
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Can you do a modified vs stock comparison on how it sounds? Is the sound different in subtle ways, or did it make a big difference overall?

I like to do listening tests on all small changes, but it sounds like you did a complete makeover at once. In particular, I would be interested to know if your speaker still beams, or did the weather seal give you a wider/taller sound stage?

It is doubtful that that the differences would be subtle.

In all honesty, reversing the polarity on the midrange and removing the port tubes are very questionable "improvements". Simply doing this by ear and without any measurment equipment is not going to be a good strategy.

Where do these ideas come from?

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I agree. Never trust your ears until you see some numbers first. I've mentioned this many times, but there is a mathematical relationship between the cabinet volume, the ports (tuning), and the drivers. In all honesty, I would say you ruined your loudspeakers. :(

Design changes without a way to verify what's going on is generally a bad idea.

If you want to smooth things out and open them up, while remaining confident that they will still be a fully and properly engineered product - just put some nice parts in the networks. Leave the coils alone - don't mess with them.

Edited by DeanG
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I like my 30's as is. And .. I've been fortunate that I haven't had the cabinet probs some folks have had. One early reviewer called them the best rock 'n roll speaker ever and I tend to agree. They still get a lot of HT action in our house. If I wanted to do that much modding I think I'd just get another set of speakers more to my liking. Hope you are happy with the result, though.

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My mind doesn't have to answer to measurements, It has to answer to my ears. I'm glad you guys are enjoying yours the way that they are but I just find them much more listenable now. Maybe our rooms are that much different? If I got different speakers I'd still have to do mods until they sound just right... so either way I got to where I was heading. Oh and they still do rock well, just not all screamy and annoyingly and out of timbre. Mostly they do HT duty though. . wish I could capture them on video but tried several times last night and my nikon just plain sucks at capturing them.

Edited by cradeldorf
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Can you do a modified vs stock comparison on how it sounds? Is the sound different in subtle ways, or did it make a big difference overall?

I like to do listening tests on all small changes, but it sounds like you did a complete makeover at once. In particular, I would be interested to know if your speaker still beams, or did the weather seal give you a wider/taller sound stage?

It is doubtful that that the differences would be subtle.

In all honesty, reversing the polarity on the midrange and removing the port tubes are very questionable "improvements". Simply doing this by ear and without any measurment equipment is not going to be a good strategy.

Where do these ideas come from?

Mostly they come from listening and realizing that it doesn't sound quite right. It's close but either it's not ringing out to the end smoothly and naturally or the voices that you know how they sound, don't sound right (Dull or muffled) due to the port tubes. And I hear ya Dean about the part where ears can be deceiving but usually I would notice on the next listening session that it's not right. But I have fired and refired theses up at least 30 times and they always sound perfect. So I guess I'm just happy with how they are setup at this point. Yes I understand they're engineered unfortunately I don't have an isobaric chamber living room. And without one they sound off.

Edited by cradeldorf
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Here is a list of all the Mods I have made to my KLF 30s. Take it for what it is. I will update it if I make any changes but at this point I don't think there is another sound I'd like to hear coming from them.

1. Removed feet and stuck flat onto a piece of carpet. I have hardwood floors.

Reasonable - not too much impact but likely to help on hardwood floors

2. Covered Mid range horns with 2 layers of gutter seal. 1/8th inch by 4" got it at Menards.

OK

3. Stuck 1/4' weather seal foam onto the inside woofer spokes.

OK

4. removed port tubes.

Raised the port tuning, maybe a little more punchy with less deep bass. More mid-range seeping through the port openings.

5. Removed all foam from inside of the cabinet, cut a piece of (factory) 1" foam to fit in the top and stapled it in. cut one 3" wide strip and put it down the inside of the cabinet on one side only up against the motor board. Put a piece of 1" foam on the bottom of the cabinet from the bottom of the port holes to halfway to the motorboard.

More mid-range seeping through the port openings.

6. Reversed the wires on the Mid horn.

Likely put a notch in the mid-range crossover region that some folks like - More "70's West Coast sound". The stock KLF-30s measure fairly flat in this region

7. Set speakers off the wall 8.5 inches off the wall and turned inwards and placed so that the distance between the horn centers is twice the distance of the horn center to the side wall.

8. Put pieces of 14"l x 4"w carpet in front of cabinets and behind the cabinets.

9. At this time I have a piece of 2" foam spanning from above the port holes to the wall behind the speakers. It's ugly but I think it sounds good. yes I know it sounds odd and I agree that it is. But it is what it is.

Removes some of what mid-range that is seeping through the port openings.

10. Removed metal jumpers from terminals and replaced with 12 gauge stranded copper.

Good Idea

Glad you like the sound you have. Your room probably dictates much of the sound.

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Depends on design, height off floor, and the woofer's required loading.

Interesting it talks about the lowest octave and shows a La Scala. They do need all the help they can get so it makes sense to have the closest to quarter or eighth space loading.

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"The midrange horn is slightly smaller than that of the Klipschorn."

Huh?

Yes, caught that too. Marketing office blunder.

My KLF-30s sit a few feet in from the corners that K-horns lived in for over 10 yrs. They are on the small furniture dollies that Harbor Freight sells (about 5 inches off the floor). Makes them easy to move when I swap out the very large speakers I have. I can say there is nothing missing in the bass department, even compared to the khorns. There is one area on the KLFs that need a little help and that is just below midrange cut off. If that could be dropped down a little (not sure if the horn will handle it) and the woofers peak in that area smoothed, they would be in another league. I haven't had to mess with the tweeter or anything since the room is 22'x20' and wide open to the back. My original pair I sold to a buddy of mine, I needed to tame the tweeters because the room was much smaller.

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"The midrange horn is slightly smaller than that of the Klipschorn."

Huh?

Yes, caught that too. Marketing office blunder.

There is one area on the KLFs that need a little help and that is just below midrange cut off.

That's exactly what I was experiencing, Peggy Bundy's voice would be normal loudness and when Al started talking you could barely hear him, like the speakers was missing a small part of the frequency range. Reversing the Mid wires seemed to cure it. Or at least I don't notice the major dropoff anymore.

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