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"Smoothing" inside of metal mid-horns?


davemac

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14 hours ago, mungkiman said:

Does it help if you check the "remember me" box when you next sign in?

 

 

 

Not sure. I'm trying it now. I'll take my time with a couple replies and see what happens. I try to get my posts "right" so I can get my points across without writing a book. I also have a mild dyslexia and sometimes I have to do a bit of editing. (Actually, I'm sure it's the keyboard's fault!) If 10-15 minutes go by without submitting the post gets archived and I have to sign back in before it will let me submit.

 

EDIT: Hey, it looks like that may be working! Thanks, Mungkiman!

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6 hours ago, ricktate said:

I could not say....I did them both together. I have no testing equipment to verify. I have never seen anyone test a smoothed horn against a stock rough one. But pretty sure smooth has to be better. I do think the enamel paint on inside and out helped the ringing part. I painted one and held it up and hit it with a piece of wood it sounded different than the one not painted.  I also put dampening material on the center outside of the horn hard to see in pic though.

 

Looks good, Rick. I don't know enough about the science of horns and what actually happens to the sound waves with different reflective surfaces. A little smoothing of obvious rough areas such as I've found is probably beneficial where polishing to a slick mirror finish could prove to be drastically worse. I know that room treatments generally involve removing reflections (rugs on wood floors,etc.) so maybe something similar applies to the insides of horns?

 

I have some aural testing of my own to do.

 

I completely wrapped the metal mids and the plastic Crites tweeter horns with rope calk and things sound very smooth and clean but I'm thinking it might be a little too much damping. I'm going to re-swap the caulked mids and tweeters for the other two undamped ones and listen again. If I still think they could use some damping I'll add smaller squares of caulk to the wider areas, as you did, and maybe increase in stages. It'll be tedious but I have to learn this stuff by doing.

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4 hours ago, JJkizak said:

It seems logical to radius the wood opening to match the logarithmic contour of the inside of the horn and not a straight 45 degrees.

JJK

 

Hey JJK,

 

Yes, seems logical to my layman's mind, too. And a lot easier that trying to flush mount everything to the front of the motorboard. It's definitely going in the plan book for later when I can properly set up my dedicated listening room.

 

Thanks for the input.

Dave

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What are you hearing with the rope caulk vs without?  I have 2 pairs of Cornwalls with same internals except one a previous owner had neatly cut and applied Dynamat to the entire exterior of the midhorn.  I never had them side by side to compare this but I'm curious.  I'm thinking that you aren't hurting anything anyway.

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5 hours ago, muel said:

What are you hearing with the rope caulk vs without?  I have 2 pairs of Cornwalls with same internals except one a previous owner had neatly cut and applied Dynamat to the entire exterior of the midhorn.  I never had them side by side to compare this but I'm curious.  I'm thinking that you aren't hurting anything anyway.

 

Hi Muel,

 

It's a little hard to say at this point. (I just this minute replied to "ricktate"  about it.)

 

To recap: I kind of jumped in head first and installed the Crites tweeters and A55 mid drivers and caulked/damped the horn lenses. So my first audition the other night was with the combination of new drivers and damping. I really should have waited on the damping for a more fair comparison, but . . . .

 

I re-EQ'd the room with the modded speakers and tried different records with different "sounds." I immediately felt that the overall sound was smoother and cleaner. I have pretty wide eclectic tastes but mostly I'm a 63 year-old rock-n-roller with music from the distorted in-your-face '60s up into some more recent better produced stuff. At first I wasn't completely happy with the highs - they seemed slightly attenuated - but I found that I could listen louder without getting up and dialing back the treble a bit. Harmonies on Abbey Road were really nice and warm. Doc Watson and his guitar? Wow, is he in the room? ELP's first album, Emerson's somewhat harsh organ in particular, benefited from the less fatiguing sound. That's it in a nutshell - warmer and less fatiguing. I do like a "crisp" sound and I still get that but I have to continue to play with things before a resounding final verdict. The "better" Crites drivers and the fully damped horns do sound really good. Which part has more impact? Don't know yet. Maybe I just need to get used to it. If you're not going with the smoother A55 mid driver you might benefit more from some damping. Of course everybody's ears are different and your mileage may vary.

 

I also have four Cornwalls that I'm modding so next up is to switch out the caulked tweeters and mids for identicals without the caulk and see how good my audio memory really is. (I'm not able to A/B side by side either so thank God for drills with screwdriver bits.) Depending on how drastic a difference I hear I might try increasing amounts of caulk on the wide flare of the horns instead of totally covering them. It's a tedious job but someone's got to do it. Hopefully I can get into this over the next couple days. I'm retired but not exactly "out of work."

 

It's all very subjective but I hope it helps.

 

All I wanted to do was try some new midrange drivers and now I'm filing and caulking and who knows what else.

 

Routing motorboard openings?

 

Are we having fun yet?

 

Dave

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17 hours ago, davemac said:

 

Hey JJK,

 

Yes, seems logical to my layman's mind, too. And a lot easier that trying to flush mount everything to the front of the motorboard. It's definitely going in the plan book for later when I can properly set up my dedicated listening room.

 

Thanks for the input.

Dave

 

I mounted my k-400s on the fronts, but not flush. First I had to make a template to make the opening slightly larger. I am contemplating a pretty face, a panel cut out that will fit around the horn, effectively making them flush.

 

Bruce

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4 hours ago, Marvel said:

 

I mounted my k-400s on the fronts, but not flush. First I had to make a template to make the opening slightly larger. I am contemplating a pretty face, a panel cut out that will fit around the horn, effectively making them flush.

 

Bruce

 

 

LaScalas, right? Would you need to move the tweeter forward to be on the same plane? (As long as it's not Delta! Ba-da-boom!) I don't know that my ears could hear a difference but I'm sure there's someone out there who'd comment about "timing" or some such. I really don't know enough about such things so forgive me for just throwing s*** out there. Doesn't Crites or someone offer brackets to flush mount tweeters and maybe even mids?

 

Dave

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Actually, the tweeters work better if they are (drivers) aligned, which would mean moving them back. I have a pair of Eminence APT150s in baffles on top of my cabs, but moved rearward.

 

Bruce

 

20170325_172744.jpg

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2 hours ago, Marvel said:

Actually, the tweeters work better if they are (drivers) aligned, which would mean moving them back. I have a pair of Eminence APT150s in baffles on top of my cabs, but moved rearward.

 

Bruce

 

 

 

 

Huh, look at that. So, the tweeters don't necessarily need to be enclosed in the cabinet, just in a stable mounting surface? Not that I'm keen on trying that with the Cornwalls. Baby steps . . . . . baby steps.

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11 hours ago, Marvel said:

 

I mounted my k-400s on the fronts, but not flush. First I had to make a template to make the opening slightly larger. I am contemplating a pretty face, a panel cut out that will fit around the horn, effectively making them flush.

 

Bruce

 

 

For a prototype panel you could look for some 1/4" MDF with more of a golden brown color. Sometimes the 2X4 sheets have some faint sort of blotchy figuring in the surface that might look nice with some clear satin or semi-gloss polyurethane. The MinWax clear polyurethane actually dries with a slight golden cast. I used some on an oak record shelf I built and it looks pretty nice. Cut it to the size you want and use the horn flange to outline your cutout. If you're handy with an electric jigsaw cut the hole just inside the line and sand to exact size. That way you can accommodate the slightly rounded corners and sides of the flange. If that works out you can use the panel with the sanded-to-size horn opening as a template for whatever other wood or material you might prefer. You could even double-side tape the panel to the motorboard if you don't think it would vibrate or resonate. Maybe a matching 1/4" trim on the front cabinet perimeter. Just a thought.

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On 8/15/2017 at 10:17 AM, davemac said:

 

Looks good, Rick. I don't know enough about the science of horns and what actually happens to the sound waves with different reflective surfaces. A little smoothing of obvious rough areas such as I've found is probably beneficial where polishing to a slick mirror finish could prove to be drastically worse. I know that room treatments generally involve removing reflections (rugs on wood floors,etc.) so maybe something similar applies to the insides of horns?

 

I have some aural testing of my own to do.

 

I completely wrapped the metal mids and the plastic Crites tweeter horns with rope calk and things sound very smooth and clean but I'm thinking it might be a little too much damping. I'm going to re-swap the caulked mids and tweeters for the other two undamped ones and listen again. If I still think they could use some damping I'll add smaller squares of caulk to the wider areas, as you did, and maybe increase in stages. It'll be tedious but I have to learn this stuff by doing.

any noise that the horn body makes will be and is distortion added to the input signal. so are you suggesting that there is some amount of unwanted resonance which will sound better than none? Some might suggest that the horn body resonance might have been accounted for in the xover (I do not believe this myself past a possible adjustment in output level) but that is another discussion and does not change the fact that if a horn body of a cabinet wall or any part of a loudspeaker resonates then that resonance is unwanted and distortion.

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12 hours ago, davemac said:

 

 

Huh, look at that. So, the tweeters don't necessarily need to be enclosed in the cabinet, just in a stable mounting surface? Not that I'm keen on trying that with the Cornwalls. Baby steps . . . . . baby steps.

 

Leaving the vacant tweeter hole in the La Scala is not a problem.  It would be necessary to fill that hole on a Cornwall to avoid messing with the bass.

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8 hours ago, moray james said:

any noise that the horn body makes . . . is distortion added to the input signal. so are you suggesting that there is some amount of unwanted resonance which will sound better than none? Some might suggest that the horn body resonance might have been accounted for in the xover (I do not believe this myself past a possible adjustment in output level) but that is another discussion and does not change the fact that if a horn body of a cabinet wall or any part of a loudspeaker resonates then that resonance is unwanted and distortion.

 

It seems to me that the Heritage lines were designed for, accepted, and released with their signature Klipsch sounds without the perceived need for flange gasketing, horn damping, changing crossover slopes, or whatever. A lot of folks bought 'em and love 'em. I'm vaguely remembering a comment where PWK himself seemed disdainful of any gaskets between the mounting flanges and the wood cabinet. But it's these older speakers with the metal horns and the "ringing" that some people complain about that those same people say benefit from some amount of horn damping. In my lurking around in various forums I don't recall many, if any, similar comments regarding the "newer" lines with the structurally reinforced-looking resin horns. Klipsch's suggested reasons for the various horn and driver changes in the '80s run from simple cost to actual sound improvements. Who really knows? I sure don't.

 

Now that I'm retired I'm taking the time to "play" more aggressively with what has been my couch potato hobby. I'm reading the forums and trying as best I can to suss out the gold nuggets from the halfway believable BS and when I find myself somewhere around the middle I begin experimenting. Trying some recommended new crossovers and drivers was the beginning. "Smoothing" the horn insides (the original subject, remember that?) was an extension of that. A logical progression from there was trying the whole damping thing. Some people say I'm very trying but I'll keep trying reasonable things until my ears think I've finally got it right.

 

I completely wrapped both the tweeter and metal mid horn lenses with rope caulk, installed lower distortion drivers, listened, and even though the sound was very smooth and clean I thought I probably went too far with the damping. It felt like the sound actually may have needed a little resonance or distortion. Or maybe I just wasn't used to the speakers sounding that kind of good. I literally grew up with the "signature" bright and maybe sometimes a little harsh sound of my '76 Corns, bought new, with the only change being a set of Dean's crossovers about 10 years ago. Maybe I've just accepted that some resonance and distortion is the norm. Over the years I've upgraded my TT/cartridge, preamp, and amp, so now I've turned my idle and questionable attention to my speakers. What's next for the '80s Corns? Remove the caulk and start again with bare horns like I should have done at the beginning. If my ears say it's too bright and I feel that compensating treble adjustments are too great then I'll add a little strategic damping. And then maybe a little more. Until it sounds right.

 

My mistake was I upgraded the drivers and did the damping at the same time and right now I can't really say which had the greater effect. (I'll find out later today.) A lot of people sing the praises of Bob Crites' smoother T120 tweeter and A-55-G mid driver. There's also a definite effect from resonance damping. You can debate things all the live-long day but they're your speakers so you really have to try things and let your own ears decide what's best for you.

 

Jeez, I think I've got diarrhea of the keyboard! 

 

Too much booze is bad for you, a little booze is good for you. I agree that extraneous vibration and resonance can add unwanted distortion. I'm just not sure that it's all bad.

 

Later, folks.

 

Dave

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1 hour ago, davemac said:

 

It seems to me that the Heritage lines were designed for, accepted, and released with their signature Klipsch sounds without the perceived need for flange gasketing, horn damping, changing crossover slopes, or whatever. A lot of folks bought 'em and love 'em. I'm vaguely remembering a comment where PWK himself seemed disdainful of any gaskets between the mounting flanges and the wood cabinet. But it's these older speakers with the metal horns and the "ringing" that some people complain about that those same people say benefit from some amount of horn damping. In my lurking around in various forums I don't recall many, if any, similar comments regarding the "newer" lines with the structurally reinforced-looking resin horns. Klipsch's suggested reasons for the various horn and driver changes in the '80s run from simple cost to actual sound improvements. Who really knows? I sure don't.

 

Now that I'm retired I'm taking the time to "play" more aggressively with what has been my couch potato hobby. I'm reading the forums and trying as best I can to suss out the gold nuggets from the halfway believable BS and when I find myself somewhere around the middle I begin experimenting. Trying some recommended new crossovers and drivers was the beginning. "Smoothing" the horn insides (the original subject, remember that?) was an extension of that. A logical progression from there was trying the whole damping thing. Some people say I'm very trying but I'll keep trying reasonable things until my ears think I've finally got it right.

 

I completely wrapped both the tweeter and metal mid horn lenses with rope caulk, installed lower distortion drivers, listened, and even though the sound was very smooth and clean I thought I probably went too far with the damping. It felt like the sound actually may have needed a little resonance or distortion. Or maybe I just wasn't used to the speakers sounding that kind of good. I literally grew up with the "signature" bright and maybe sometimes a little harsh sound of my '76 Corns, bought new, with the only change being a set of Dean's crossovers about 10 years ago. Maybe I've just accepted that some resonance and distortion is the norm. Over the years I've upgraded my TT/cartridge, preamp, and amp, so now I've turned my idle and questionable attention to my speakers. What's next for the '80s Corns? Remove the caulk and start again with bare horns like I should have done at the beginning. If my ears say it's too bright and I feel that compensating treble adjustments are too great then I'll add a little strategic damping. And then maybe a little more. Until it sounds right.

 

My mistake was I upgraded the drivers and did the damping at the same time and right now I can't really say which had the greater effect. (I'll find out later today.) A lot of people sing the praises of Bob Crites' smoother T120 tweeter and A-55-G mid driver. There's also a definite effect from resonance damping. You can debate things all the live-long day but they're your speakers so you really have to try things and let your own ears decide what's best for you.

   "Who really knows? " Everyone who measures or has the ears trained to hear these things. Just because you cannot identify something does not mean it is not there or having an impact. There are all manner of reasons why things go unnoticed.

 

Jeez, I think I've got diarrhea of the keyboard! 

 

Too much booze is bad for you, a little booze is good for you. I agree that extraneous vibration and resonance can add unwanted distortion. I'm just not sure that it's all bad.

 

Later, folks.

 

Dave

with respect to your first paragraph, the modifications mentioned cost far more than a manufacturer can afford that is the simple truth or  they are not worth the improvement to the end user if he has to pay for them by the time the product reaches the market place but that does not mean that they are worthless or not valid. DIY is the end user's opportunity to play catch up and make good the undone things the manufactures simply could not afford to do.

   "Who really knows?" Everyone who measures these things or who has training and experience listening for such things that's who. Just because someone may not notice or recognize distortions does not mean they do not exist or have an impact upon the sound that they hear. For example large format compression drivers have about half the distortion of small format compression drivers. That is not a subjective statement that is a fact. If someone listens to a comparison of small format drivers Vs large format drivers and does not perceive a difference or simply does not feel the difference is worth the cost that changes nothing. The choice is a choice and the fact remains.

   With regards to your trial of damping material I think that you may find that Duct Seal is much more effective material than rope caulk due to its higher density and that dynamat is better again (constrained layer damping) and is much much cleaner and easier to use than either rope caulk or duct seal. The more that you experiment the more that you spend time listening for differences the better able you will be able to hear and find the differences and the more that you will ultimately hear in your music. What  you are doing is a lot of work effort and money and you are in a territory most audiophiles never enter.

   Here is a truth that PWK would agree with, if it moves it distorts, the more it moves the more it distorts. Vibration damping when done properly and with the right material can have a most dramatic impact upon the quality of the sound your system can reproduce enhancing clarity detail and dynamics. Give your changes some time so you can adjust to the new. Doing mods which allow for side by side back and forth comparisons is very helpful but they are not always possible or practical. Listening is a skill and like any other skill it will improve with practice. You deserve much credit for being willing to wade into the very deep and dark end of the pool. Your efforts will be rewarded. Keep on and report back I am sure that your accounts have an will motivate many others to do just what you are doing, reaching for more.

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22 hours ago, moray james said:

any noise that the horn body makes will be and is distortion added to the input signal. so are you suggesting that there is some amount of unwanted resonance which will sound better than none? Some might suggest that the horn body resonance might have been accounted for in the xover (I do not believe this myself past a possible adjustment in output level) but that is another discussion and does not change the fact that if a horn body of a cabinet wall or any part of a loudspeaker resonates then that resonance is unwanted and distortion.

 

8 hours ago, moray james said:

   With regards to your trial of damping material I think that you may find that Duct Seal is much more effective material than rope caulk due to its higher density and that dynamat is better again (constrained layer damping) and is much much cleaner and easier to use than either rope caulk or duct seal. The more that you experiment the more that you spend time listening for differences the better able you will be able to hear and find the differences and the more that you will ultimately hear in your music. What  you are doing is a lot of work effort and money and you are in a territory most audiophiles never enter.

   Here is a truth that PWK would agree with, if it moves it distorts, the more it moves the more it distorts. Vibration damping when done properly and with the right material can have a most dramatic impact upon the quality of the sound your system can reproduce enhancing clarity detail and dynamics. Give your changes some time so you can adjust to the new. Doing mods which allow for side by side back and forth comparisons is very helpful but they are not always possible or practical. Listening is a skill and like any other skill it will improve with practice. You deserve much credit for being willing to wade into the very deep and dark end of the pool. Your efforts will be rewarded. Keep on and report back I am sure that your accounts have an will motivate many others to do just what you are doing, reaching for more.

 

Thanks MorayJames for all your comments and the vote of confidence.

 

(Maybe I should start another thread on Damping instead of continuing this side-line here?)

 

In my rambling and roundabout way I think I was agreeing with you. I've been listening to the same set of '76 Corns since, well, 1976. Even in all that time I haven't really hung with many people with much experience with high-end audio (I got some awesome speakers! They're 100 watts! You get the picture.) My music listening has always been a somewhat solitary pursuit - others just weren't into it the way I was. So, like many of us blissful ignorants I guess my subconscious just accepted that whatever it was coming out of my Cornwalls was simply what I was supposed to be hearing and I was content with that. A modest inheritance allowed me to upgrade some other components and I started checking out various forums where I began learning a little about tweaks and mods and such. I learned about Bob Crites and his parts upgrades and about the benefits of horn damping on the Steve Hoffman music forums. Having bought some crossovers from Dean G through this Forum some years ago I found myself checking back over here and started asking questions.

 

And here we are.

 

Side by side A/B-ing is not doable for me so my head-first leap into damping is modify, listen, modify, listen  . . . . I went with rope caulk instead of researching further because it was suggested, it's cheap, and Home Depot is 10 minutes away. Baby steps. I really did like the fully damped sound but it felt like something was missing. (Again, maybe I'm just too used to the original brighter sound.) So tonight I pulled the caulked horns and installed the undamped ones to get back to square 1. Well, Square 2 -- new drivers. Re-EQ the room. It does sound very bright and frankly a bit harsh in the vocals on Abbey Road. OK, add a hand-sized patch of caulk to the top of the mid horn. Re-re-EQ the room (some subtle changes.) Hm-m-m-m. Sounds quite bit nicer. The Beatles' harmonies are much warmer. Side 1 of Dark Side Of The Moon sounds really good! Must be that little extra bit of distortion, eh? :lol: Tomorrow, Doc Watson.

 

Respecting your advice I'll leave things where they are while I look for some Dynamat. Plus I have an excuse for some extended, long overdue listening sessions.

 

I replied to "muel's" question earlier and closed with, "Are we having fun yet?"

 

Yeah. I think we are.

 

Later,

Dave

 

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