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Home theater with Khorns


jebartist

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I have a pair of absolutely mint 1987 Klipschorns with original AK-2 xovers in them. I bought them a few months ago from the original owner. I wasn't really looking for khorns, but they popped up locally so I jumped on them. These were 10 miles from my house, so it was a no brainer really. 

 

Anyway, I was/still am building my home theater and now the front left and right mains are khorns. I am no trying to decide what to use for surrounds. I will be putting together a 7.2.4 setup. Right now, I'm in the middle of putting all new flooring and paint in my soon to be home theater.

 

I'm leaning towards using Heresy's for the side and rear surrounds. Maybe even one for the center channel or put together a custom center channel from spare parts I would have to acquire. 

 

What would everyone's recommendation be? La Scala's are out of the picture. No room for them. The rear surrounds have some space, but the side surrounds would need to be pressed tight against the wall.

 

Thanks!

 

P.S.. The Klipschorns need crossover work and possibly other mods. I will address those after I get the room setup. For now, I'm focusing on acquiring all the speakers.

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Welcome

 

Sounds like a good plan, the only difference is I would just update the caps in the crossover or go with a different stock crossover and not make any other mods like changing drivers or horns. But that's just me, I trust the original designs after watching the testing they go through to get a final design. 

 

What many people miss is that a mod is not always an upgrade, many times these parts get sold later, seen it many times with crossovers and horns especially, they love them, there great, but are for sale a year later. 

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1 hour ago, jebartist said:

I

 

P.S.. The Klipschorns need crossover work and possibly other mods. I will address those after I get the room setup. For now, I'm focusing on acquiring all the speakers.

I lean towards the Heresy 1 as it uses the k77 and K55V  , so as to compliment the 87 KHORN -

 

For the capacitors in your Crossover , klipsch OEM Capacitors from @JEM Performance  --will restore the network's specs  with capacitors that are spot on , as the 87 Khorns were tested on the klipsch bench instruments , in that  perfect balance ,and as  @dtel said ,  earlier ,  there is no need to modify anything else -

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Thanks guys. I will cross each bridge at a time. Once I get to the crossovers, I'll upgrade them to at least AK-3's. The bass isn't really there and midrange is muddy and they are completely sealed in the corners. All speakers are playing, so only place I can assume the problem is in the 34 year old xovers.

 

With that said, I mentioned that about the khorns, but wanted to keep the focus on the Heresy's as surrounds and possibly center channel. Would those blend well or are they overkill?

 

No sub has been decided as well, but save that for another discussion.

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Having been down this exact path with K-horns, Heresy 1 or 2 (or Fortes, Cornwalls, or Chorus) will be fine for surrounds. The center channel is the one that matters most for matching and I don't think you are going to be close to happy with a Heresy as the center channel. 

A LaScala works perfectly in that role, but singles can be rare. A cornscala might also be an option if you a a DIY guy. YMMV

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3 minutes ago, jebartist said:

I think I just scored a special pair of Cornwall I's and Chorus I's. The Cornwalls are Walnut, which matches my Khorns, but the Chorus' are in Oak finish. Both are in mint condition within 2 hours of me. 

congratulations

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5 hours ago, jebartist said:

Thanks, but no room for La Scala's.

 

I've contemplated DIY route would probably be my best option for center channel.

In many cases if the mains (Khorns in your case) are not to far apart just go with no center, set the center to phantom, this will send the center signal to the front mains.  If the mains are not to far apart this is a better sound then a mismatched or under acheving center, especially with khorns.

 

Many people think it's a crazy idea but think about this, when it's just stereo the speakers are making the sound image in the center already, or should be. Most of the time this will sound better than a center that does not match or can not keep up.

 

But if the mains are far apart it would leave a hole in the center, part of why PWK designed a center speaker even for stereo. 

 

From the Heresy advertisement.......

 

"First introduced in 1957, the Heresy, a three-way design, started out as a compact center channel speaker to accompany the Klipschorn® in three-speaker stereo arrays. The Heresy IV offers unparalleled sound quality from a relatively small speaker."

.

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12 hours ago, jebartist said:

Thanks guys.

 

The room is 18'6" wide x 17'8" deep with 9' ceiling. The wall the Khorns are on is a 5' knee wall

That might be to wide to use phantom ? When listening in stereo does the sound come together and sound like it is coming from the center ?

 

Our room is 24' wide and 18' deep and open more behind that, but we use a center, the HT is all Forte's and it's no problem using a Forte as a center. The Forte looks tiny compred to the sub it stands in front of, but our room is not the average as far as what some would have. My wife love this stuff and there is a seperate 2 channel system in the same room with a huge sub both setups share so the front wall is mostly use up by speakers, we love it and that's all that matters, the wife picked out the 2 ch speakers and they are by far the biggest, 6' wide each. 

 

Whatever you decide to do with the speakers, your plan on using Heritage will make a great HT, you will be suprised at the sound, to me Heritage makes the best sounding HT. One thing to remember if you end up wanting a sub for movies a sub does not have to go on the the front wall if there is somewhere else it can go to be out of the way or hidden.    

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Thanks!

 

My thoughts were to start with one sub on the front wall and add a second if I feel the need on the rear wall. The rear wall would be the ideal location for the sub as to keep from crowding the front wall. I'm putting all the equipment in an adjacent closet and installing it all in a server rack with proper ventilation. I will keep my turntable in the room and probably add a 2 channel preamp and 2 channel tube amp for 2 channel listening. That was the original goal with this room, but then it morphed into a full blown home theater. It's a third living room to my house, so why not.

 

Has anyone ever heard of a custom ordered Cornwall direct from the factory? These Cornwall's I'm buying supposedly come from a Klipsch sales rep that ordered these special from the factory this way. Believable?

 

Couple shots of the Chorus I's I'm buying and one of my Khorn's. I've fixed that corner since that picture in the remodel of the room. That was a double door cased opening. I removed it and extended the wall there and installed a single door 3' away from the Khorn. Right now the room is in disarray, so I'll save pictures of it till it's finished.

 

 

Cornwall.PNG

Chorus I.PNG

Klipschorn.jpg

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9 hours ago, jebartist said:

Has anyone ever heard of a custom ordered Cornwall direct from the factory? These Cornwall's I'm buying supposedly come from a Klipsch sales rep that ordered these special from the factory this way. Believable?

I think people have ordered them, I am pretty sure someone ordered 3 of the same in the past so one shoudn't be a problem, but there is a long backlog because of covid, still trying to catch up.

 

Good looking speakers.

 

9 hours ago, jebartist said:

so why not.

Exactly, it will get much use by the family. 

 

.

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I don't know about older KHorns and Heresy's but all I can tell you is the Heresy III is a phenomenal HT and music center between 2 AK5.5 KHorns. Main thing is just having the height/position of it right relative to the seating position. With the slant base it has far enough away the Heresy sounds like it's coming from TV level like the KHorns. If you are too close to it it may be an issue though as a center, so you will have to elevate it a bit.

 

Voicing on it is a perfect match on mine and the LCR sound stage is seamless with movies. I actually have custom Aussie Walnut Forte IV's on order for my corner surrounds to upgrade to 6.2 (I use 2 subs). Down the road will eventually add 4 heights for Atmos/DTS:X and Auro. But for now I will be happy going from 1 to 3 surrounds as I've been running LCRS aka 3/1.2 for 2-3 years now.

 

But between equal rough time period and model, the Heresy is an excellent center between them. Dialog is crystal clear and it actually helps with upper frequency extension since the H3s extend to 20kHz where as the KHorns fall off after 18kHz. Not that you can really hear that anyway as lots of great cinema horn systems also roll off above 18kHz as well. But to be honest when I initially just ran 2ch HT with the KHorns, they really came alive even more when I wasn't relying on them for phantom center anymore when I added the 2 H3 70ths to my system.

 

I have the Heresy III's crossed over at 60hz, to give them a bit of padding before they fall off and on my pre-pro depending on the source type I have that set to redirect to the KHorns for music and the subs center channel bass management with films, both modern lossy/lossless discrete surround and older matrix surround films from the 80s.

 

Now there are a lot more options for you as in the late 80s you also had the Belle's too which are a killer center for KHorns. Really just depends on your room layout, console/furniture considerations etc. Because at one point or another in Klipsch history, the Heresy, Cornwall, Belle and La Scala's have all been used as center channels for the KHorn and all will do the job. The latter 2 especially in wider stereo arrays primarily for a 3ch stereo system for music. Something that still sounds amazing even with the Heresy -- which I know first hand since it's how I exclusively listen to music with it... with a custom PWK box made for me with an adjustment gain for the center. Music DSP in modern Pre-Pros other than Meridian is horrible, especially Atmos/DTS:X ones. You'll enjoy music a lot more in passive 3ch than using the very generic "improved" DSU or DTS Neo:X upmixers. Neo:6 Music and PLII Music are not available in Atmos/DTS:X capable AVR/Pre-Pros, but the passive 3ch sounds better for music anyway, and better than straight 2ch IMHO.

 

There were also some other bespoke models in the 80s and early 90s that Klipsch no longer makes that also may work as a center as well for late 80s KHorns, but I'd probably stick with the heritage "legacy" line of models for the reasons state above -- they've all been used as center channels between KHorns at some point in different systems over the years with great success.

 

Space/footprint wise, the Cornwall and Heresy will be the most friendly, and both are also enclosed of course too. The La Scalas and Belle's stick out a good amount. The low end of the Cornwall would be the best out of all of them. So if you can fit them, the Cornwall would be my choice, and the Forte or Heresy for your side and rear surrounds.

 

Good luck!

 

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Thanks guys.

 

Looks like I'll have my Khorns, side surrounds (Chorus I), rear surrounds (Cornwalls), center channel (Heresy I) Most all will have the K-55-V mids and K-77 tweeters. Timber should match well I would think. At least I'll give it a try and go from this setup.

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