Cornwall harshness in high mid-range

[swami49]

I bought a pair of Klipsch Cornwalls, circa 1983.The high mid-range sounds

brassy and shrill, which is apparently common to these speakers. I have been told I have the following options:

New crossover ($550), to replace original,with different xover points;

a tube power amp, which they say softens the tone.

A friend says that unless I'm going to go to vinyl (I am not), the tube idea is bunk, since the cd's are compressed digitally and will not be softened as

such.

I also bought an equalizer-expander (dbx 4bx). Since I don't have a power

amp, I have not hooked it up yet (It eats power, and these speakers require

a lot of it.

Finally, someone suggested using Mortite (window caulk)somewhere inside the cabinet to reduce vibration, claming that to be the cause of the shrillness.

Would appreciate the wisdom of experience.

Sam

[Frzninvt]

The problem most likely is due to your amplification, and possibly if you are using a DVD player as a CD player. I have yet to hear a DVD player that can do both well for under $1000. There are other SS amps out there that will make them sound alot better. The DBX 4BX is NOT an equalizer at all, it is a Dynamic Range Expander w/Impact Restoration. It was designed when vinyl was the popular media and will make the CD's sound even more bright even at the lowest settings. I would sell it and get the newer DBX 3BX-DS that was designed with "Digital" in mind. It can take the edge off harsh sounding CD's, and has a ton of capabilities and is far superior to the 4BX. Most newer CD's are NOT heavily compressed but highly over-saturated and will even sometimes sound like they are breaking up, recording engineers are trying to cram to much on to the CD. So having a compression feature is actually useful. Older analog CD's are much smoother sounding. The thing about Cornwalls and other Heritage speakers is they will reveal all the flaws in your equipment. Your system is only as good as your weakest link. Don't give up hope they can sound much better when paired with the right gear. Just look at the Heritage I have, I have no brassy or shrill highs at all!

[artto]

(It eats power, and these speakers require

a lot of it.)

Oh really? WRONG. your Cornwalls are quite efficient.

[swami49]

I meant the expander, not the speakers eat power. The Cornwalls are amazingly efficient.

[hightone]

I have cornwalls and tubes(no turntable yet) and cornwalls with solid state. Neither sound to bright unless played through a DVD player or inexpensive cd player. You could use some rope caulk on the midrange horn lens. This may help with some of the harshness you hear. Cornwalls do not require very much power at all. I use a 50 watt tube amp turn it up half way and the cops come. What is your sorce component? It may be the part of the problem.

[swami49]

It's amazing how these speakers show the flaws of other components. I hooked up a Luxman receiver, after trying a Hitachi Class G Amp, and the harshness abated considerably. I plugged in a dynaco FM-3 to the DBX expander, and it sounded even better. I am going to have to splurge on a good but reasonable cd player to get a total package. any suggestions?

The other thing about these speakers is that even at low volumes, music carries through the hous, and sounds great. I am impressed.

[jt1stcav]

Same here. I used to have harsh mids with my old Carver equipment; my 50 WPC McIntosh MC250 SS amp does wonders, plus my AMC CD player is a major step up from my old Carver CD player. And the Orbeck speaker cables reduced alot of the brightness I used to experience with my old cables...your source components have alot to do with the overall sound quality of your Cornwalls (and mine are all original, with no mods whatsoever). Experiment...you may be surprised on just how good your Cornwalls can sound!

[jt1stcav]

I just missed your last post as I was writing mine...Go to www.audioadvisor.com and check out their sale on a new AMC CD8d 24bit/192kHz CD player. It's a brand new model at a low $250 (paid $299 for my discontinued CD8b several years ago). It's very affordable high-end! Check it out.

[Dflip]

Go to the search option, type in Cornwall, starting on page two there are the following threads:

Dampening Cornwalls

Hyde banished -- transforming the Cornwall

page 3

The Jekyll and Hyde Cornwall 

Revealed:  Secret Cornwall Mods at DFW Forum

Two channel forum page 3

I'm  in  love.....(boom)......  I'm  all  caulked  up !!

This you will give you an overview. I have put rope caulk on the woofer basket, 2-3" on the squawker, replaced the capacitors, inductors in the original B network, upgraded the wire and connectors, attached a 1x2" piece of oak to the front baffle to tighten it up, and got a tube amp. It sounds great to me. Others will tell you some of these changes shouldn't effect the sound. I can only go by my ears, and my ears like the changes.

My Acurus SS amp and pre provided great detail, but an hour of listening was about all I could take at a time. Too bright and too harsh.

Good luck.

[Frzninvt]

The DBX 4BX only needs a few watts of AC to operate, but it will certainly place additional demands on your amp, receiver or speakers since it is making the sound even more dynamic and lifelike. When used and adjusted correctly they can sound incredible, but they obviously will make your equipment work harder to reproduce the dynamics. The impact restoration circuit alone is worth the price of the unit, I love the way it can bring the drum attacks to life!

[Mark Hardy]

No doubt that the Cornwalls are agressive and can be downright unpleasant with the wrong electronics and/or the wrong source material! On the other hand, with the right electronics and an excellent recording, they're great. Of course, you want to be able to listen to ANY recording that you like, so...

The following will work wonders for the harshness you hear:

1) Tube amplification. My personal fave is a 2A3 SET (I use the inexpensive Bottlehead Paramours), but a PP EL84 amp is probably also a good choice. I really wouldn't feel that anything more powerful was necessary or advisable.

2) Damp the MR horn. "Rope caulk" is cheap and easy to apply, but there are many other options, including lots of old tee-shirts wrapped 'round the horn and secured with liberal amounts of duct tape!. This will help but is not a "night and day" change.

Big efficient speakers like these need room to breathe, too. Mine are in a room that's about 12' x 16', which is still really too small IMO.

[TBrennan]

Or you can find speakers that aren't inherantly harsh and don't need fiddling and EQ in the form of the "right" electronics, horn damping, crossover mods and so on. IMO&E The Klipsch Heritages have an earwire sound due to a couple of inherant flaws in the design though mainly the design of the midrange horn and the extreme directionality (narrow dispersion) of the horn, especially as the midrange was pushed up to 6500hz. Jim D reports that the mid horn on the KHorn has a very narrow 40 degree pattern, the CW is the same horn but shorter. I also think the extreme narrowing between the driver exit and the horn throat is a cause of distortion and shrillness.

A number of the Atlas midranged speakers also have a 9khz resonant flare, this can be tamed by Max'es "P Trap". I don't know if 83 CWs use the mid driver that is prone to this flaw.

I tamed some CWs by substituting a wider dispersion tractrix mid horn with a far more open throat from the Klipsch Pro line for the stock mid horn several years ago. The info may still be in the archives of this board, I dunno.

[JCturboT]

Sam,

Are the horns metal or plastic? Typically you should not have to dampen a plastic horn as they are "dead" as compared to a metal horn which do have a "ringing" effect.

My 1984 Cornwalls had plastic horns and were very forgiving in the amplification department.

My guess is your source component-is there any amp/receiver you could possibly try?

Jeff

[Colin]

The big old Cornwalls are wonderful but revealing loudspeakers. I lived with a pair for about 20 years and got to know them quite well. After auditioning a dozen different loudspeakers and amplifiers in my own home with the same equipment for Enjoy the Music.com, the only loudspeaker I really wanted was grand-daddy Khorn.

If you bookmark the valuable information posted at the Belgium audio site (http://www.belgaudio.com/kcmeasurements1.htm), you will see the frequency response for most Cornwall models.

First, depending on its size, the listening room can have a reflection at about 5-kHz, which makes loudspeakers brighter and sharper sounding. I measured this affect in about a dozen models in a room 14 by 17 with a 8 ceiling. Breaking up flat reflecting surfaces and dampening the corners helps somewhat. So does moving them away from the front and sidewalls. The mid-horn is relatively narrow, compared to JBL and other big old Klipsch horns, make sure it is pointed directly at your ears, or the back of your head (depending on preference).

Second, though perhaps most important, some models of the Cornwall crossover network (the B2, for one) create a vicious bounce-back at the 5 to 9-kHz levels, resulting in a shrill, vibrant sound. Search the Updating Older Models forum for references to the P-trap. ALK custom crossovers resolve this problem and the big old horns are worth the investment. If I was going to live with my big old horns for five to ten years, I would certainly invest in the ALK crossovers. Mmm, maybe I should order a pair for my Khorns

Before I did that for my big old horns though, I broke down and bought an old, but solid ADC equalizer for $30. That really did the trick. Using a Radio Shack SPL meter and the Stereophile Test CDs, I reduced the Cornwall bounces at 80 to 100-Hz and 5 to 9 kHz. The key is to apply only half of the amount needed. If the bounce is up 6 dB at 7-kHz, then only cut back about 3dB. Too much equalization muddies the sound, but too little can remove the obnoxious overtones.

Third, many models of CD players, including the outrageously expensive ones have extreme high-end jitter (thank you, Stereophile magazine). Gentler, better defined CD players will sound better with the revealing nature of the big old horns. Go to the Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity site (http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/main.html) for their excellent measurements of which cheap players have as little annoying jitter as some very expensive high-end models. I switched years ago to a British Rotel model and loved the slight differences it made.

Well constructed, but awkward looking, Vibration Isolation Platforms (VIP) will make a noticeable, if not dramatic, difference with any disc player, be it CD, DVD or 12 analogue vinyl. See my cheap tweak at http://www.enjoythemusic.com/tweaks/.

Fourth, caulking either the plastic, but especially the metal, horns with soft window putty is also simple, fun, noticeable, but slight (one or two on a scale of 10, where Stereophile recommended loudspeakers rank eight, nine or 10). So is padding them down with 30-lb gray paving stones (http://www.enjoythemusic.com/magazine/equipment/1299/sandbagging.htm). I would try any of these projects.

Fifth, a tube pre-amplifier will also work, but I thought the flea-powered Bottlehead 2A3 Paramours made the biggest difference (scoring at least six, if not seven or eight) with most loudspeakers seriously auditioned for Enjoy the Music.com, unless they had deep impedance dips. There is something so right about tubes with super-sensitive big old horns. HORNS LOVE TUBES. Dont believe me - ask any guitar player.

Finally, dynamic range expansion can make a very noticeable difference. I once thought dBx was going to catch on; that every new receiver and tape deck would include it and that CDs, with their limited dynamic range, would not last. Boy, was I wrong. Once I got my CD player (Sony version two of their first one), I never played the slow, bumpy, scratchy, popping, clicking and fluttering mechanical black discs again.

Your big old horns idle along with barely a watt during most music passages at normal talking levels. Un-expanded peaks, about 15dB higher, require quick microsecond bursts of only a few more watts. Expanded peaks, possibly double, about 30dB, will still only require a handful of watts. Try it, you will probably like it. In fact, I think I might search eBay for one now.

Hope you are not sorry you asked.

[TBrennan]

Colin---While your opinion is as good as any you commit some factual error.

The Cornwalls reviewd on the Belgian site are not typical of the majority of Cornwalls. They are the late model Cornwall IIs which use completely different treble drivers than most CWs; using the "hepner" integrated mid driver-horn and an improved tweeter which is signifigantly flatter and more extended than the EV T-35 used in earlier CWs.

Also, to hit peaks of 20db over the 1 watt listening level would take about 120 watts, not counting for speaker compression; hardly a "handful". I doubt that the speaker can reach peaks of 30db over the 1 watt level, 2024 watts would be needed to do so IF the speaker didn't compress and IF the speaker could handle the power and neither is the case. Even high efficiency, high output speakers need lots of power for optimal dynamics, that's why I used 200 wpc with my LaScalas. Low powered tube amps will compromise dynamics, let there be no doubt of that. But we pick what compromises we can live with.

[Colin]

Thanks, when I equivocated about the Belgium audio site, I said most Cornwalls, guess I should have said some Cornwalls. I realize that there are different variations within the same Klipsch models and that only when they changed two of the major components, did they call it a new model.

It is true what you say about the power requirements to accurately reproduce the dynamic peaks of recorded music. Thanks, I didnt have the calculator on screen, when I wrote that. With that in mind, the awesome power supply of the Nelson Pass X250 amplifier was indeed wonderful to hear on Cornwalls, especially at louder than normal listening levels. It never seemed to run out of steam and I never heard anything remotely like clipping. In fact, I am trying to borrow a 1,000 watt amplifier right now to hear it on my big old horns, just for giggles. It is true that with flea-powered amplifiers, I am probably listening to soft clipping most of the time, especially with the lower impedance notes where the woofer is pushing the tube amplifier and not the other way around.

Glad to see you hanging in here Tom, you are a valuable asset to this forum; I miss some of the other guys who have faded away in the last few years

[Terry N. Cruse]

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On 4/30/2003 2:07:24 PM TBrennan wrote:

Colin---While your opinion is as good as any you commit some factual error.

The Cornwalls reviewd on the Belgian site are not typical of the majority of Cornwalls. They are the late model Cornwall IIs which use completely different treble drivers than most CWs; using the "hepner" integrated mid driver-horn and an improved tweeter which is signifigantly flatter and more extended than the EV T-35 used in earlier CWs.

Also, to hit peaks of 20db over the 1 watt listening level would take about 120 watts, not counting for speaker compression; hardly a "handful". I doubt that the speaker can reach peaks of 30db over the 1 watt level, 2024 watts would be needed to do so IF the speaker didn't compress and IF the speaker could handle the power and neither is the case. Even high efficiency, high output speakers need lots of power for optimal dynamics, that's why I used 200 wpc with my LaScalas. Low powered tube amps will compromise dynamics, let there be no doubt of that. But we pick what compromises we can live with.

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Tom,

A fellow POWER ADVOCATE? I don't beleve it. Is "headroom" a thing of the past?

I use two Luxman M-117s in BTL @ 420wpc to power four CWs . Love the warm "tubie" sound of the Lux SS. No clips with 300w of headroom. The first 100w is wonderful.

I.B. Slammin

[Audible Nectar]

Oh, yeah, Tom likes to crank it up.

It was Tom who showed us it was possible to get 120ish hz from the JBL bass bins down to 25 hz or so. I figure if he can do this with his woofers, then mine will do what I want with no sweat. So yes, the SS power advice hasn't gone unnoticed here....

I guess it boils down to taste - and listening habits. DeanG cranks it up with tubes, we crank it up with SS (in my case, Mac in the 2 channel setup). In either case, careful consideration is necessary.

[redwood forest]

Klipsch speakers produce an honest, revealing sound that shows any weaknesses with your system. Most people that complain about harshness in their Klipsch speakers can solve their problems by getting a better amplifier which is the actual source of the problem. Tube amplifiers have a built in distortion that hides the harsh sound of horn speakers. Some people say that tube amplifiers have a softer sound, and this is why. You will have to pay dearly for a solid state amplifier that can provide clean, detailed, honest sound. Until you can afford this ultimate amp, perhaps a tube amplifier would be best.

The ringing effect of midrange metal horns is well known. If you hold up the long metal horn unattached from the cabinet and hit it with a metal object, you will hear the horn ring like a bell. However, if you attach and screw the horn back to the cabinet, the ring will stop. You will have no problem as long as the horn is attached to the cabinet as it should be.

[jt1stcav]

Having the extra headroom for my '79 Cornwalls was an added bonus when I would play my organ music to "live" levels. Both my Carver M-400t (@ 201 WPC) and TFM-35x (@ 250 WPC), and McIntosh MC7200 (@ 200 WPC) were just idling along at maybe 20 watts peak (and well over 110 dB)! But I never had to worry about running out of power during dynamic peaks in the music. My 50 WPC MC250 is probably the least powerful amp I'd ever use with the Cornwalls (I doubt whether I'd want a 3.5 WPC SET to listen to my favorite pipe organ recordings at the levels I like...I have nothing against SET's, but I don't think they'd perform to my expectations at the volume I generally prefer). Granted, I've never even come close to taxing the reserve power to my MC250, but I do have less overall headroom if I ever was to push it to extreme measures!

As far as midrange harshness goes, I pretty much tamed that beast when I bought my first Mac amp; the MC250 is also a warm sounding SS amp that makes my Cornwalls appear more tube-like in their overall sound quality (the Carvers weren't nearly as refined as the Macs are). Also my AMC disc player contributed to that warm "British" sound with its DAC and jitter circuitry. Even my Orbeck speaker cables helped out alot in that arena, whereas the Kimber Kable 8TC they replaced was just too bright for my ears (the 8TC worked perfectly with my Magnepans). I'm sure if I installed ALK crossovers, rope caulked my squawkers, retuned my room, and purchased all tube components, the harshness associated with the Cornwalls would be as close to being eliminated as one can get. But as it stands right now, this is by far the best my Cornwalls have ever sounded, which ain't half bad! There's always more room for improvement, though.