profsbg Posted December 31, 2006 Share Posted December 31, 2006 I have a basement room about 24 x 14 x 7'2". The ceiling is mostly a drop down with very absorbing tiles. Running along the long wall and coming about 3.5 ' into the room is enclosed and drywalled main ducting, which drops the ceiling further down to 6'8" ( the remainding width of 14 - 3.5 = 10.5' has the tiled drop ceiling at 7'2"). I have some Chorus II along the long wall with tiles 7'2" above and listen to them very near field, about 7 ' back (spaced almost like equilateral triangle). I found that moving my seating back under the enclosed ducting sounds worsens the sound in various ways. I recently found that removing some of the tiles makes the sound more alive and much more preferable to me, introducing some slight reverb and diffusion perhaps (from the joists above the drop down?). The rest of the room is fairly dead with carpeting on the floor and window shades and wall hangings and furniture.I would like to purchase some Khorns and put them under the enclosed ducting. On that long wall, I can space them out about 17' of the 24'. I will have to build false corners due to the presence of doors and hallways in the corners. I can move the false corners forward a bit so that the the front of the Khorns would be more flush with the edge of the enclosed ducting. In any case, the Khorns would be situated so that they would mostly be directly incident on the 7'2" tile ceiling I have a few questions 1. What experience is there with Khorns with roughly 7' drop ceiling? This seems a lot less than the 8.5' recommended by Klipsch 2. Is the 3.5' wide further drop down due to ducting a problem if Khorns are under it? There is not much I can do about this ceiling structure 3. My experience with removing a few of the ceiling tiles is really positive. I read here about Berger's Space Coupler which I could replace some or all of the ceiling tiles with (they are about $200 for each 2'x2'x3" coupler unit, but I may be able to diy a fascimile if I need a lot of them). This seems like an interesting idea as it can add in some sense the space above the drop down extending the ceiling to about 8'4" (although there are the floor joists and some but not a lot of pipes and ducting running between the joists). It also adds some diffusion from the grating. Does anyone have experience with such an idea? It seems like this problem of low ceiling height in basement rooms with drop down ceilings and which cannot be remodelled would come up a lot Thanks <><><> Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sheltie dave Posted December 31, 2006 Share Posted December 31, 2006 You have almost a carbon copy of my basement, except I currently have KHorns and Fortes in various parts of the basement. I personally feel money spent on components FIRST is a better investment than pursuing sound treatments, but that is me. No matter how much money I spend to improve the sound field, it still is a near field environment. In a smaller room, average components and great sound treatment yield average sound. Great components, minor sound treatment, and judicious volume control can yield great sound. And as one of my Cerwin Vega friends always proves, crappy components and no volume control yield horrendous sound![] With the KHorns, you definitely will soon find the two to three spots where the drop ceiling frame is not properly riveted. There may also be a few other metal to metal sound shorts that may need some rubber, or other insulation, installed to quiet matters. With five to fifteen watts, your pulse will be pounding in your alcove! What will you be using with the Khorns? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parrot Posted December 31, 2006 Share Posted December 31, 2006 In my previous home I had Khorns in the basement with a fairly low ceiling, probably about the same as yours. It wasn't to my liking but I had to make do with what was available and the other dimensions made it worthwhile. In other words, maybe 4 times the floor space for a foot lower ceiling! I don't understand all of what you're saying about replacing ceiling tiles with something else, but anything you can do for more height will be a big big plus and well worth the effort. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
profsbg Posted December 31, 2006 Author Share Posted December 31, 2006 <>At this point I have an Apple Powerbook (with lossless encoding) to a Lavry DA10 Dac which also has a decent preamp and volume control network. Right now I use it to drive Wright 3.5 monoblocks or Charlize t-amp. I am also waiting on a tube preamp (actually a headphone amp with preamp capability Singlepower MPX3). So there are various combos and I am playing around with them and the Chorus II. I also have some CD player and other gear, but the above is what I use. I am pretty satisfied with it at the moment, although I might get one of the JM Merlin preamp if the Singlepower doesnt work out. The problem I have is the room seems so dead to me, not vibration or reflection or other serious issues at least that seem obvious to me. I could try removing some of the area carpet but the tile floor that they cover is cold. That is why I removed some of the ceiling tiles to experiment with, just a few along the reflected paths from the speakers to my sitting position. I was really surprised how it appeared to improve things. But I need something to replace them with. And maybe get further improvement. Since going from the Chorus II (which I would move upstairs to a family living room with HT where I currently have Kg4.5's) to Khorn is big step, I am trying to get a feel if others had this problem and a solution. Somehow my perceived deadness of the room really bothered me, I have heard of this complaint before with absorbing drop ceiling. I recognize there are two factors here : the ceiling height and the absorbing tiles.I wasnt sure how all of this affected the Khorn or why it needed the ceiling height maybe compared to other speakers. The diffraction gratings (which I would use as direct replacement for some of the drop ceiling tiles) are discussed in http://forums.klipsch.com/forums/permalink/795474/776905/ShowThread.aspx#776905. I would be willing I think to manufacture myself probably a whole ceiling of them to replace the drop ceiling if necessary as I am not worried about sound isolation and the claim seems to be that one cannot have too many (although their may be diminishing returns). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gaspr Posted January 1, 2007 Share Posted January 1, 2007 I don't know if anyone here has had hands on experience with thespacecouplers. From what I have been able to gather, they work best when coupling a listening or studio area to a largerarea. This helps to create a longer and more pleasingsemi-reveberant tail to the sound. I do think that you are on theright track. Might be somewhat expensive and or time consuming(if you make your own) to do your whole ceiling withcouplers. Maybe you could do a smaller area with couplers andreplace some or all of the remaining ceiling tiles with something lessabsorptive? The general advice seems to be that you can't have tomuch diffusion in your listening room. Good luck and let us know howthings work out for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colterphoto1 Posted January 1, 2007 Share Posted January 1, 2007 perhaps a simple solution that would give varying degrees of reflection would be to simply replace some of the tiles (vinyl covered fibreglass?) with the composite heavier tiles or alternate with 1/2" plywood panels... This might be preferable to seeing 'through' the gridwork to the exposed beams, give more mass to the system to prevent vibration, and enhance the liveness that you seek. M Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
profsbg Posted January 1, 2007 Author Share Posted January 1, 2007 Thanks for the suggestions. Right now the visual aspect is secondaryto the sound, although obviously I would like something that has somehiding capability. It does seem like a huge amount of work to do thewhole ceiling in these couplers. I think I will experiment withbuying/manufacturing a few of them, and mixing them with either theexisting tiles or some standard but heavier more reflecting ones. I wasalso thinking about trying some of the fluorescent light grids whichare plastic and have a narrower grid. There would not be as muchdiffusion from the grid but perhaps would still benefit from theeffective increase in ceiling height and reflection off of the abovefloor and joists. I am still curious why the Khorn seems to require more ceilingheight (or if they really do): room volume, room modes,?<> Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gaspr Posted January 1, 2007 Share Posted January 1, 2007 My guess as to why khorns sound better in larger rooms is that theyhave a chance to really open up. Being 100% horn loaded, andbeing in a 1/8 space (corner), they are able to couple to andcontrol a huge amount of air. Really gives them a "live", room filling sound. Even though they are not at there best insmaller rooms, they are still pretty impressive. Not sureif ceiling height or simply room volume is more important. Youmight want to pay attention to the first reflection points on your lowceiling and treat these areas somehow. Probably best to usediffusion if possible, absorbtion if necessary. Again, good luck and welcome to the forum! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colterphoto1 Posted January 2, 2007 Share Posted January 2, 2007 too large of a room is also detrimental to Khorn listenability because the listener has to sit either out of the sweet spot, in the sweetspot but with furniture awkwardly placed, or manufacture false corners. My 15x22 with Khorns on the long wall seems just about right. I can sit directly in the cross between the speakers and be 4' from the back wall. Most Khorn rooms I have visited would have you sitting in FRONT of the coffee table to get best soundstage because the room was too deep for it's width. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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