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Why is the Beauhorn the only design (that I know of at least) that implemented the Lowther properly (according to its design intent): Horn-loading not only the rear for bass but the front to bring the lower mids up to the level of the upper mids, for a speaker that actually measures flat (from the depth of where room interactions are significant, 80 Hz or so, to 10 Khz)?
I've had Lamhorn, Beauhorn, Cain & Cain, and other wideband back-horn speakers and the B is the only one that sounds and measures close to neutral.
(Thorsten confirmed this in his own measurements around 1.5 decades back now.)
So, why the heck does NOBODY (else) build an enclosure for the Lowther (or any similar wideband driver all of which suffer from the same rising response)?
Follow Ups:
Oh, I almost forgot. I have a flawless pair of custom made Medallion 3 cabinets made with 3/4" Baltic Birch inside and out. However the BB on all of the internal turns were steamed and bent to form all/only curves inside these cabinets. I have very briefly experimented using industrial strength Velcro to hold various designs of external front horn additions for reinforcement for the front and back of the Lowthers. This really will work!
Any way, I am going to be giving the cabinets away to anyone who is interested in picking them up at my Central Florida location.
I know that the location and pick up only thing is tough, so I am not expecting anything. But, my next step is to "put them down".
Lance A.
Been There Done That, Over and Over and Over Again. I absolutely agree that the B Horn was the best of this genre, but I have moved waaaay beyond this type of cabinet with my stable of Lowther and other wide band drivers.
OB top with your choice of attached low frequency augmentation down below. I use a pair of specially designed RAAL Dipole Ribbons to enhance the "OK" highs of my big wide banders. No filters on the Lowthers/wide banders.
Lance A
Lance, I've heard such OBs at shows (Pass's and others) and they never sound right to me. They always sound very thin in the presence region which is an absolute killer for me. Perhaps this is something that can be fixed with xover/EQ but the tall-thin widebander (Lowther) baffle with helper woofer coming in at 100-200 Hz just never sounds good to me personally.. yours may be different.
Forget about Lowther's for a bit. When a combination wide bander OB/bass augmentation (it's actually waaaay more than augmentation though when done right) is correct, then there just AINT NO thinness and or lack of lifelike weight and tone. I use many very high quality wide range drivers to accomplish this goal, Lowthers included.
Lance
I remember when Thorsten owned (I think) the big Beauhorn. Maybe some of the reasons people don't implement combo front and rear loading could be found in Thorsten's reasons for moving on? I think he moved on to Supravox on OB, then?..
The classic TP1 and Audiovector designs are both front and rear loaded... though maybe not as pretty or "compact" as Beau'.
The reasons I would not pursue such a design include:
> Alternative driver manufacturers offer similar designs with mitigated idiosyncrasies.
> Specific Lowthers with lower magnet power and AlNiCo can get you satisfactory results - for a Lowther - with a simpler cabinet.
> Alternative configurations have been devised that address the issues and offer more besides (e.g. separate bass driver supporting a wide range driver).
> Cost and size of sufficient loading.
> System integration - how much faffing is required to get the Lowthers running powerful drivers sounding right in a system?
> Despite better loading and Freq resp, it is still a Lowther with its commensurate limitations (and strengths, of course).
In summary, is the final outcome (enough strengths and no music-killing weaknesses) enough to justify the cost, size and faffing when alternative methods offer as much (or more) for less?
These are my off-the-top-of-my-head reasons and value judgement - others' value judgements will differ.
Cheers,
91
"Confusion of goals and perfection of means seems to characterise our age." Albert Einstein
Thorsten never bought the B-horns. He loved 'em but then built his own DIY speakers. I think the B-horns especially with his tweaks were very expensive back then.
I had had the Supravox field-coil drivers on open baffles. They were very good indeed.
As to the rest of the post, regardless of Lowther limitations or lower-sensitivity Lowthers, the ones most people seem to consider the best do require something to get the lower mids up.
Now if the answer is "such a cabinet is very difficult to build", that makes sense. In fact I think that is the reason.
There is no speaker without compromises.
The lower mids issue is well known - it is a given. The higher power the motor, the more pronounced the rising response and the greater the need for front loading. This is borne out in the drivers recommended for the TP1 etc. and the success of the more powerful drivers in designs like Azura and Oris horns. It is also why the weaker drivers - with less severe rising response - have been successfully used by some folks in simple rear-loaded designs... in the right system with some faffing.I think that if the difficulty of the cabinet build justified the outcome, more people would do it. CAD and CNC are readily available these days, which would reduce the difficulty and cost. I'm not convinced the result would suit enough people's listening preferences to make it a viable commercial venture; it would likely only be viable as cu$tom or DIY for those that value what such a system can do.
Cheers,
91.
"Confusion of goals and perfection of means seems to characterise our age." Albert Einstein
Edits: 01/19/16
I'm pretty sure that widebanders of all stripes suffer at least to some degree from the rising response issue. Anyway, point taken - it's more pronounced in the more sensitive drivers.
I'll have to check out measurements from some of those new, ultra-expensive widebander backhorns...
Someday, I'd like to listen to several implementations - sadly, not likely in my part of the world.
I don't think my bank account (or mortgage) could withstand the cost of some of those Voxative speakers. sigh.
Cheers,
91
"Confusion of goals and perfection of means seems to characterise our age." Albert Einstein
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