Alpair 12 break-in question: 2mm?

The current state of "country" music is a shame. The distance between country and mainline pop is narrowing to the point of not difference. There is no resemblance between current "country" and and the music of Patti Page, Loretta Lynn, Mel Tillis, Conway Twitty, Charlie Pride, you name them. Country music is just as badly compressed as any other current pop genre. Alison Krauss' roots are not country but blue grass -- totally different. I just love her album with Robert Plant --"Raising Sand", and in part because of Plant's background. My favorite cut is the last -- "Your Long Journey",but then how many of you are starring 70 in the face?
 
Last edited:
Quality folk / bluegrass / country / hybrid?

Transatlantic Sessions gentlemen. If you haven't seen or heard any of these, try to. I'd suggest the DVDs initially -the audio quality is much of a muchness, but being able to see them all adds an extra something. I honestly can't recommend it highly enough. Series 3 - 5 are the high points IMO, although they're all fantastic. Jerry Douglas & Aly Bain as musical directors = brilliant.
 
In light of Scott's comment any my previous, it is interesting to note that American Appalachian folk music, of which bluegrass is a derivative, is derived directly from Irish/Celtic music. Try some O'Carolan from early 18th century and note how modern is sounds.

OK. Back to building boxes for the 10P's I am cooking.
Bob
 
Slightly different question..
I have my new 12p drivers and my question is can i secure the bare wires to the speaker terminals using electrical tape for the first phase of the burn-in process before eventually loading them into enclosures? ( First 100 hours )
Or is there any other alternative at this point to soldering? Right now i don't have any equipment and i would love to hear them a little bit

Thanks
 
t's comment any my previous, it is interesting to note that American Appalachian folk music, of which bluegrass is a derivative, is derived directly from Irish/Celtic music.

Paddy Maloney, bandleader and showman, likes to tell the story of his first tour through the US with the Chieftains. During one of their first stops, apparently, a gentleman in the audience loudly shouted, "that ain't foreign music! That's bluegrass!"

Let's not forget that Scat is pretty directly derived from mouth music. Let's also remember that the NYC Irish bars of the 19th century tended to hire African American bands to play the traditional music of the green, sheep-stained hills of home. Then there were the Clancy Brothers, who convinced us all that Greenwich Village folk was Irish music.

If there's a moral, it's "listen to everything." Since some bit of it was probably stolen from something else, that makes listening to good music the same kind of fun as watching a great caper movie.

Which reminds me, Bob... Have you checked out Gangstagrass?
 
Hi just read this thread, I think there sould be a better explanation of the break in!!...definitive , all I read when purchasing was low volume for the first 100 hours. Now I see up to 800 hundred hours and Description like lobby room level ive never thought about the volume when in a lobby! An English write up online for resalers to Translate and pop in the box for these unique drivers with some what Complex break in does not seem to much to ask ?? If the break in is as important as the design of the speaker , did I Ruin my 400 $ alpair12p playing a couple of alums above lobby room volume ill never know..sorry this sound negative
 
did I Ruin my 400 $ alpair12p playing a couple of alums above lobby room volume ill never know..sorry this sound negative

No, probably not :) I think what was meant is that the break-in process continues to have small changes up to 800 hours... but you don't have to be as gentle with the drivers as for the first 100 hours of running time.

Excerpts from an earlier post by Mark Audio:

Hi Rongon,
Its very unlikely you've done any damage with only 6 watts on tap and a sealed box volume of 9.5 litres. With over 100 hours on your drivers, you can afford to start applying normal listening volumes. That should be something in the low 80dB's at a typical listening distance of 2.5 metres. If you haven't got a SPL meter, check out your mobile phone, you may be able to download an application to covert it into an SPL meter.



And oh, some folks do not believe in break-in at all. :)
 
Last edited:
Just received my 12P gen2's this morning, so a bit anxious to get them broken-in ASAP.

Is there any problem in doing this in an OB? I don't have any real "boxes" to mount them into and the plan is also to use them in my OB's once they are well and truly broken-in.

Btw, is there any harm in playing them 24/7 (opposed to the 4 or 6 hour intervals I read about) for the first let's say 200h at sufficiently low volume and with easy listening music?
 
ok, so no real need for any sort of box then, that's good news
let's say 1 week (24/7) like that at very low volume and afterwards another week a bit louder, and again a week...building it up steadily for about 3 weeks in total, would that suffice for overall break-in before installing them in my OB?
fwiw; I'm cutting the low end (once installed in my OB's) feed to the 12P's at 250Hz, so they hardly get any low-end to speak of.
 
i did break in my alpair 10M's in the ported boxes with old delta blues for about a week (i was not there, i just let them play from a playlist in repeat from a computer during a holiday) at maybe 65dB (measured on my phone) for a week. They now work exellent in my ported boxes (almost 1.5 years later), even on bass heavy music (like dub) i can get rather loud (arround 100dB rms) and low (wel into the low 30's due to the ports) with them without any hearable distortion or damage.
 
I've been very gently breakin' them in now for the first 10 hours, as you suggested simply sat on their magnets, pointing upwards, playing all through the night.
This morning I turned the volume up a notch and another 8 hours later changed the tune as well to something less "gentle", so they got a better workout, albeit still with a cautious touch of the volume knob.

Now we're about 30hours in and they really sound quite a bit better then those first minutes.
It's surely not a question of me getting used to the sound, as I have them playing in another (closed off) room, so I hardly hear anything of the break-in, apart from when I go and check on them every now and again.

At the moment my guess is that I'll be running them like this for about a week 24/7, steadily building things up this way and then sometime next weekend give them a try in my OB's, to hear what they truly sound like.
 
Hi friends!

After buying some pretty poorly built Super Pencils with 12Ps used for my DIY Pass/Colburn class A setup, I identified that the spider on one of the drivers was pretty loose. Also, the sound is wiry at even moderate SPLs, and increasing volume level is kinda untempting. Burn in and use history of the used pair is unknown.

So what have I done? I have damped the cabinet walls around the driver and stuffed with 550 grams of polyfill from below the damping material and down to the vent, iaw with a post from Markaudio some time ago. I also redid the internal wiring and changed binding posts, ensuring soldered connections all the way from the amp boards to the drivers. Speaker wires between amp and speakers attatched with tightened spades.

Sound improved in all aspects, but the discovery of the looser spider and still wiry sound at moderate levels led me to order a new pair of drivers. That will allow me to have full control of the break-in process.

Plan is to leave them for approx 200 hours playing at low levels iaw Planet10’s SOP for initial phase break in, before mounting and real world break-in, gradually increasing SPLs.

Reading to the threads, I am left with a couple of unanswered questions, and though not the most important, I would very much like some thoughts and shared experiences wrt them.

1: What, besides bass and treble extension, will be the main differences in sound / tonality between a new and broken in driver? When I recieved my used drivers, they sounded kinda cold and tinny. This improved after the cabinet work I did as well as from playing them. Can I espect the same kind of tonal shift with my new drivers? Experiences/thoughts?

2: I use high quality 2,5mm2 cooper wire soldered for internal speaker wiring. Planet10 recommends cat5. I have a bunch of solid core cat 6. but having 4mm2 speaker wires, it kinda challenges my reasoning to use 24awg inside the speakers. Could Dave or someone who have tried this elaborate on the soundwise advantages of using thinner solid core wires for internal wiring? Impedance etc is not very interesting, I am looking for what soundwise inprovements/differences to expect. I know trying is best. But with limited time and family business being more important, I would like to know what to expect before redoing the wiring.

If these new drivers work out as expected, I will build new boxes some time. Either biguns or properly braced Supers, or OBs with woofers in the long term, as there is a likely significant potential for improvement there.

Wish you all a good day!

Regards,
Andy