..........Sigh !!! Long Post, apologies in advance.
About the time I thought I had it.
These latest replies are much appreciated. I am now back to square one again but better that than the time spent building something to find out it likely doesn't work. Had you Guy's not given this latest info I'd planned on starting as soon as I got back to work (seasonal self employed).
I'm near to 1 year trying to figure out what we want and how to make it fit AND function properly.
The room is a nightmare. 12.8' x 18' with a huge diagonal cut in rear facing D.R. , open to D.R. on that remaining length, huge picture window on opposing length as well as 36" front door. A mere 8" (including moulding!) before you hit wall that faces actual 'living' area that is the ONLY wall that can be used for TV , Music and Education (books). Thus being Couch and 2 chairs take all space on opposing lengthy sections of space making for no one actually sitting to a 'sweet spot'. Furniture is overstuffed huge ( I warned Her, She see's my point now) which thus enter into actual 'listening area' by over 3' on each side which is enough to block sound waves were speakers at farthest most point on 'HT' wall making corner use of any speaker but especially Horns a total waste. Keep in mind that door swings the same 36" into room on one side, you have to enter and exit room on the other and you still have that mere 8" that is the maximum you could use until you are actually seated in that room. I also now need to plan for near future - 16:3 , this big Mitsubishi is 7 years old (not a single service call) and planned future calls for 62" of space for 'too small' component rack/TV stand.
I could have made a real nice drawing but am too Computer illiterate to know how to get it here anyhow so your patience is appreciated. I hope description allows you to visualize this.
There is virtually only the one way we have it to place furniture and only that one wall to use . Add a vaulted ceiling open to hall, D.R. that further impedes sonics .
Best I've been able to come up with is 2 - 22" bookcases a mere 8" deep , the TV and a lousy 18" per side for speakers. Subs were going to be I.B. . I had wanted and still do to run 2 sets of speakers up front . My experimentation thus far with the 3 sets of brand name speaks I own as well as over a dozen mock-ups made with OSB or Cardboard with over a dozen different drivers I've purchased this year in every configuration including line array has led me to believe 1 set of speakers simply will not meet all my musical tastes as well as HT.
I'm only going through all this as I see countless posts where Guys ask questions over and over again and seem to pay no attention to the answers they are given. To top it off they continually come back with another thought of their own regards 'will this work?' I find that ruder than me writing a couple long posts. I appreciate every answer I'm given and I figure I owe it to the people decent enough to reply to my queries to tell them why I can't do what they are advising me to do.
TubesGuy - Nice to see a neighbor, I'm about 15 miles north of the Dells, I get into your neck of the woods every couple months. Never did the tree bit but perhaps I should try just hanging my drivers from ceiling in basketballs? How about O.B. on my truck antenna for autosound with a 2000 watt amp? I read Dave's comments about the minionken giving one of the best responses from the FR125. I don't see it giving me the volume I want with a single driver after yesterdays experiments with 2 drivers vs. 1 . I have thought of a possibility of using the minionken as a top end and a 6 or 8" FR or woof on the bottom. I own a set of BIC V830's that I was going to sell the drivers from and scrap the cabinets until I pulled a driver and saw how well those cabs were made - pretty decent. Top mid/tweet compartment is near to identical to mini dimensions and bottom leaves me 27" to play with. I've been pondering on that.
ChrisB and Cal -
I'd assumed (will I ever learn not to?) that the D'Apollito had been built and tested and I was surprised that the BSC issue had not come up considering how narrow the baffle is. One of the mod's I'd mentioned I had planned on making included round overs on the front as well as mounting drivers in rounded rings via Cain & Cain simply because of that concern. Non the less all I'd read to date indicated that single driver or multiple driver were the best bets for FR so I was surprised to see the drawing using that style initially. I have virtually no space at all to even toe in or out which I know is again assuming much from any speaker . With a side firing driver I'm only getting about 11"s before soundwaves hit the side of the TV which has got to make a mess of things and it also totally eliminates any chance of a 2nd set of speakers as you'd be driving directly into the side of that set unless it was less than 30 some inches.
I really appreciate all the input everyone has given me on this but it now appears I'm once again back to the drawing board.
Every new home ought to be built around proposed audio system. Listening room a minimum of 22 x 26! Build a shed for relatives and Company to sleep in and eliminate a bedroom.
Bluto
About the time I thought I had it.
These latest replies are much appreciated. I am now back to square one again but better that than the time spent building something to find out it likely doesn't work. Had you Guy's not given this latest info I'd planned on starting as soon as I got back to work (seasonal self employed).
I'm near to 1 year trying to figure out what we want and how to make it fit AND function properly.
The room is a nightmare. 12.8' x 18' with a huge diagonal cut in rear facing D.R. , open to D.R. on that remaining length, huge picture window on opposing length as well as 36" front door. A mere 8" (including moulding!) before you hit wall that faces actual 'living' area that is the ONLY wall that can be used for TV , Music and Education (books). Thus being Couch and 2 chairs take all space on opposing lengthy sections of space making for no one actually sitting to a 'sweet spot'. Furniture is overstuffed huge ( I warned Her, She see's my point now) which thus enter into actual 'listening area' by over 3' on each side which is enough to block sound waves were speakers at farthest most point on 'HT' wall making corner use of any speaker but especially Horns a total waste. Keep in mind that door swings the same 36" into room on one side, you have to enter and exit room on the other and you still have that mere 8" that is the maximum you could use until you are actually seated in that room. I also now need to plan for near future - 16:3 , this big Mitsubishi is 7 years old (not a single service call) and planned future calls for 62" of space for 'too small' component rack/TV stand.
I could have made a real nice drawing but am too Computer illiterate to know how to get it here anyhow so your patience is appreciated. I hope description allows you to visualize this.
There is virtually only the one way we have it to place furniture and only that one wall to use . Add a vaulted ceiling open to hall, D.R. that further impedes sonics .
Best I've been able to come up with is 2 - 22" bookcases a mere 8" deep , the TV and a lousy 18" per side for speakers. Subs were going to be I.B. . I had wanted and still do to run 2 sets of speakers up front . My experimentation thus far with the 3 sets of brand name speaks I own as well as over a dozen mock-ups made with OSB or Cardboard with over a dozen different drivers I've purchased this year in every configuration including line array has led me to believe 1 set of speakers simply will not meet all my musical tastes as well as HT.
I'm only going through all this as I see countless posts where Guys ask questions over and over again and seem to pay no attention to the answers they are given. To top it off they continually come back with another thought of their own regards 'will this work?' I find that ruder than me writing a couple long posts. I appreciate every answer I'm given and I figure I owe it to the people decent enough to reply to my queries to tell them why I can't do what they are advising me to do.
TubesGuy - Nice to see a neighbor, I'm about 15 miles north of the Dells, I get into your neck of the woods every couple months. Never did the tree bit but perhaps I should try just hanging my drivers from ceiling in basketballs? How about O.B. on my truck antenna for autosound with a 2000 watt amp? I read Dave's comments about the minionken giving one of the best responses from the FR125. I don't see it giving me the volume I want with a single driver after yesterdays experiments with 2 drivers vs. 1 . I have thought of a possibility of using the minionken as a top end and a 6 or 8" FR or woof on the bottom. I own a set of BIC V830's that I was going to sell the drivers from and scrap the cabinets until I pulled a driver and saw how well those cabs were made - pretty decent. Top mid/tweet compartment is near to identical to mini dimensions and bottom leaves me 27" to play with. I've been pondering on that.
ChrisB and Cal -
I'd assumed (will I ever learn not to?) that the D'Apollito had been built and tested and I was surprised that the BSC issue had not come up considering how narrow the baffle is. One of the mod's I'd mentioned I had planned on making included round overs on the front as well as mounting drivers in rounded rings via Cain & Cain simply because of that concern. Non the less all I'd read to date indicated that single driver or multiple driver were the best bets for FR so I was surprised to see the drawing using that style initially. I have virtually no space at all to even toe in or out which I know is again assuming much from any speaker . With a side firing driver I'm only getting about 11"s before soundwaves hit the side of the TV which has got to make a mess of things and it also totally eliminates any chance of a 2nd set of speakers as you'd be driving directly into the side of that set unless it was less than 30 some inches.
I really appreciate all the input everyone has given me on this but it now appears I'm once again back to the drawing board.
Every new home ought to be built around proposed audio system. Listening room a minimum of 22 x 26! Build a shed for relatives and Company to sleep in and eliminate a bedroom.
Bluto
planet10 said:
I've finally got some adapters made and replaced the thoroughly corroded so called Monster brand (style?) 14 ga. speaker wire sold at Home Depot with parallel runs of CAT 5/channel, so a bit shy of 15 ga.. Tried a single run (~18 ga.), but it rolled off what little LF/mid-bass/lower mids dynamics the 40-1354 has about 3 dB, so figured it would be even worse with the much lower efficiency/higher power rated FR125S.
The weather will dictate when I get to try the drivers since Buzz spends any day not too windy/rainy playing golf, so if the violent t-storms that knocked me out bed before sunrise lingers on long enough I may get to swap them out later on today, otherwise it could be awhile due to our current severe drought.
GM
Thanks, you must have some serious 'mojo' working as the wind picked up to at least 30 mph gusts after the rain tapered off and later in the evening it went from near short sleeve temps to sleet/snow accumulation! by the time I left Buzz's apt. around 4 am and now the rain barrels have a ~3/4" thick ice cap, so you can give it a rest. 
Anyway, the MLTL cab performs as predicted, though as Dave P10 mentioned with an early MLTL design of mine someone built, it allows the driver to over excurse too much on wide BW material at too low an average SPL compared to non-XBL^2 motored drivers, so I had to use Buzz's ancient, no-name ~one octave EQ to put a 6 dB dip centered at 30 Hz to protect it and the drivers have a too resonant treble, so put a 3 dB dip centered at 2 kHz and hopefully this will disappear with more break-in, otherwise it will require a contour filter in our opinions once we remove the EQ.
Today I'm going to try different tunings to see if I can find an acceptable trade-off between LF extension/driver protection so I can remove the EQ plus double up the CAT 5 wire runs in the hope that it may be at least a partial cause of the current mid-bass 'blues' since I noticed the 40-1354 suffered a bit after switching to the CAT 5 the other day.
Otherwise, as expected, the 125S is for the most part in another league compared to the heavily tweaked 40-1354, though I was rather disappointed with its inability to provide any 'foot tapping' mid bass worthy of the description that the 40-1354 has in spades for such a small driver, though again, I'm hoping that the spiders will loosen up enough to help solve this problem otherwise either a much more attenuated tuning will be required, necessitating a woofer system, bipolar layout, or at least corner loading, which isn't an option for Buzz in his current apt..
GM
edit: Another thing, these beam worse than a traditional rising on axis horn. I had to toe them in half again as much as the 40-1354s to keep vocals from coming from virtual twins standing at the mike, so Jim Griffin's tweeter addition seems a good plan even if their HF response is better than our rolled off hearing can appreciate.
Anyway, the MLTL cab performs as predicted, though as Dave P10 mentioned with an early MLTL design of mine someone built, it allows the driver to over excurse too much on wide BW material at too low an average SPL compared to non-XBL^2 motored drivers, so I had to use Buzz's ancient, no-name ~one octave EQ to put a 6 dB dip centered at 30 Hz to protect it and the drivers have a too resonant treble, so put a 3 dB dip centered at 2 kHz and hopefully this will disappear with more break-in, otherwise it will require a contour filter in our opinions once we remove the EQ.
Today I'm going to try different tunings to see if I can find an acceptable trade-off between LF extension/driver protection so I can remove the EQ plus double up the CAT 5 wire runs in the hope that it may be at least a partial cause of the current mid-bass 'blues' since I noticed the 40-1354 suffered a bit after switching to the CAT 5 the other day.
Otherwise, as expected, the 125S is for the most part in another league compared to the heavily tweaked 40-1354, though I was rather disappointed with its inability to provide any 'foot tapping' mid bass worthy of the description that the 40-1354 has in spades for such a small driver, though again, I'm hoping that the spiders will loosen up enough to help solve this problem otherwise either a much more attenuated tuning will be required, necessitating a woofer system, bipolar layout, or at least corner loading, which isn't an option for Buzz in his current apt..
GM
edit: Another thing, these beam worse than a traditional rising on axis horn. I had to toe them in half again as much as the 40-1354s to keep vocals from coming from virtual twins standing at the mike, so Jim Griffin's tweeter addition seems a good plan even if their HF response is better than our rolled off hearing can appreciate.
OK, got plenty of twisted speaker wire now to keep the voltage drop vanishingly low and removed the no-name EQ, which not surprisingly lifted a virtual thick veil from in front of the speakers, but left us with an even more maddeningly resonant HF, so extended the vents from 2" to 5", lowering Fb to around 37 Hz to damp the driver better and emphasize the mid-bass a bit more.
The drums on Dave Brubeck's TAKE FIVE improved a somewhat, as did Brian Bromberg's WOOD, but still lacked the 'snap' of the dirt cheap 40-1354s, which while good for the $$ are hardly a reference of note. Wedging some sheet polyfil strips into the vents 'tightened' them up to 'close enough' to the 1354s, but they should clearly outperform them IMO. Its big, super compliant surround seems to be the culprit when trying to use all that excursion, so next up is a damping ring and I hope it damps the ~2 kHz ringing too as without the EQ it excites our tinnitus something fierce even at fairly low listening levels.
Still, I'm pushing them to their absolute practical SPL/BW limits and have popped the VCs off the back plates several times with no apparent damage, so they seem plenty well built and the mids/HF are as good overall as I'd hoped for at this price level when driven at ~piano bar average SPLs. Indeed, I wouldn't be surprised if it 'rocks' harder than a JX92S can, though at the lower levels Buzz and many others listen at the Jordan's greater resolution would justify its pricing if the budget does.
BTW, a tweak I periodically harp on is the need to mass load tower cabs with heavy plants or equivalent and these relatively high excursion drivers in tall, skinny cabs need it big time, so we went from 10 lbs (bar bell weight) for the 1354s to 25 lbs on top before we couldn't hear any difference.
GM
The drums on Dave Brubeck's TAKE FIVE improved a somewhat, as did Brian Bromberg's WOOD, but still lacked the 'snap' of the dirt cheap 40-1354s, which while good for the $$ are hardly a reference of note. Wedging some sheet polyfil strips into the vents 'tightened' them up to 'close enough' to the 1354s, but they should clearly outperform them IMO. Its big, super compliant surround seems to be the culprit when trying to use all that excursion, so next up is a damping ring and I hope it damps the ~2 kHz ringing too as without the EQ it excites our tinnitus something fierce even at fairly low listening levels.
Still, I'm pushing them to their absolute practical SPL/BW limits and have popped the VCs off the back plates several times with no apparent damage, so they seem plenty well built and the mids/HF are as good overall as I'd hoped for at this price level when driven at ~piano bar average SPLs. Indeed, I wouldn't be surprised if it 'rocks' harder than a JX92S can, though at the lower levels Buzz and many others listen at the Jordan's greater resolution would justify its pricing if the budget does.
BTW, a tweak I periodically harp on is the need to mass load tower cabs with heavy plants or equivalent and these relatively high excursion drivers in tall, skinny cabs need it big time, so we went from 10 lbs (bar bell weight) for the 1354s to 25 lbs on top before we couldn't hear any difference.
GM
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