FrugalHorn -> FE166?

[rjbond3rd]

Hi folks, in looking at the FrugalHorn plans, I'm wondering if the FE166E could squeeze in there. Baffle width is just under 7 inches, with internal width of 5.5 inches, and it looks like it could go in there, especially if a supra-baffle is used.

Has anybody tried that, or do you have any thoughts on what the result would be? Thanks in advance -- the FrugalHorn looks like a fantastic design.

[DaveCan]

I'm thinking it wouldn't be very good at all, and the 166 would probably sound the chits crammed into that tiny cab... Plus it was not designed for that driver, but for the 108ez first ,and then later used with the 126... But if ya wanna then have at it Dave

[Scottmoose]

No chance. It's far too small for it.

[rjbond3rd]

Hi guys, thank you for the replies to my newb question. It can definitely get in there physically (with the supra-baffle) so I'm guessing you guys are saying it doesn't fit for other more sophisticated reasons.

It seems to have been designed with a lot of flexibility. For example, the chamber has dividers that permit up to 5.4 liters. That's vastly bigger than the chamber on Ron Clarke's A166.

So do you mean that, despite the adjustable size of the chamber, the throat is just impossibly small? In reading the plans, the throat looks to be about 5.5" wide x .75" high = 4.125"^2 (no quite sure of the .75 height from the plans but it looks to be about that).

Looking at the A166, the throat seems to be about 7.9 x 1.3 = 10.27"^2.

What if I simply make the Frugel-Horn's width greater until the throat area equals the value the A166 is using? A longshot of course, but I thought I'd ask in the hope of learning something. Thanks in advance!

[DaveCan]

Why not just build the A166? If your just wanting to have fun and play around some, then you can put the 166 in the FH ,but why bother?

To me the FH is a cool little horn that sounds good, and would be a good choice if you just can't get the wife or other to go for anything bigger, or you have a tiny room.

If it were me ,and I'm no designer, I would re-work the FH cab to have the driver at a more reasonable ear height as its basically a floor standing speaker cab that fires at your kneecaps. I always thought that this was a big flaw of the design IMO, but many really like it and of course YMMV..

Btw only my observations ,and in no way do I mean to say the FH doesn't sound good, it does..
Dave

[rjbond3rd]

Hi DaveCan, thanks for your words, especially with regard to driver height. My wife is just fixated on those amazing FH pictures of the flower-like supra-baffles with the voids left open. And now the standard has been set: in her mind, speakers should look like flowers in a vase.

I'm really trying to comprehend the horn theory. It would be fantastic if you could scale a horn in just the width dimension in order to nail the throat size. (This presumes the FH adjustable chamber, and it assumes you can live with whatever the horn's cutoff freq is, of course.)

So that's what I'm wondering: can you scale a horn's width to a larger driver, until the throat area matches that required by the driver?

The equation for throat area I'm using is:

throat area = (2pi * Fs * Qts * Vas) / speed of sound

So throat area is a function of driver params, but the mouth equation is not:

mouth area = (1/size-factor * 4pi)(c / cutoff-freq)^2

Which are from this site:

http://rocketsciencecanada.com/rocke...nfo_Design.asp

Am I totally missing something obvious? Pardon these newbie questions -- I'm not trying to avoid the work, I'm really stuck after hours and hours. The problem with self-teaching is that I have an idiot for an instructor.

[Scottmoose]

Not generally, because in the process, you're going to change everything else, not just the throat.

Horn theory will only take you so far with most domestic horns, because they have to use a combination of QW & horn actions to fit into a vaguely reasonable cabinet size. See these two posts by GM which list a 'sufficient' number of publications on horns generally: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showt...60#post1527960

[DaveCan]

If the wife really loves the FH with the flower type SB, then why not build it for the driver (s) it was meant for instead of using the 166? If it was me I'd build Ron's A126 instead ,and use Dave's modded 126 driver, and put the flowery Supra Baffle on it if I had to keep the WAF happening The A126 isn't a whole lot larger, better driver height and fuller sounding etc..

As Scott has pointed out you really can't just put any one driver in a horn cab and some other type cabs too that were not designed for it..

All the designs that these guys have worked on and given for the d.i.y.-er , should be built to the letter IMO ,otherwise you have no reference to how the design was suppose to work and sound in the first place..


Dave

[rjbond3rd]

Hi guys, thank you again for your help! The lady will have her flower-speaker one way or another.

What got me thinking about scaling, in all dimensions or just width, is the http://www.hornlautsprecher.de site.

Many of the designs have the same "shape" and differ only in HxWxD, with some squishing and stretching -- but still variations on one shape.

Anyway, I'll keep chipping away. Thank you for the advice and the articles! It's a long slog but I guess it will be my personal Mt. Everest -- I can hardly complain that it's hard since the challenge is practically the point. That, and a speaker that looks like a flower which will probably be a plant-stand.

Thanks again guys!

[DaveCan]

It would be kind of neat to poll some women and see what they would appreciate as a compromise enclosure etc ,in the shared listening space.

I think the Frugal Horn and the like would probably be very high up on the list, and also small bookshelf sort of cabs, very high WAF for size etc.

It's funny in that most women love to dance and groove etc( at all age levels), but somehow unlike us men folk, they don't often appreciate their stereo systems as the dominating factor of the room decor, go figure

Wouldn't it be cool if the lady of the house one day said something like, " Ya know honey , your a good man and I'd like to support your interest in music, you can build a pair of speaker cabs any size you want, as long as we can still sit together in the room and have space for when company comes over'' Schwing!!!
Dave