A12P F.A.S.T

[Toppsy]

This is my first forray into a FAST speaker. That is a full range speaker with bass helper.

These are designed by Scott (Scottmoose) will a little input from me on the cabinet design and shape and are a follow up from when young Chris661 came over to listen to my A12P standmounts (featured elsewhere on a seperate thread) and brought along his actve bass speakers so we could try them out with these to see how the bass was improved or not. As it turned out it was an improved combo and so spawned these standmounts.

They have been designed to be seperate cabinets using the above mentioned A12P standmount speakers with the active bass helper cabinet below. They don't have to be joined together and are designed so for anyone who wants just a active bass helper speaker to augment any small full range speakers they can simple build the bass helpers. In my case I have built them as a single integrated floorstander.

It's early days yet as I have only built and finished one speaker. The other is still in finished panels ready for glue up. Still need to play around with phase, volume and XO points when I have the other cabinet finished. However early listening to the one speaker and one standmount with the bass speakers crossed over at 100Hz and 90 deg phase angle on the bass helper suggests these do the biz by retaining all the qualities of the A12P but with reinforced bottom end detail.

Here are some photos.





Not sure where this design is going as they are still in the experimental stages and a project still under construction but initial listening has encouraged me to make some grille covers for the speakers as I feel the naked front baffle distracts a little with the difference in the two drivers. I think this makes for more eye candy, but then i would be biased wouldn't I.

Anyway here's a photo of the one finished (in bare birch ply) with the grille in place.

[soundnovice]

wonderful build Toppsy

[zman01]

Hmm... build looking good Colin, and in the long run I just might have to settle for something like this given my liking for Zimmer music like Inception and The Dark Knight Rises OST... not to mention rock and metal Look forward to more listening impressions once both cabinets are done.

[wcwc]

I was thinking of doing something similar with the A7.3. Why did you pick the A12P?

[Scottmoose]

...a follow up from when young Chris661 came over to listen to my A12P standmounts (featured elsewhere on a seperate thread) and brought along his actve bass speakers so we could try them out with these... They have been designed to be seperate cabinets using the above mentioned A12P standmount speakers with the active bass helper cabinet below.

[glt]

What is the driver?

[vinylkid58]

Looks like a Peerless HDS woofer. Just a guess.

jeff

[chris661]

Originally Posted by vinylkid58

Looks like a Peerless HDS woofer. Just a guess.

jeff

Pretty sure that's the one, yeah.

I got to see the Peerless driver before it went into the cabinet. Really nicely made.

To expand a little on what Colin has said, the speakers I took around were my FAST speakers with Tang Band W6-1139 woofers. You know, the 6"ers with ~13mm of one-way travel.
Put mine through an active crossover and big ol' solid state amp, and set the crossover and volume low.
With the crossover set to around 55Hz (where the Alpairs begin to fall off in the small ported cabinet they were in), we then got the subwoofer volume so that, while in-play, you didn't notice them, but you could immediately tell that they were gone.

My woofers gave another 15Hz of extension (f3 ~40Hz) over the Alpairs. These Peerless drivers in those cabinets ought to go considerably lower, so I'd expect even more benefit to the sound there. The Peerless drivers are also of considerably better quality than my TBs, so I'm expecting great things here.

Chris

[ctrevith]

Nice build! What's the sense at this point of how the Peerless HDS matches with the A12P? The reason I ask is that I'm considering doing the same thing with an SBA SB34NRXL75-8. I'm concerned though that it may be overkill if the A12P is SPL limited even if crossed over a little higher say 200-400Hz.

[zman01]

Colin,

Any updates on how the speakers are playing?

Chris661,

Did you get a chance to play any heavy (and noisy) stuff on these?

- Zia