Jim G & Dave.
Lucky you!!!
Jim, should you decide to EnABL your ring less devices, don't put any gloss coat on the center dome until everything else has had a chance to cure out. The physical height of the dust cap places it's output just beyond the phase neutral position of the midrange. This is a timing error, caused by the over tall voice coil. I don't see any benefit to carving the voice coil former and reattaching the cap as the amount to remove cannot be more than 1 mm.
For these drivers here, I have resorted to a 1 mm diameter drop of PVA over the center spot on the dome, to help reset the phase behavior. There is still more high frequency energy evident than I care for, but it is not at all insulting to listen to. When using a drop to perform this service, you want to turn the drivers face down, after application with a full diameter round toothpick body, so you get the maximum loft possible out of the surface tension. These dot's are phase plugs
Dave,
I would be very tempted to not have any phase plug sticking out into the cone emission area. At most a very gently curved surface with perhaps 1 mm of loft at the center, with the outer curved edge at the same height as the cone joint with the voice coil when at rest. Without actually cutting into the glue welt there.
All of you who remove this ring might consider having someone cold cast a trim ring to cover the outer surround glue area. Just a very gentle slope up to the basket height would be perfect. If it were made from a plastic with a speed of sound through it of about the same as acrylic, that would be a very desirable addition. PVA would likely be a good attachment material, over whatever the surround is attached with.
If you want to experiment with the center dome, which is a functionally correct design and far superior to a dust cap that bridges to the cone surface, you might pattern the outer edge as shown and cut away the center, leaving just a ring radiator.
If they had not chosen to extend the center dome/voice coil to allow extended frequency response, ala the common commercial loudspeakers that spit high frequencies at you, then they would not have had to apply the ring, in an attempt to reblend the highs back in, and we would not be worrying ourselves with sharp knives and coffee fingers..... Oh well, everything else is just so well done here.....
Bud
Lucky you!!!
Jim, should you decide to EnABL your ring less devices, don't put any gloss coat on the center dome until everything else has had a chance to cure out. The physical height of the dust cap places it's output just beyond the phase neutral position of the midrange. This is a timing error, caused by the over tall voice coil. I don't see any benefit to carving the voice coil former and reattaching the cap as the amount to remove cannot be more than 1 mm.
For these drivers here, I have resorted to a 1 mm diameter drop of PVA over the center spot on the dome, to help reset the phase behavior. There is still more high frequency energy evident than I care for, but it is not at all insulting to listen to. When using a drop to perform this service, you want to turn the drivers face down, after application with a full diameter round toothpick body, so you get the maximum loft possible out of the surface tension. These dot's are phase plugs
Dave,
I would be very tempted to not have any phase plug sticking out into the cone emission area. At most a very gently curved surface with perhaps 1 mm of loft at the center, with the outer curved edge at the same height as the cone joint with the voice coil when at rest. Without actually cutting into the glue welt there.
All of you who remove this ring might consider having someone cold cast a trim ring to cover the outer surround glue area. Just a very gentle slope up to the basket height would be perfect. If it were made from a plastic with a speed of sound through it of about the same as acrylic, that would be a very desirable addition. PVA would likely be a good attachment material, over whatever the surround is attached with.
If you want to experiment with the center dome, which is a functionally correct design and far superior to a dust cap that bridges to the cone surface, you might pattern the outer edge as shown and cut away the center, leaving just a ring radiator.
If they had not chosen to extend the center dome/voice coil to allow extended frequency response, ala the common commercial loudspeakers that spit high frequencies at you, then they would not have had to apply the ring, in an attempt to reblend the highs back in, and we would not be worrying ourselves with sharp knives and coffee fingers..... Oh well, everything else is just so well done here.....
Bud
Hemp FR 4.5 C
Final notes, I think....
I have used a pair of Electron Pools to settle the phase/time shifted highs back into the body of the music, as they should have been from the first.
So, for all of those of you who look with horror at the prospect of knifing your hemp, the EnABL process and an appropriate Pool will do the trick. And this without in any way limiting what this speaker brings to the show.
You can go right ahead and EnABL these drivers and not remove anything. Just be sure you add the 1 mm dia dot of PVA on the dome center (Parts Express sells the correct stuff as speaker surround glue) and PM me to find out how to get a pair of correction socks..... Electron Pools tucked neatly into little woven cotton tubes with an enigmatic color code on the working end.
Bud
Final notes, I think....
I have used a pair of Electron Pools to settle the phase/time shifted highs back into the body of the music, as they should have been from the first.
So, for all of those of you who look with horror at the prospect of knifing your hemp, the EnABL process and an appropriate Pool will do the trick. And this without in any way limiting what this speaker brings to the show.
You can go right ahead and EnABL these drivers and not remove anything. Just be sure you add the 1 mm dia dot of PVA on the dome center (Parts Express sells the correct stuff as speaker surround glue) and PM me to find out how to get a pair of correction socks..... Electron Pools tucked neatly into little woven cotton tubes with an enigmatic color code on the working end.
Bud
badman
Answers some hot button questions the rest of us had, about what to do with our drying supplies of white out.
Glad to know that a PVA coating does not swamp the EnABL pattern. Did you use it full strength? Planet 10 has some treatments where he uses cut PVA in layers. Certainly should do the job either way.
Bud
Answers some hot button questions the rest of us had, about what to do with our drying supplies of white out.
Glad to know that a PVA coating does not swamp the EnABL pattern. Did you use it full strength? Planet 10 has some treatments where he uses cut PVA in layers. Certainly should do the job either way.
Bud
coming to terms with Lowther DX4
Well ,everybody is busy painting the speakers and not much of reports on the sounds of treated speakers. I think its time to give the credit where its a due. I have to admit I had a little headache with ENABLED DX4 but its all over now (almost;0)
First I intended them to work in front horn (azura 204 Hz) -wrong .They did not load properly and in my room with many recordings (both analog and cd's)they produced honk and bright ,shouty and fatiguing sound. I'm not lucky to have tons of gear to swap and find the best combination so I had to work with what I had in hand .
I think the enabled cones (as well as listener )goes to similar break-in process like a new ones because right after I've got the drivers back I tried closed box (I bi-amp and use Klipshorn bass bins crossed at ~200 Hz.) and the results were not good. Two weeks ago I decided to try again (After changing cables , coupling caps and tweaking CD player ,also I've changed phono cart). Oh ,what a relief ! Finally smooth, even ,detailed sound with good imaging and beautiful textures but a little thin in the lower midrange .After a little deliberation I've got this completely absurd idea to back load lowther with azura horns facing a corner with intention of bringing the 150-200Hz up in line with the upper frequencies . Well ,it may be (and probably is ) stupid but in my
narrow (10ft) room it works very good .Actually it is the first speaker I have which I like more , more I listen to it .With classical material (opera ) the voices finally breath -in in the space and the violins and strings don't slide down like from the iceberg. Electric guitars cut trough without mercy and listening to some life performances is really a thrilling experience . I can't say how the new lowther compares to old one as I did not use the old one that way but I enjoy the sound and this is the only thing which matters now. Sorry if this opinion sounds a little superficial and shallow but for a second language speaker its difficult to articulate subtleties and nuances of performance (there is only one Cat after all
On the final note I have to add that I like horns and I do miss a narrow range say 400-2kHZ when I had the lowther in front horn. There is some special quality in horns some people love some don't care for . I do.
PS. I almost forgot to mention the "electron pools" Bud sent me over . There is a chance that there was no break-in process and all the smoothness came from those little "cotton ties " I did not make a comparison before and after just hooked them up and let them do "the magic".You gotta trust the man ;0)Regards, L
Well ,everybody is busy painting the speakers and not much of reports on the sounds of treated speakers. I think its time to give the credit where its a due. I have to admit I had a little headache with ENABLED DX4 but its all over now (almost;0)
First I intended them to work in front horn (azura 204 Hz) -wrong .They did not load properly and in my room with many recordings (both analog and cd's)they produced honk and bright ,shouty and fatiguing sound. I'm not lucky to have tons of gear to swap and find the best combination so I had to work with what I had in hand .
I think the enabled cones (as well as listener )goes to similar break-in process like a new ones because right after I've got the drivers back I tried closed box (I bi-amp and use Klipshorn bass bins crossed at ~200 Hz.) and the results were not good. Two weeks ago I decided to try again (After changing cables , coupling caps and tweaking CD player ,also I've changed phono cart). Oh ,what a relief ! Finally smooth, even ,detailed sound with good imaging and beautiful textures but a little thin in the lower midrange .After a little deliberation I've got this completely absurd idea to back load lowther with azura horns facing a corner with intention of bringing the 150-200Hz up in line with the upper frequencies . Well ,it may be (and probably is ) stupid but in my
narrow (10ft) room it works very good .Actually it is the first speaker I have which I like more , more I listen to it .With classical material (opera ) the voices finally breath -in in the space and the violins and strings don't slide down like from the iceberg. Electric guitars cut trough without mercy and listening to some life performances is really a thrilling experience . I can't say how the new lowther compares to old one as I did not use the old one that way but I enjoy the sound and this is the only thing which matters now. Sorry if this opinion sounds a little superficial and shallow but for a second language speaker its difficult to articulate subtleties and nuances of performance (there is only one Cat after all
On the final note I have to add that I like horns and I do miss a narrow range say 400-2kHZ when I had the lowther in front horn. There is some special quality in horns some people love some don't care for . I do. PS. I almost forgot to mention the "electron pools" Bud sent me over . There is a chance that there was no break-in process and all the smoothness came from those little "cotton ties "
I did not make a comparison before and after just hooked them up and let them do "the magic".You gotta trust the man ;0)Regards, L
Oh my yes. The Fostex drivers you know are as tabby cats are to puma's when compared to the treated 4.5 Hemps. The Hemps are to Limonos older style DX 4's as puma's are to the two ton, horse eating, flightless, dragon birds that roamed South America in years gone by.
Just the most explosive speakers I have ever had the delight to uncover. I am just sorry to have sent them to him, with him hoping for "a little bit better". No way to effectively communicate what he was going to have to wrestle with. The pools he speaks of? Just swamped the Fostex drivers, made them sound dead. They were marginal on the PM6A's for Jon at Lowther and a step back proved a better idea there. Two steps back was perfect for the Fostex 127 E's.
I am very happy that Limono has adapted and found the way to use those dragon birds. There was no other way to treat them, they were not going to be anything less than exceptionally clear, forceful, dynamic, colorful and hard to tame.
Now that he has them harnessed, we can go about opening up the rest of his system and give real wings to those dragons. If you think it wild and woolly now Limono, just hang tight my friend.
Bud
BudP said:
Hi Bud:
The whiteout seemed well-suited to the task, as it's readily available, easy to apply, and bonds well to paper while protruding slightly above the surface. The pattern I did was a little 'loose', the theory being that a little variance here is perhaps even desirable. The PVA was used thinned, a single layer, which doesn't do much to the surface of the cone- it's soaked right up. And I've seen Planet10s usage, mine was very much like a single coat he might do.
I used a pattern around the edges of the cone, 'bars' on the outside, dots on the inside around the vc former. I also treated the tip of the phase plug. After staring at them a while, it became apparent that it looked ridiculous, the enclosures are spherical black metal. So I painted the cones yet again- this time with something with no real mechanical purpose- a sharpie. What better to stick to white-out? Did the phase plugs, and the pattern all black, now it matches much better visually. It leaves a sheen on the surface, but doesn't have enough solids in it to really influence the mechanicals of the cone.
All things considered, I think it came out well and plan to do it on some other drivers.
Hi Robert.
Be very careful about what you use as a Gloss coat replacement. Not all materials have the required "speed" of propagation. The PVA and Gloss coat are both acrylic based materials and regardless of flexibility their lateral propagation speed is roughly three times the speed of sound through air.
This is needed because none of us owns FEA software designed to predict the placement of a suppression ring that will stop mid cone or elsewhere delamination of the traveling wave in the boundary layer. This is a difficult concept to wrap your head around, but the conformal coating (gloss coat in my case, PVA in Badmans's) actually distributes all of the energy to the pattern rings for processing and so must have this speed of lateral propagation. If you just apply the pattern and not a gloss coat everything will sound fine until a dense portion or elevated power level are encountered. At that point the area of cone or dome that actually contributes to a systemic ringing will emit a short sharp "bark" of sound and then settle back down again.
If the gloss coat material is too slow, and every sort of varnish I ever tried is just that, they will actually change the tone of the emitted wave structure. In one case, for a guitar speaker, we actually moved from normal tone to flat.
Yep, the entire frequency range was shifted down by that amount. Please take this to heart. Every description I have heard about the effects of C37 is that it dampens the signal and smooths out the expression into the air. This is EXACTLY WHAT YOU DO NOT WANT TO HAPPEN!!!!
This is not a damping process. We are instead literally flinging the energy off of the cone surface before it has a chance to turn bad and corrupt that surface. We do not want to add a storage mechanism, which is what all damping materials do.
Please, buy some junk speakers and treat them first, with the white out and C37. If the two together bring the sound to life, remove all sorts of sonic corruption that you did not know could be removed, don't alter the tone of the frequencies from normal to flat and dry in something less than 3 years, then by all means move on to the speaker you really want to treat.
End of soap box, thanks for listening, please don't take it personally. I just don't want you to have a "bad" experience. I have had plenty in 30 years of learning about this and you should at lest observe caution in your experiments.
Bud
Be very careful about what you use as a Gloss coat replacement. Not all materials have the required "speed" of propagation. The PVA and Gloss coat are both acrylic based materials and regardless of flexibility their lateral propagation speed is roughly three times the speed of sound through air.
This is needed because none of us owns FEA software designed to predict the placement of a suppression ring that will stop mid cone or elsewhere delamination of the traveling wave in the boundary layer. This is a difficult concept to wrap your head around, but the conformal coating (gloss coat in my case, PVA in Badmans's) actually distributes all of the energy to the pattern rings for processing and so must have this speed of lateral propagation. If you just apply the pattern and not a gloss coat everything will sound fine until a dense portion or elevated power level are encountered. At that point the area of cone or dome that actually contributes to a systemic ringing will emit a short sharp "bark" of sound and then settle back down again.
If the gloss coat material is too slow, and every sort of varnish I ever tried is just that, they will actually change the tone of the emitted wave structure. In one case, for a guitar speaker, we actually moved from normal tone to flat.
Yep, the entire frequency range was shifted down by that amount. Please take this to heart. Every description I have heard about the effects of C37 is that it dampens the signal and smooths out the expression into the air. This is EXACTLY WHAT YOU DO NOT WANT TO HAPPEN!!!!
This is not a damping process. We are instead literally flinging the energy off of the cone surface before it has a chance to turn bad and corrupt that surface. We do not want to add a storage mechanism, which is what all damping materials do.
Please, buy some junk speakers and treat them first, with the white out and C37. If the two together bring the sound to life, remove all sorts of sonic corruption that you did not know could be removed, don't alter the tone of the frequencies from normal to flat and dry in something less than 3 years, then by all means move on to the speaker you really want to treat.
End of soap box, thanks for listening, please don't take it personally. I just don't want you to have a "bad" experience. I have had plenty in 30 years of learning about this and you should at lest observe caution in your experiments.
Bud
Robert F said:
Not dismissing what Bud has to say about the effects in tanem, i have found that 2 vanishingly thin coats of C37 transform a set of FR125s for the positive. A similar amount of puzzlekoat works almost as well. One has to be very careful working with the puzzlecoat as it is far to easy to find that you have glued the VC to the phase plug...
One experiment comes to mind, and that is to fully EnABLE an FR125 after it has been C37ed (i'll likely try that one as i have at least 2 sets of C37ed FRs here -- that is if someone doesn't buy them off me 1st -- i have at least 2/3 of a dozen other drivers in the experimental queue).
dave
Bud,
Thought you'd like some feedback on the litz loops and the EnABL treatment on an EX3.
First off tho', I should say something about my set-up as it's not typical: it's single channel mono. The amplifier was made for me by a very fine audio engineer.I asked him to regard the SPU cartridge and the EX3 drive unit as each having their own voice and that each should be considered as being part of the amplifier.I also asked him to dissolve the difference between the pre-amp and the power amp so that the voice of each was reflected in the other.The RIAA was to be the voicing of the overall system. What I didn't want, was an amplifier made of joined-up fragments.The whole system is the amplifier.
The first litz loop I made was 150mm long, half of which was bared and was inserted in the ground side of the loudspeaker.
The sound was not good. Upper voices sounded as tho' the record was being played with a dirty stylus.Intriguing! Listening to the choir on Handel's Dixit Dominus I noticed that the "dirty stylus" sound, was a small area - trapped, like a bubble that needed pricking.[What the hell am I talking about here? I should go to bed.]
The second loop was the same length but with 1cm bared ends.
The "dirty stylus" sound was absent but the upper voices sounded thin, trapped and disconnected.
The last loop I made was 450mm long with 1cm bared ends.
Great! Lovely harmonic richness, a slightly opened up lower mid-range.The whole system sounds calmer as tho' some hash has been removed.Bud, I don't know wether you are a Geller or a Faraday? This loop stays in.
To EnABL the EX3 I cut up small blocks of "post it", knowing that the treatment could be reversed. All that I could practically do with this method, was to do the two outer rings and the outer wizzer cone.
The sound was not good. It sounded dead,flat - as tho' the drive unit couldn't be bothered.Ahh! temperamental creatures these Lowthers. Mr Harrison; the bloke who made my amp, said "Lowthers sing sweetest just before they die" He added: " With humans its often the reverse."
Cilla
Thought you'd like some feedback on the litz loops and the EnABL treatment on an EX3.
First off tho', I should say something about my set-up as it's not typical: it's single channel mono. The amplifier was made for me by a very fine audio engineer.I asked him to regard the SPU cartridge and the EX3 drive unit as each having their own voice and that each should be considered as being part of the amplifier.I also asked him to dissolve the difference between the pre-amp and the power amp so that the voice of each was reflected in the other.The RIAA was to be the voicing of the overall system. What I didn't want, was an amplifier made of joined-up fragments.The whole system is the amplifier.
The first litz loop I made was 150mm long, half of which was bared and was inserted in the ground side of the loudspeaker.
The sound was not good. Upper voices sounded as tho' the record was being played with a dirty stylus.Intriguing! Listening to the choir on Handel's Dixit Dominus I noticed that the "dirty stylus" sound, was a small area - trapped, like a bubble that needed pricking.[What the hell am I talking about here? I should go to bed.]
The second loop was the same length but with 1cm bared ends.
The "dirty stylus" sound was absent but the upper voices sounded thin, trapped and disconnected.
The last loop I made was 450mm long with 1cm bared ends.
Great! Lovely harmonic richness, a slightly opened up lower mid-range.The whole system sounds calmer as tho' some hash has been removed.Bud, I don't know wether you are a Geller or a Faraday? This loop stays in.
To EnABL the EX3 I cut up small blocks of "post it", knowing that the treatment could be reversed. All that I could practically do with this method, was to do the two outer rings and the outer wizzer cone.
The sound was not good. It sounded dead,flat - as tho' the drive unit couldn't be bothered.Ahh! temperamental creatures these Lowthers. Mr Harrison; the bloke who made my amp, said "Lowthers sing sweetest just before they die" He added: " With humans its often the reverse."
Cilla
Hi Cilla,
Is this a Litz interconnect with a turn in it ?
I am not sure from your description and thus cannot understand the reason for your findings.
Also what kind of cable are you comparing it with ?
The nature of the NFB loop sensing at the output terminal of your amplifier might also be unique, so the results might not be repeatable with other Amp-LS combinations.
Cheers ........ Graham.
Is this a Litz interconnect with a turn in it ?
I am not sure from your description and thus cannot understand the reason for your findings.
Also what kind of cable are you comparing it with ?
The nature of the NFB loop sensing at the output terminal of your amplifier might also be unique, so the results might not be repeatable with other Amp-LS combinations.
Cheers ........ Graham.
Graham,
What I've been messing around with are not interconnect cables, but with Bud's idea of using short lengths of multy-stranded litz cable, ends bared and twisted together forming a loop, these are then connected to the ground side of the LS terminal.Well, at least this is how I understand Bud.He refers to these devices as "electron dumps" or "electron pools", I called them "litz loops".Mine were made from LS cable.
The Harrison amplifier is NFB free.In my post I tried to give a flavour of my system as I knew that the results could not be regarded as typical.What really surprised me tho', was that these devices did anything at all! Equally surprising, is the effect that the ratio between bare ends and covering has on the sound.
Bud suggests that the ground side needs to be given more attention as information is lost here and that these devices help to retrieve some of the lost information.
Cilla
What I've been messing around with are not interconnect cables, but with Bud's idea of using short lengths of multy-stranded litz cable, ends bared and twisted together forming a loop, these are then connected to the ground side of the LS terminal.Well, at least this is how I understand Bud.He refers to these devices as "electron dumps" or "electron pools", I called them "litz loops".Mine were made from LS cable.
The Harrison amplifier is NFB free.In my post I tried to give a flavour of my system as I knew that the results could not be regarded as typical.What really surprised me tho', was that these devices did anything at all! Equally surprising, is the effect that the ratio between bare ends and covering has on the sound.
Bud suggests that the ground side needs to be given more attention as information is lost here and that these devices help to retrieve some of the lost information.
Cilla
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