new member - with Lynn Olsen ME'2..

[bourney]

Hi all , my first post from a less than novice DIYer (from England) but hoping i may be able to pick a few brains on here regarding a pair of speakers i have recently obtained. i was pointed in this direction as i believe the designer of my speakers uses this forum from time to time. who better to help me get the best from them???

anyway here are the little fellas:





and this is what i am using to drive them:



the kit is now in a bigger room and i have followed Lynn set up instructions regarding toe in (pretty extreme toe in!) and i must admit they sound fantastic, especially in the mid and treble - the bass is quite lightweight but very agile. the qulaity of the cabinet work would shame most speakers from manufacturers

the firts thing i want to do is mount teh two ugly crossover boxes into a single box that can be rack mounted and i am wondering if there are any issues with doing this - ie two crossovers in a single standard cd player width case rather than having each box sitting behind each stand?

any advice greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Steve

[sdclc126]

Hi Steve,

Welcome! First off, you have a terrific looking set-up there with some great equipment - nice job. Guys like us could live in a room like that.

Second, I don't believe there will be any issues with putting your crossovers in the same box, as long as they're not jammed together - you want to keep all the inductors, especially the larger ones, separated so they don't interfere with eachother.

So, configure it so that no two inductors on the separate XOs are closer together than any two on each individual board, and you should be OK. Does that make sense? Also, perhaps a metal panel of some sort to give each XO a separate chamber, but I honestly don't know if that will make a difference.

[zigzagflux]

Steve:

Welcome to the ME2 club !

Wonderful speakers, aren't they? Put up a few pics of mine for camaraderie.

The crossover idea sounds like a good one to me; I personally think the conglomeration of inductors and Hovland capacitors is sexy, but I understand wanting to squirrel them away; if for no other reason than to keep the kids from stepping on them !

Question: in your picture, you don't show a whole lot of toe-in. Is this how you actually have them configured? In my room, they are almost pointing directly at my head (maybe about a foot or two in front of me). The spacial representation is striking.

Enjoy.

http://www.poeschleng.com/images/temp/upright.JPG

[bourney]

hi, thanks for the welcome,

that photo is in my old bachelor pad..i am now moved in with the good lady. I have set them up with the very heavy toe in, in the new room and it has totally transformed them. I've got to be honest tho, they do look strange in this way. Once i get the crossover boxes sorted - they are currently in 2 galvanised type cases - i will be able to tidy cables up and i am sure they will look more acceptable.

i agree with the spatial thing, they really do throw it around a bit and the width of the image is so wide.

i may try my Rel sub with them once i have the crossover casing sorted out.

[Lynn Olson]

Glad you like them - take good care of them, I understand the Vifa 5.5" drivers are out of production now. Your cabinets are certainly gorgeous with that sparkly aluminum-accented finish - my Ariels are so much more mundane looking in plain old wood-colored MDF with surface sealant.

Hmm - as for the crossover, it's fine putting the crossovers anywhere you want, but I'd try and keep a little distance between the Left and Right crossovers, maybe a foot or so. I would NOT put them in any kind of metallic box, bad idea. Use wood or plastic. Karna rather cleverly concealed the crossover by using upside-down wicker baskets that were just about exactly the right rectangular shape to cover the crossover board.

You'll like the REL subwoofer, it's what I use, and it's one of the very few that integrates successfully with the Ariels and ME2's. You will find the ME2's are very revealing of changes you make to the electronics, so have fun tweaking your amplifiers.

[bourney]

wow..thanks Lynn..i feel a bit starstruck

i can take any credit for the build of these I'm afraid, i bought them from someone who had a friend who had built them for him. very thick laquer and faultless piant work. he also put together a design folder that is nearly 1" thick.

would it be ok to mount the crossovers in a plastic case but with a metallic fascia? it has to be aesthetically pleasing to `the boss' as will be in our lounge. You can see the galvanised boxes behind the stands in their current form, will the fact that these are mettallic after the crossovers at all? also i want the inputs from the amp to be on the rear of the case and also the outputs to the speakers on the same back plate. Will this cause any problems?

[zigzagflux]

Originally posted by Lynn Olson
I understand the Vifa 5.5" drivers are out of production now.

Yes, they are out of production. Fortunately, they are still available from Madisound and North Creek. I ordered a full set of spare drivers just for longevity sake.

Given the inexpensive $44 Vifa (tweeters have escalated in price, tho) it seems worthwhile to consider.

[c2cthomas]

Welcome to diyAudio bourney! Wonderful system!
WARNING! DO NOT READ Lynn's "Beyond the Ariel" thread!!! Should you dare to wonder off there you will soon be plotting out space in which to locate "the new speakers" and seeing as they will be OB's they will consume a great amount of floor space. This will involve either moving to a house with a larger listening room - or knocking out a couple of walls!!! You only thought that you had a problem with where to put your x'overs for the ME2's. Hah - you ain't seen nothing yet!!!

[Lynn Olson]

Originally posted by bourney

Would it be ok to mount the crossovers in a plastic case but with a metallic fascia? It has to be aesthetically pleasing to `the boss' as will be in our lounge.

You can see the galvanised boxes behind the stands in their current form, will the fact that these are metallic after the crossovers at all?

Also I want the inputs from the amp to be on the rear of the case and also the outputs to the speakers on the same back plate. Will this cause any problems?

Aluminum, copper, and bronze are acceptable, but I really would keep any ferrous material at least 6 inches or more away from the inductors. Air-core inductors are inherently free-field and you have to keep in mind the field grows and shrinks with the current flowing through the inductors - the positioning of the inductors at right angles to each other keeps inductor-to-inductor interaction to a minimum, but they still interact with the outside world quite freely.

In terms of esthetics, have you considered glossy multi-coat piano-black paint or polished ebony wood for the fascias? That would be an elegant complement to the superb painted finish on the enclosures.

Don't see any problem with location of input/outputs. The only thing you really need to consider is physical isolation of the inductors from nearby ferrous materials (at least several inches) and mechanically quiet locations for the capacitors (which are quite sensitive to vibration). Resistors don't care that much about their surroundings, although keeping them well-ventilated is a good idea.

In terms of room positioning, any object closer than a metre to the centers of radiation of the drivers will create a noticeable image shift and flattening of stage depth. Properly operating Ariels and ME2's should routinely create stage widths of 100~120 degrees, very stable central and off-center images, and image depths from 20~30 feet deep as well as images that come into the room at least several feet. In the highest-quality setups (DHT triode amplifiers of high quality) you will hear images that come to your knees.

When I talk about "stage depths", that doesn't mean direct images of the instruments themselves, but the apparent space they are performing in. Even pretty bad recordings have apparent performing spaces - with good recordings these spaces are quite realistic, and with poorer (digital reverb) recordings the spaces are more "virtual" and insubstantial. With really atrocious recordings (Dolby Digital soundtracks) the apparent space can actually be program-modulated - that this escapes the mixdown process is a comment on the spatial fidelity of modern studio monitors.

The picture below shows the Ariels right after the last VSAC show in Silverdale, Washington State. That was 4 or 5 years ago, if I recall right. The living room I now have in Colorado still needs a lot of work - plenty of standing waves and a stairway at an awkward 45-degree angle that intrudes a few feet into one side of the room. The prospect of rotating everything around by 90 or 180 degrees is sort of appalling, but the new speakers might necessitate that. Maybe Karna and I can find artistic-looking rugs we can hang on the walls to deal with the slap echoes.

[Irakli]

Welcomee to the forum Bourney and congratulations with a nice system

I have crossovers in one box and in site of Lynn's advse it is located quite close to the power conditioner (at least 70 lb. of iron. Crossover box is second one from the bottom). Never had any problems.