FR125S suitable for home theater?

[Ryan_Mc]

I'm going to start making a home theater setup and want to make my own speakers for it. I don't have any lofty goals for now, just want something with 'proper' drivers that's better than the usual HTIB. Hopefully these will sound as good as a Bose setup? (lol jk) I will probably want to play with different configurations in the future. But for now I will want 5 speakers for the four corners plus center.

I like these drivers because the seem to pretty good by what I've read and they are full range. I'm worried about not having a tweeter for dispersing the sound, though my HT area is fairly small ~15ft. X 15ft. I also like the looks of these since I want the speaker to be visible (i.e. no speaker grills).... just an aesthetics thing I suppose.

I'm probably going to jump on a used AVR 125 receiver since it seems to fit what I need right now and will buy me some time to make a more informed decision on what's important to me when I upgrade. I will also be using a separate sub.

So are these suitable for what I want, or should I be looking at something else?

Thanks,
Ryan

[chrisb]

With appropriate bass management and powered woofers for the heaviest lifting, the CSS FR125S could be a great entry into the world of DIY speaker building.

Here's a basic book-shelf sized design for HT application for this driver that works like a charm:





http://homepage.mac.com/tlinespeaker...odic-plans.pdf


or if you the space to accommodate bipole floorstanders, (shown with push-push sub.











Warning, this can be a very addictive habit ,

[Ryan_Mc]

Yeah I know it's addicting, I did a lot many years ago with car audio. Should be a little more fun this time around having a fairly well equiped shop to work in. Santa brought me a 42" LCD this year so that has really jumpstarted this project. Nice TV but the internal speakers are a POS.

Those little book shelf's are what I had in mind though the bipoles are interesting. What's the advantages with those? I see they use the WR125S, and is that a teensy tweeter below them or what? They really don't take up any more space than the book shelf box on a stand but I'm trying to keep thing pretty close to the wall so would the rear driver have any ill effects being with 12" of a wall?

The rear speakers I'm going to have to get fancy with... probably half build them into walls.

That sub is about what I have in mind too. I have a pair of 10" 4ohm speakers that have been collecting dust. I plan to run them in series for 8 ohms and use a Bash 300.

[chrisb]

Note that the little bookshelf models are resistively ported out the back. While there are several advantages to the slanted back shape, you could juggle the dimensions a bit for a more conventional rectangular box that when made from plywood could easily be light enough for wall mounting.

This is work well for rear / surrounds as well, and with an appropriate adjustable bracket, could allow for fine-tuning of directional dispersion.

Just be careful about making them too shallow - one of our earlier projects using the FR125 (Tom Zurkowski's PAWO) had major midrange coloration issues with the FR125 in a very shallow box.

Here's a more conventionally shaped small enclosure (still rear vented):

http://homepage.mac.com/tlinespeaker...slotPortBR.pdf




Yes, the bipoles used a small tweeter - IIRC, these were sourced from Apex Jr, and were dirt cheap, but sounded great with a simple 1st order XO about an octave above the WR's on axis roll-off point.

The bipole also has a lot of sonic advantages, but needs more breathing room behind and to the sides than you might have. In re-reading your original post, I suspect that by the time you allow for and audience, a 15x15ft room would be a tight squeeze for a pair of these, sub(s), and furniture.

Another proven enclosure for the FR125 is the P10 mini-onken - a much larger enclosure than the little guys (i.e. approx 14 Litres vs 7 Litres) shown here stand mounted, but we've also installed those with wall brackets



http://homepage.mac.com/tlinespeaker...-FR125-map.pdf

[Henkjan]

would be an excelent entry into good HT.. I don't think the off axis response will be a problem with a usual HT setup, where the listening angle is a lot narrower than most stereo setups. given their small size, you probably want to cross somewhat higher to your sub than the THX specced 80Hz, if possible 120Hz or even 150Hz, if you can place the sub (or better 2 subs) near the fronts this should work fine.

[chrisb]

Originally posted by Henkjan
would be an excelent entry into good HT.. I don't think the off axis response will be a problem with a usual HT setup, where the listening angle is a lot narrower than most stereo setups. given their small size, you probably want to cross somewhat higher to your sub than the THX specced 80Hz, if possible 120Hz or even 150Hz, if you can place the sub (or better 2 subs) near the fronts this should work fine.

bingo

It's been at least 3 years since I last played with my old Denon HT receiver, ( which is at least 50yrs in the format wars - just how many channels are we up to these days - wait, don't answer ), but I think if you set the speaker management on even the most rudimentary old 5.1 rigs to "small" for the L&R front channels, the bass frequencies are redirected to the sub.

[planet10]

FR125 (or WR with helper tweeter) makes a good HT system. They are particularily synergistic with the receivers typically used.

The small boxes are 4.5 litre. The miniOnken 13 llitre. The bipoles ~20 litres.

We have a video editing suite with 5 miniOnken installed (w dual 9" push-push active woofer)

dave

[dazydee]

I have used my Cyburg Monitors (see avatar) as center and rears occasionally, much to my liking.

I would recommend some extra tweeter for the people listening off axis though.

[Bigun]

Originally posted by chrisb


Just be careful about making them too shallow - one of our earlier projects using the FR125 (Tom Zurkowski's PAWO) had major midrange coloration issues with the FR125 in a very shallow box.

<snip>

How shallow was the box which gave this problem and were you able to eliminate this problem?

[planet10]

Originally posted by Bigun
How shallow was the box which gave this problem and were you able to eliminate this problem?

http://www.planet10-hifi.com/tom-zHorn.html

We fixed it by changing drivers, and further improved it by adding a supraBaffle.

The PAWO is not suitable for the FR125

dave