For those here that don´t know me: i don´t like small speakers.
I don´t care about WAF, maybe because my wife never has objected to stuff like these in the livingroom:
I design and build mostly large speakers and i normally regard a driver with a sensitivity below 95dB as defective.
A couple of months ago fate or chance or whatever intervened and there was a sound reason for me to try to design something using Morel drivers.
Very reluctantly from start, i after a while, reading specs over and over, decided to do the best i could, starting at the budget end of those rater expensive drivers.
After a few days with the slideruler, paper and pen, WinIsd etc, i ended up with this.
Having lived with those for some weeks now i´m still stunned by what they do, don´t understand how they can, but will recomend any one who wants something really small but likes the sound of really big speakers, try this design.
Drawings up here soon.
Ingvar
I don´t care about WAF, maybe because my wife never has objected to stuff like these in the livingroom:
I design and build mostly large speakers and i normally regard a driver with a sensitivity below 95dB as defective.
A couple of months ago fate or chance or whatever intervened and there was a sound reason for me to try to design something using Morel drivers.
Very reluctantly from start, i after a while, reading specs over and over, decided to do the best i could, starting at the budget end of those rater expensive drivers.
After a few days with the slideruler, paper and pen, WinIsd etc, i ended up with this.
Having lived with those for some weeks now i´m still stunned by what they do, don´t understand how they can, but will recomend any one who wants something really small but likes the sound of really big speakers, try this design.
Drawings up here soon.
Ingvar
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So, what is this then?
The two sligtly larger round parts are Morel CAW638, the smaller one in between is Morel CAT408.
These reside in something i would call a rather large aperiodic box.
During design i eventually ended in this box that had a teoretical f3 at 34Hz, decent for two 6 1/2", in reality, after breaking in, f3 is far lower.
First measurment, in my livingroom, no mike damping, just quick and dirty, no smoothing at all, still looks pretty decent.
Ingvar
The two sligtly larger round parts are Morel CAW638, the smaller one in between is Morel CAT408.
These reside in something i would call a rather large aperiodic box.
During design i eventually ended in this box that had a teoretical f3 at 34Hz, decent for two 6 1/2", in reality, after breaking in, f3 is far lower.
First measurment, in my livingroom, no mike damping, just quick and dirty, no smoothing at all, still looks pretty decent.
Ingvar
This is measuremnt from speaker in above picture, after about 1 hour listening, it´s pretty obvious that the f3 calculation was decently ok, which proves the old proverb, "even a blind hen".
With industry standard smoothing:
Linear behaviour might be good, dont know if it is important, but dynamic capabilities is, i beleive, the most important part in a speakers way of reproducing recorded music in a lifelike and enjoyable way.
With industry standard smoothing:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Linear behaviour might be good, dont know if it is important, but dynamic capabilities is, i beleive, the most important part in a speakers way of reproducing recorded music in a lifelike and enjoyable way.
No, its not any kind of qw related pipe or tl, it´s a quite large box, for 2x6,5" drivers, around 55 litres if i remember correctly, but vented, tuned to slightly above 30hz.
All inner surfaces are lined with heavy felt, except the entrance area of the rather long vent which is where the flow resistance material is placed, which is done at place of use, tuning them to the listening room.
All inner surfaces are lined with heavy felt, except the entrance area of the rather long vent which is where the flow resistance material is placed, which is done at place of use, tuning them to the listening room.
Hi,
No doubt though you can probably do better with better value drivers
in similar cabinets. Morel drivers although expensive, have never stood
up as value for their cost, in all the comparative DIY testing I've seen.
(Or do similar for quite a bit less.)
rgds, sreten.
Aperiodic loading is very different to tuned vented (damped or not) loading.
No doubt though you can probably do better with better value drivers
in similar cabinets. Morel drivers although expensive, have never stood
up as value for their cost, in all the comparative DIY testing I've seen.
(Or do similar for quite a bit less.)
rgds, sreten.
Aperiodic loading is very different to tuned vented (damped or not) loading.
X-over at measurment time was suposed to be around 3k, after rework and fiddling with components that works, still a litte dip, 4dB or so, around 2,5k.
How they sound?
Now we are entering the subjecteve realm, ok with me, music is as far from objective anything can be. Bear in mind, i designed these speakers, i dont write about them here with a comercial interest, all drawings will be published here and availlable in pdf file for anyone who wants them.
I think:
LF extension is really astonishing with impact or force like very much larger drivers more associated with pro or studio use, still very tonaly corect, You allways hear the note the baseman plays, not just a rumble.
Voices are lifelike and present, maybe lacking in the sense of actual presence and force as a really good 12".
Soundstage is ridicously good, and separation/resolution of unison voices is the best i´ve ever heard.
Drawbacks?
None.
Hullo! There we caught the liar!
Major drawback is very poor sensitivity, measured after a few hours of use, gives 2,83v @ 100Hz 1M = 92dB , as it is a 4ohm load it also needs an amp with decent power and current capacity.
My tiny ML11 amp gladly produces 120dB with these speakers and a simple EL84PP (Edison12) has no trouble playing music at fairly realistic levels through these speakers
How they sound?
Now we are entering the subjecteve realm, ok with me, music is as far from objective anything can be. Bear in mind, i designed these speakers, i dont write about them here with a comercial interest, all drawings will be published here and availlable in pdf file for anyone who wants them.
I think:
LF extension is really astonishing with impact or force like very much larger drivers more associated with pro or studio use, still very tonaly corect, You allways hear the note the baseman plays, not just a rumble.
Voices are lifelike and present, maybe lacking in the sense of actual presence and force as a really good 12".
Soundstage is ridicously good, and separation/resolution of unison voices is the best i´ve ever heard.
Drawbacks?
None.
Hullo! There we caught the liar!
Major drawback is very poor sensitivity, measured after a few hours of use, gives 2,83v @ 100Hz 1M = 92dB , as it is a 4ohm load it also needs an amp with decent power and current capacity.
My tiny ML11 amp gladly produces 120dB with these speakers and a simple EL84PP (Edison12) has no trouble playing music at fairly realistic levels through these speakers
Already ordered a pair of these and I hope I'll have the kit at home before next weekend. Can't wait to start building these!
Here's another picture
For my own listening impressions you could simply read the post about it on my blog -> ?music
Rammstein was ridiculously fun to play on these speakers. Ever since I visited Ingvar a couple of weeks ago I've been trying to replicate that sofa-shaking bass at 0:23-0:24 in Fuhre Mich but nothing in my house can do it.
Here's another picture
For my own listening impressions you could simply read the post about it on my blog -> ?music
Rammstein was ridiculously fun to play on these speakers. Ever since I visited Ingvar a couple of weeks ago I've been trying to replicate that sofa-shaking bass at 0:23-0:24 in Fuhre Mich but nothing in my house can do it.
Yes it was my friend, with the new x-over even better, since You were here i´ve had time to listen at very low levels too, which was´nt that fun in the beginning, but as the drivers are broken in the low level dynamics improves drasticaly and now they are very nice for those who play soft, not anything You or i will be caught doing?
True that Morel arent cheap. They arent unique but they are usable. Cheaper alternatives everywhere. With Morel youre paying for things like large flatwound or hex wire voicecoils. The advantages of that id imagine would be high BL with respect to the resultant inductance, in comparison.
But id agree with Tux, youre tweeter is wrongly phased.
But id agree with Tux, youre tweeter is wrongly phased.
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I'm with sreten here.
My experience with Morel is that their cone drivers' unit-unit consistency (even units from the same batch) is so risible that I cannot fathom a situation where I'd find them suitable regardless of their other virtues (though large voicecoils is pretty much the beginning and end of that list).
Their tweeters do seem to be more consistent in their performance.
Hi,
What is the difference ? Your bigging up your design whilst also clearly
stating you have real relative experience of designing similar speakers.
Its not rocket science to realise / discover good drivers designed for
domestic use actually do the job a lot better in much smaller cabinets
than 95dB+ drivers usually designed for a different purpose, usually SPL.
Sod the guru stuff, and the intimations your design is fantastic, I'm out
of here and you need to apply some circumspection to what you say.
rgds, sreten.
If you want to build a pair of speakers involving $650 worth of drivers
there are plenty of choices out there, some are a lot more ambitious.
MTM's are hardly thin on the ground. In this case there are some better
documented, described, detailed and more accurate designs available
for a lot less, capable of the same sort of performance envelope.
I'm not knocking the design as such, I just can't do with the hyperbole
and waffle about the technical details, e.g. the two Morel bass drivers
at 86dB each into half space are equivalent to a 4 ohm 86dB driver at
100Hz into full space, real sensitivity is 83dB/W, or 86dB/2.83V/1m,
nothing like 92dB at 1m, and the tweeter only does 89dB ....
Expensive drivers don't make a good design if they are not good value
in the first place, and here there is nothing to suggest optimum use, e.g.
whilst you can use two 17L Vas drivers in a 55L box you have choices.
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My intentions were only to share something that i think worked out well.
Not that i found a new theory on par with Einsteins, wich by the way are questioned more and more, there is nothing new here, only a design that imo works very well.
Incidentely, everyone who has been here for listening, quite a few in this home, agrees.
As for the very different opinions regarding driver quality, i think that is nothing unique for this particular brand.
I clearly state that i don´t usually work with this kind of speakers but at this time there was good reasons to try, i can´t see where i´m trying to build a gurustatus here but let it be official now and here, i´m not a guru! Wearing ponytail thou.
The x-over issue adressed above has been rectified, the lp section was way to low, hence the large dip.
Regarding sensitivity, 100Hz from the signal generator into the amp, 2,83Vrms across speaker terminals, measured with Fluke 179 TRMS measures 92dB at 1M, that equals 89dB for 1W which seems to me coresponding to two 86dB drivers parallell in half space, as stated measured in my livingroom so roomgain is ofcourse part of measurement.
Regardless of technical pros and cons, i find these speakers ridicously fun to listen to music through, that´s the reason i wanted to tell about it.
Not that i found a new theory on par with Einsteins, wich by the way are questioned more and more, there is nothing new here, only a design that imo works very well.
Incidentely, everyone who has been here for listening, quite a few in this home, agrees.
As for the very different opinions regarding driver quality, i think that is nothing unique for this particular brand.
I clearly state that i don´t usually work with this kind of speakers but at this time there was good reasons to try, i can´t see where i´m trying to build a gurustatus here but let it be official now and here, i´m not a guru! Wearing ponytail thou.
The x-over issue adressed above has been rectified, the lp section was way to low, hence the large dip.
Regarding sensitivity, 100Hz from the signal generator into the amp, 2,83Vrms across speaker terminals, measured with Fluke 179 TRMS measures 92dB at 1M, that equals 89dB for 1W which seems to me coresponding to two 86dB drivers parallell in half space, as stated measured in my livingroom so roomgain is ofcourse part of measurement.
Regardless of technical pros and cons, i find these speakers ridicously fun to listen to music through, that´s the reason i wanted to tell about it.
This is all VERY interesting, Ingvar! You'll just have to ignore sreten's usual negativity. The fact is that good polycones are thin on the ground, and the Morel CAW 638 is a mid/bass driver of great loveliness that we'd all like to try. Vented magnet is also a feature that I always particularly like.
Alas, Morel don't make modelling easy, though I found a nice series crossover Morel design at Eltim:
You seem to have made a variant of Lynn Olson's respected Ariel here with an overdamped bass from the large cabinet. I'd be interested to see what crossover values are working for you. Depends on bafflestep choice really.
Alas, Morel don't make modelling easy, though I found a nice series crossover Morel design at Eltim:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
You seem to have made a variant of Lynn Olson's respected Ariel here with an overdamped bass from the large cabinet. I'd be interested to see what crossover values are working for you. Depends on bafflestep choice really.
Few polycones? Few good ones perhaps. I havent heard these Morels, but the data for the CAW 538 and 638 are interesting. However, I had never heard a modern polymer cone that i liked, they seem to smooth over the detail. Disclaimer: my sig lol. If I found a hard poly cone, say nylon, aramide, then maybe. Polyprop just sounds mushy to my ears. Id even take metal in preference, which before i listened to them, was completely opposite to my expectations. That said, if the filter is fixed, then they look reasonbly flat. I have a similarly sized single woofer TQWT that was designed to be flat down to 43hz with a 5 inch driver. im sure yours sound great, as im sure mine do also. But, i bet mine cost a lot less.
I really like my morel MTM's (MW144's with DMS 37's) They don't play low like the ones featured in this thread (as each mid is in a 5L sealed enclosure) but the bass they do produce surprised me!
getting the crossover right made a world of difference. I suspect when I finally get the 10" vifas covering the lows up to 200 - 300 Hz then they will really start to shine
The breif test I did (in mono) did seem to indicate an improvement in clarity once the mids weren't trying to reproduce the full range.
Tony.
getting the crossover right made a world of difference. I suspect when I finally get the 10" vifas covering the lows up to 200 - 300 Hz then they will really start to shine
The breif test I did (in mono) did seem to indicate an improvement in clarity once the mids weren't trying to reproduce the full range. Tony.
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