What a contraption! 
Never seen anything like it. All I can say is that my experience on a 200Hz Goto-ish horn was annoying using the K55/FS100W, compared using the same horn with a Yamaha driver, and then only with a slight modification to the throat. Although the Yamaha could not go as low, it did everything clean. I don't see the point using a horn only between 100-300Hz. The driver need to be able to do 100 to 1200Hz at least. I don't like steep slopes from anything other than bass, so sound, ugly or not, will always sip through from a horn like the WE 15A.
Never seen anything like it. All I can say is that my experience on a 200Hz Goto-ish horn was annoying using the K55/FS100W, compared using the same horn with a Yamaha driver, and then only with a slight modification to the throat. Although the Yamaha could not go as low, it did everything clean. I don't see the point using a horn only between 100-300Hz. The driver need to be able to do 100 to 1200Hz at least. I don't like steep slopes from anything other than bass, so sound, ugly or not, will always sip through from a horn like the WE 15A.
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Probably won't see another horn like it, a spiral pattern would have worked better, but I wanted something easy to build with materials I had on hand.What a contraption!
I was hoping the speakers harvested from a boom box were going to work on the four fold horn, but they did not have enough "oomph" to push it.
I have a variety of drivers and empty cabinets and horns, are you interested in trading anything for your K55/FS100W?
I reached down to 150 Hz up to about, and I am guessing now, maybe 12kHz. They were very thin around 100Hz, but I only had a horn made for 200Hz.
I think something has to be done with the diaphragm and suspension. Material does not have a nice enough sound for taste, but I am very picky.
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Sure, I can trade a pair of both the K55 and FS100W. Send me a list of what you have for interesting speakers. The FS100W goes a little lower.
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me too.. Maybe in a 4 sided 50 or 60 Hz LeCleach Horn..
First I will see how high my 16Hz bass horn goes and if i need to fill in the gap between the 160Hz horn.
) - are they worth the troubles , to using them from 100-1K ?
Zen, i think only one person, who is not a member here has used the FS100W reliably. Rewind has tried them on a 150Hz or so horn and I am sure he will give his thoughts. I will build a horn suitable to loading down to 100Hz and take some data in the first few month of next year but until then ……….
Hi Rewind,
Just to be clear did you modify your k55 as per Dietmer's explorations?
Also, your horn cutoff was closer to 200hz no? And you were using +6 to +12dB of EQ to bump 100hz noticeably into the game? Playing lower than cutoff and bumping an unloaded portion of the spectrum seems unfair to the driver? I like your approach and conclusions about slopes and tonality bleeding through regardless of cutoffs so I just want to be sure I understand the parameters of your evaluation!
I can definitely understand your issue with some music not sounding right on a given reproduction system.
Smart audiophile systems surpass most studio monitoring systems and it follows that *often* what the engineer heard during tracking was partially distorted due to his monitoring in the control room. When such a record is released and played back on more revealing equipment the bite of guitars could be lost as some noticeable amount of distortion was coming from the monitoring and not the material... The same thing happens with modern bass heavy music... Very few people are using bass horns when producing dubstep and glitch and when you suddenly find yourself with uber clean bass-repro due to a bass horn or similarly performing alignment the producers who have good monitoring become immediately apparent while most guys mixes fall apart (laughably so)...
It's a shame that seeking good sound can often result in isolation from the music one wishes to enjoy.
At the end of the day, if we are limited to one system, the choice seems to be between fidelity, transparency and trust in the mix engineers monitoring setup (and his skill in producing high quality widely translating mixes) <<vs>> sacrificing the purity of those rare high end visions of unyielding artists for the LCD output of the music industry at large (expecting everyone shut up and play bangers on boomy reflex boxen).
In both cases we lose information attached to the original vision of the artist... Many of us combat this by having more than one system/alignment we use for listening and choosing the material for the room/people/system.
Thanks for your reports on the fs100 and k55... The latter as modified by Dietmer looks interesting to the crowd who won't afford a we555 but want to visit a wide bandwidth driver that reaches below 200hz. If you did the prescribed mods?, could you do a test limiting the output of the k55 from 300-3k and compared it to the Yamaha JA-6681 with the same bandwidth and let us know how compromised or lacking the k55 is for such range... I would appreciate any more intel I can get on the topic.
Cheers!
Just to be clear did you modify your k55 as per Dietmer's explorations?
Also, your horn cutoff was closer to 200hz no? And you were using +6 to +12dB of EQ to bump 100hz noticeably into the game? Playing lower than cutoff and bumping an unloaded portion of the spectrum seems unfair to the driver? I like your approach and conclusions about slopes and tonality bleeding through regardless of cutoffs so I just want to be sure I understand the parameters of your evaluation!
I can definitely understand your issue with some music not sounding right on a given reproduction system.
Smart audiophile systems surpass most studio monitoring systems and it follows that *often* what the engineer heard during tracking was partially distorted due to his monitoring in the control room. When such a record is released and played back on more revealing equipment the bite of guitars could be lost as some noticeable amount of distortion was coming from the monitoring and not the material... The same thing happens with modern bass heavy music... Very few people are using bass horns when producing dubstep and glitch and when you suddenly find yourself with uber clean bass-repro due to a bass horn or similarly performing alignment the producers who have good monitoring become immediately apparent while most guys mixes fall apart (laughably so)...
It's a shame that seeking good sound can often result in isolation from the music one wishes to enjoy.
At the end of the day, if we are limited to one system, the choice seems to be between fidelity, transparency and trust in the mix engineers monitoring setup (and his skill in producing high quality widely translating mixes) <<vs>> sacrificing the purity of those rare high end visions of unyielding artists for the LCD output of the music industry at large (expecting everyone shut up and play bangers on boomy reflex boxen).
In both cases we lose information attached to the original vision of the artist... Many of us combat this by having more than one system/alignment we use for listening and choosing the material for the room/people/system.
Thanks for your reports on the fs100 and k55... The latter as modified by Dietmer looks interesting to the crowd who won't afford a we555 but want to visit a wide bandwidth driver that reaches below 200hz. If you did the prescribed mods?, could you do a test limiting the output of the k55 from 300-3k and compared it to the Yamaha JA-6681 with the same bandwidth and let us know how compromised or lacking the k55 is for such range... I would appreciate any more intel I can get on the topic.
Cheers!
Hi Greg,
Did you ever try the Federal TS100-N or version of. I have gone down the Azura 160 and 340 and currently use a fane 8"?
I am looking at a compression option.
Cheers
Greg
No, just the FS 100 which I did not like very much. The sound was so garbled even when using it as it should, above 500Hz. The horn was just too long. The K55 is actually a nice sounding driver. I had a listen to the Klipsch Heresy the other day and it sounds very okay. I never modded the K55 and earned a penny when I sold them.
I am sure I could have done a better job modding the FS100 but when I never liked the treble so I did not see the point.
The horn was a poor replica of a Goto 150 horn.
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I have read this thread twice now with some interest. First I have found the K-55 to be a surprisingly good driver. I mostly listened to it down to 400hz only though. In my personal quest I find another reason than mentioned here to look for a compression driver to go low like the 555. This is to avoid crossing over in the 100-5000hz range. Call it my personal taste but That is a sensitive region for my tastes. That the K-55 can be made to go this low or even to 200hz and still rise to 5k, combined with its being a good sounding driver added to its economy is downright interesting to me. I will fabricate a 150hz JMLC horn and try this out. Thank you all for your comments and especially Deitmar for his explorations, measurements and documentation.
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