Ambience tweeters?

[Audiophilenoob]

you know there's not a single thread on these????

what are the pros and cons of an ambience tweeter rear firing in a speaker tower?

how would one impliment this?

it's a very rare design to see in high end audio

[jaudio]

The sound is hard to describe. I guess one could say a wider stage. I used a cone tweeter in the rear and a dome in front. I crossover the cone tweeter just a little lower than the dome,then adjusted the volume on the cone until I was happy with the level.

It would be a good idea to use a l-pad and a off on switch on the rear tweeter.

[michaelpage26]

Here are some high end designs that use rear firing tweeters/ribbons:

HGP Lyra SoNova
Triangle Stratos Australe
Triangle Stratos Volante
Triangle Stratos Magellan
Von Schweikert Audio VR-9SE (see pic)
Von Schweikert Audio DB-99 MK II
Von Schweikert Audio VR-11 XTC
North Creek Music Manifest

[Audiophilenoob]

Originally posted by michaelpage26
Here are some high end designs that use rear firing tweeters/ribbons:

HGP Lyra SoNova
Triangle Stratos Australe
Triangle Stratos Volante
Triangle Stratos Magellan
Von Schweikert Audio VR-9SE (see pic)
Von Schweikert Audio DB-99 MK II
Von Schweikert Audio VR-11 XTC
North Creek Music Manifest

that's a very beautiful speaker...

good call with the on off switch....

should an ambience tweeter be the same tweeter as the front? or should it be smaller/larger...?

the Wilson Alexandria uses a 3/4" supertweeter for ambience... so should it be more efficent/powerful than the front?

[troystg]

Originally posted by jaudio

It would be a good idea to use a l-pad and a off on switch on the rear tweeter.

Parts express was selling input terminals with bi-amp inputs, a switch and an L-pad in one "cup".

They were dirt cheap so I bought 4-6 of them just to try out this very idea.

Maybe you can find some of those to try it out.

[jaudio]

Originally posted by Audiophilenoob



should an ambience tweeter be the same tweeter as the front? or should it be smaller/larger...?

Normally yes but not always. The reasonl I used the cone tweeter is it had a lower crossover point,so I got more midrange

Originally posted by Audiophilenoob


the Wilson Alexandria uses a 3/4" supertweeter for ambience... so should it be more efficent/powerful than the front?

Equal to or less that why it is a good idea to use a L-pad

[Mr Evil]

Originally posted by michaelpage26
...Von Schweikert Audio VR-9SE (see pic)

It's a Dalek!

[michaelpage26]

I don't have any experience with ambience tweeters, but it seems that the front firing tweeter is larger or the same size compared to the rear firing. One example is the North Creek Music Manifest. It uses for front firing tweeters the Aurum Cantus G1s while for ambience tweeters it uses the smaller Aurum Cantus G2is. Also an intresting note is that the ambience tweeter is mounted horizontally (see pic)!

P.S. I didn't know that the Wilson X-2 Alexandrias had ambience tweeter!

[BassAwdyO]

my question is this... Do you use them as normal or reversed polarity? Bipole, or Dipole that is...

Does it matter?

how about side firing ambience tweeters?



sounds like a good way to smear all the detail for me... What are the advantages again?

[DSP_Geek]

Originally posted by BassAwdyO
my question is this... Do you use them as normal or reversed polarity? Bipole, or Dipole that is...

Does it matter?

how about side firing ambience tweeters?



sounds like a good way to smear all the detail for me... What are the advantages again?

Part of the rationale for extra drivers is to equalise the power response to somewhere near flat. Directivity increasing with frequency for tweeters means the diffuse field tends to roll off in the upper range of those drivers. This is curable by increasing the diffuse power by crossing in a supplementary tweeter firing well off-axis; typically the frequency response is shaped by adding another small capacitor between the high pass crossover and the ambience tweeter so its -3 dB point is at some high frequency, say around 10 kHz. Wilson Grand Slamms use that very technique in their rear-facing ambience driver. I might add that somewhat flat room response is part of the magic around dipoles: the nonflat off-axis response is diminished at 90 degrees, or precisely the angle where high frequency rolloff is most severe.

As it turns out, you can get to a good start by calculating the Zobel capacitor for the main tweeter and using that value with a properly Zobeled ambience tweeter to get a decent first try at setting the proper crossing in for the ambience driver, assuming similar efficiencies and responses. You also have the advantage of being able to use a smaller rear tweeter since the high -3 dB point reduces power demands further down the spectrum, where the main tweeter does a good job of filling the room anyway.


Francois.