Suitable midrange cone, for bandpass mid in Unity horn.

[JLH]

Originally Posted by paulspencer

Jim I've heard both, admittedly at different times in different horns. The original Unity kit about 3 or 4 times and my simplified version of it (S1) with the Pyle driver. The Pyle drivers are obviously cheap when you see them, but in my less than ideal comparison I didn't notice a sonic penalty in using them.

I agree with this. There is no advantage to using expensive midranges in a Unity/Synergy design. The power that the drivers see at even ear spliting levels is so low (less than 5W) that high end midranges are a waste. The featues of the more expensive midranges don't come into play at these low power levels.

[paulspencer]

Originally Posted by JLH

I agree with this. There is no advantage to using expensive midranges in a Unity/Synergy design. The power that the drivers see at even ear spliting levels is so low (less than 5W) that high end midranges are a waste. The featues of the more expensive midranges don't come into play at these low power levels.

JLH,
I think the Misco and Pyle are not worlds apart, both are fairly basic unimpessive drivers. The Misco is a bit better quality, with the Pyle drivers you have to be careful with the terminals, they are a little flimsy. I would be curious to hear better quality drivers compared, I'm not entirely sure the improvement would be completely lost, however I do tend to agree that the sound is strongly horn dominated. In other words, the design of the horn itself has such a big impact on the sound that differences from driver to driver, once they have been integrated properly, are going to be less than expected.

[jdubs]

Thanks guys, I appreciate the feedback. I'm using the original Unitys with the Pyle drivers and was curious if I was "missing" anything. I think the Miscos are something like $30 a piece which is a LOT more than the Pyles.

By the way, the Unitys are mating VERY well to my Rythmik 12" servo h-frames with a 300hz crossover point. Its a great combo.

-Jim

[bwaslo]

Hey Paul, any progress on the Celestion driver group buy?

[paulspencer]

Bill, still waiting to hear back regarding shipping. As soon as I know I'll send out details.

[Patrick Bateman]

Yesterday I stumbled across the fact that the JBL Vertec arrays use some very Unity-horn-ish concepts. In particular, a coupling chamber on the midrange drivers. The patent also shows the use of foam in the coupling chamber, a la Geddes, but they've stopped doing that. The patent even references Danley's patent at Sound Physics Labs, so they were definitely, uh, "inspired" by the Unity.


Here's the back of the midrange and high frequency array. Look familiar?


You can control directivity with a waveguide, but you can also control it with an array. In the Vertec, it's interesting that the D'Appolito arrangement controls low frequency directivity, while the waveguide at the apex does the same. It allows JBL to get the directivity of a much larger waveguide in a compact box. (This thing is tiny - not much larger than a bookshelf speaker.)


The whole array is about $3000. It's passive. Here's some part numbers, in case you want to use the JBL parts for your Unity horns. The midranges are about $100 each. Definitely pricey for a 2.5" midrange, but not all that outrageous compared to the Faital 3FE20, which has a smaller voice coil.

It's not obvious from the picture, but the woofers have a coupling chamber also. (again, very much like the Unity.) The woofer coupling chamber is formed by a metal plate behind the woofer grille, behind the JBL logo. It covers the majority of the woofer cone.


Here's the measurements. Seems like a promising design for hifi or home theater. It was heartening to see that many of the design choices I made in my small Unity horns were mirrored by JBL. (I've never seen this box until today - I came up with the idea of using 2" and 3" midranges along with small neo compression drivers without seeing this design.)

The earlier designs used a different shape for the waveguide; I'm a bit curious if the newer design is optimized to reduce interference from the compression drivers. The JBL literature notes that the waveguide and cabinet is designed to reduce diffraction, again a la Geddes.

[weltersys]

Originally Posted by Patrick Bateman

Yesterday I stumbled across the fact that the JBL Vertec arrays use some very Unity-horn-ish concepts. In particular, a coupling chamber on the midrange drivers.

It was heartening to see that many of the design choices I made in my small Unity horns were mirrored by JBL. (I've never seen this box until today - I came up with the idea of using 2" and 3" midranges along with small neo compression drivers without seeing this design.)

Though the VT4886 has much better horizontal dispersion characteristics than the small format VLA series, it shares it’s design with the VT4889, 4888 and 4887, the VT 4886 is simply a shrunken version of the above marketed towards those that believe a line array is the solution to all audio needs.
The entire VT line is simply JBL’s answer to the L-Acoustics' V-DOSC line array from the early 1990s, they are nearly identical in design concept (using diffraction for HF dispersion) , not very similar to the Synergy horn design concepts.

JBL’s Precision Directivity series, and Renkus Heinz Co entrant horns are far more similar in concept to the Synergy/Unity horn than the VT series.

Because the VT886 is so small (only 22.8” wide), the wavelengths at the crossover points are almost (close but no cigar) short enough to constructively combine, so it has better midrange dispersion characteristics than its larger brethren.

Better is not that great, or very close to the even dispersion a Synergy style horn can afford, as is evident in the comparison of the VT 4886 horizontal dispersion to the VTC eL210 which uses a Paraline HF coupler and Synergy style mid porting on a straight sided (semi conical)horn.

The VTC eL210 has a uniform - 6dB 90 degree horizontal coverage pattern from below 500 Hz to 20K, the VT886 at 90 degree level varies about +1 dB to -7dB over the same range.

Art Welter

[Patrick Bateman]

Originally Posted by weltersys

Though the VT4886 has much better horizontal dispersion characteristics than the small format VLA series, it shares it’s design with the VT4889, 4888 and 4887, the VT 4886 is simply a shrunken version of the above marketed towards those that believe a line array is the solution to all audio needs.
The entire VT line is simply JBL’s answer to the L-Acoustics' V-DOSC line array from the early 1990s, they are nearly identical in design concept (using diffraction for HF dispersion) , not very similar to the Synergy horn design concepts.

JBL’s Precision Directivity series, and Renkus Heinz Co entrant horns are far more similar in concept to the Synergy/Unity horn than the VT series.

Because the VT886 is so small (only 22.8” wide), the wavelengths at the crossover points are almost (close but no cigar) short enough to constructively combine, so it has better midrange dispersion characteristics than its larger brethren.

Better is not that great, or very close to the even dispersion a Synergy style horn can afford, as is evident in the comparison of the VT 4886 horizontal dispersion to the VTC eL210 which uses a Paraline HF coupler and Synergy style mid porting on a straight sided (semi conical)horn.

The VTC eL210 has a uniform - 6dB 90 degree horizontal coverage pattern from below 500 Hz to 20K, the VT886 at 90 degree level varies about +1 dB to -7dB over the same range.

Art Welter

Here's a pic of the Precision Directivity design. The PD764 is like a 'horn within a horn'. I'd argue the Unity and Synergy designs are like a 'horn stacked on top of a horn.' And the secret sauce is manipulating the dimensions so that the apparent source is FORWARD of the actual loudspeaker diaphragm. For instance, the diaphragm of the compression driver in a Unity horn is producing 2000hz, but that wave cannot expand until it reaches a point in the horn that's a few inches forward of the diaphragm. That's the key, and it's responsible for the excellent phase response. The PD764 doesn't have that going for it.

IMHO, the Unity and Synergy are an evolution of the D'Appolito array.


Basically fold the second speaker around a conical horn, add coupling chambers to increase efficiency and reduce distortion, and *voila*, you're pretty close to a Unity horn.

The problem with a conical horn is it's size - they're humongous. And the size is dependent on the wall angle. IE, a 135 degree conical horn is much MUCH smaller than a 45 degree conical horn. So I think JBL has (cleverly) used varying coverage angles in their array. JBL's solution maintain's a beamwidth of 90 degrees using a waveguide that's less than sixty four square inches, then trades off to a midbass array (which also controls directivity, jut not as well as the WG.)

By manipulating the dimensions of the high frequency portion of the waveguide, they can also make the compression driver's acoustic center move forward, even though the driver itself is significantly far back from the midranges.

Now if only I could find a phase response plot I could test out this theory...

[JLH]

I find it interesting that JBL is using four 2.5" mids in that speaker. I kind of feel like it validates my choice of using 3" cone tweeters.

[winslow]

Scratches head at how to do those in my car...

Sure I could figure something out that could work.

Where did I see a Unity/Synergy horn that had the backwave of the midrange ported into the horn for lowend reinforcement? Wonder if I could do that with a pair of 3s or something to get them to play down to 50o in the car door?