New to the site

[arrie]

Hi everyone, just to say i have been following the discussions on this site for quite a while now and i have been learning a lot about audio ever since. so much so that i think it is time to become part of these discussions as i can see that there are quite a lot of audiophiles out there, just like me.

my main interest at this stage is the combining of the old with the new, with respect to acoustical amplification. after going through countless pages of technical specifications and also numerous plans, i have been wondering what the result would be if one were to combine the enclosure designs of yesteryear with the more powerfull amplifiers available today. my interest is especially in the various horn designs.
I have been playing music at various functions both indoor and outdoor for several years now with all my speaker enclosures being the Bass Reflex type. this has been working for me for many years but it is time to step raise the bar with a few DB's. and that is my main reason for joining this site. i will be posting soon with many questions!

[Cal Weldon]

It can be fun to use old with new. I do it. Remember that the old boxes were designed for smaller amps so you have to rework them to stiffen them up a bit.

[chrispenycate]

Evolution in drivers is the main problem. Most modern loudspeakers are heavy cone, long throw designs so the voice coil is still in the magnetic gap with the excursions involved with ported enclosures - velocity speakers. The kind of cone driver that will benefit most from horn loading is a light cone, short throw, a pressure generator, with the horn working as an acoustic impedance transformer. Not that some of these are not still manufactured, but generally for specific products. And you can get some improvement of efficiency out of non-optimal drivers, too.

The major reason low frequency horns went out of fashion was the sheer size needed to handle frequencies we now expect. PA companies preferred to carry twice the power, if it took up less truck space. Four metre mouths were OK built behind screens in cinemas, but lots of gigs they didn't fit in the elevator. As long as you were only aiming to go down to 50 Hz or so, no real problem, but 25Hz was not entirely practical.

Mind you, they did sound good.

[Cal Weldon]

There are still lots of 15" PA units with 5-8 mm throw, but you are right that the boxes get a bit unruly. Doesn't make a lot of sense when voice coils are hardy and the watts are cheap.

[planet10]

Welcome to the forum Arrie.

dave

[Tajzmaj]

Welcome...
Taj