Room size is 20 square meters, but i’m currently building a new house with bigger room (about 35m)
Listening distance now is 3,5m
Klipsch heresy is rated as 96db/w/m
Faital is 99db/w/m
I can’t find a reason why they should need more power
Maybe because of high power (500watt) their suspension is very hard and they aren’t able to play as good on low levels
Did You ever care to measure sound levels at listening position? Well - I did, and levels above 70dB are to be considered loud (for me). If You add to the situation that dynamic peaks can be top 20dB then You arrive at 90dB (at peak). At the moment my 15W amp. is almost enough with 3way scanspeak speakers (9900/18W/25W) @ roughly 86dB/W.
I'd say the "not so good on low levels" is usually caused by the fact that constructions using PA drivers are sometimes lacking low bass (yes, it has something to do with the stiffness of the suspension but via the higher fs caused that way and not in the way some people often explain it). If listened loudly the equal loudness curves come to the rescue.
Regards
Charles
Again the 15PR400 is a very good PA driver with low mechanical resistances (high Qms, low Rms), actually lower than some high reputation home audio drivers, so i don't think it has problems at low levels.
For sure I measure, and 70 db is very unsatisfactory for me.
For jazz, audiophile vocal music maybe it's ok.
But definitely low for dance, electronic, rock,metal, classical. etc. it has to give you that live experience, that punch of the big horns in a concert or the timpani rumbling in a philharmonic.
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99 is max across the frequency range
At 40 Hz they are 90! You have to compensate with the tuning or bass boost from amp
They will play to low, you will crank the amp, the amp goes into clipping and it will damage the drivers, even if they are rated 400W!
The main question is: will ae td15m be an easier load for amplifier ? Or will it give better LF extension?
Have you measured pr400 personally?
I calculated with bassbox 6 pro and got different results
That is very normal for a low Q driver measured in an open baffle or a big closed box.
Things will look different in a reasonably dimensioned reflex box however.
It is a driver with reasonable parameters for a Hi-Fi capable tuning.
There is no possible way to kill a 400 W rated woofer with a 15 W tube amp.
Apart from that occasional short-term clipping will possibly go unnoticed with a tube amp because many of them clip in a soft fashion.
Regards
Charles
There's no 15" woofer that will be more efficient with low extension than 15PR400 - AE is not going to be any better (and costs few times as much). If You want to go all out then look at faital 18FH500 FaitalPRO | LF Loudspeakers | 18FH500 - but I'm not sure how tube amp. will handle such a beast 😀.
Sorry, i missed your reply
I know about MAG- pretty nice speakers and really cheap( about 120 usd for 15 woofer)
There is a guy at Ukrainian hi fi forum that modified these for open baffle usage
He positioned them as eminence alpha killer)
Worth an email to HORNS - Horns by Auto-Tech
inquire if they have a few large horns/waveguide in stock
JMLC-350
eJMLC-300
SEOS-18
SEOS-24
SEOS-30
I use the Faital HF108 1" compression driver on a waveguide with a 1200Hz BW3 crossover to a sealed Faital 12PR300 midrange. I use two sealed + DSP equalized AES TD15S woofers for bass. Using old cabinets until spring.
PRV WG35-25-B
10.1"H x 14.2"W x 5.5"D
inquire if they have a few large horns/waveguide in stock
JMLC-350
eJMLC-300
SEOS-18
SEOS-24
SEOS-30
I use the Faital HF108 1" compression driver on a waveguide with a 1200Hz BW3 crossover to a sealed Faital 12PR300 midrange. I use two sealed + DSP equalized AES TD15S woofers for bass. Using old cabinets until spring.
PRV WG35-25-B
10.1"H x 14.2"W x 5.5"D
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Sorry, I'm late to this, but I've had PC issues and won't post from a phone screen. Even though I like AE drivers (I own 12 of them in total) I would have told you to go with the Faitals as they are good and will be much cheaper locally. Enjoy.
My 8 15s are sealed, EQ'd and sometimes run very hard and have been connected to about 900W/ch/driver for a decade with no issues. They have been used crossed to other HE drivers (eg 2123) and CD/WG and were fine.
Complete and utter rubbish. I designed, built and ran PA systems for about 25 years and used within ratings, they are fine.
My 8 15s are sealed, EQ'd and sometimes run very hard and have been connected to about 900W/ch/driver for a decade with no issues. They have been used crossed to other HE drivers (eg 2123) and CD/WG and were fine.
Hmmm. Too weak, eh?
Thanks but i already have k402)
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I’ll try with tube amp and if I won’t like it I’ll consider using active amp
I have access to pascal d-class amps, they seems to be the best now
Do You have an experience with horns? I was also considering horn for mids and high until i had a listen to klipsch that supouse to be very good - well they're not - it's just an another horn (nothing special for me). Also You're going to encounter serious problems matching bass with mids/high from horn that are wayyy more efficient - it just don't want to sound right. I was also considering tannoy and loved bass/lower mid (there's not much of the lowest bas in tannoy cheviot though) from larger/light cone but didn't realy think that the rest that came from concentric driver was matching.
I have no experience in building horn speakers, but pretty big experience in listening different horn loaded systems
Really liked sound of jamboree- the main reason i have bought k402
Also i liked radian 950 on arai 290s horn
Then I decided to take best of both and coupled radian with k402
Sorry for that extra post... I thought the K402 was on your wish list.
For home use, a few 15" midrange designs, like the Geddes Summa15, push a plastic 1" compression driver like the Faital HF108 down to 900Hz in a large 1" horn like the SEOS-18 or the JMLC-350, to cover up to 18-20kHz.