Any body can point me to someone on here diyaudio site for proven plans, my budget with components and crossover is $700 except BB ply for a 3 way home stereo sounding pair of speakers for small PA use? I just finished a few months ago a pair of diy 3 way fully horn loaded and neo drivers from another well known site and sounds ok but it just sounds too PA if you know what I mean. I spent $1200 for the build total. I know I could've spent that on a JBL or QSC powered but I like to build and hope with great success. I have used this for 4 dj use and birthday parties not really what I am looking for and will probably just use it as a back up speakers for future gigs. Thanks🙂😕
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The best speakers I've ever heard were PA. Long Point cinema, 1966 Altec Lansing Voice of the Theater. Far Out Music 2016, Peavey SP2. I live in a fly-over state, there are no Magnaplaners within 1000 miles.
My best amp is PA, a Peavey CS800s. The one that demoed at Far Out was a Peavey CS600. .03% HD. The 2004 SP2 is specified +- 3db 54 hz-17 khz. 2nd & 3rd harmonic plotted at 20 db down 100 hz to 12 khz.
OTOH many venue systems produce high tech garbage.
Details matter. Your failed project could be possibly tweaked to sound good. Put it in an open field, run a frequency response test with a good microphone. Possible tweaks are crossover changes to flatten frequency response. Stuffing the box with wool could break up standing waves. Internal baffles or external ports. Read multi way or full range threads about speakers.
My best amp is PA, a Peavey CS800s. The one that demoed at Far Out was a Peavey CS600. .03% HD. The 2004 SP2 is specified +- 3db 54 hz-17 khz. 2nd & 3rd harmonic plotted at 20 db down 100 hz to 12 khz.
OTOH many venue systems produce high tech garbage.
Details matter. Your failed project could be possibly tweaked to sound good. Put it in an open field, run a frequency response test with a good microphone. Possible tweaks are crossover changes to flatten frequency response. Stuffing the box with wool could break up standing waves. Internal baffles or external ports. Read multi way or full range threads about speakers.
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Is that the set you built with a passive crossover? Got any pics?
Some of the best sounding speakers I have ever owned were reflex 3-way PA boxes. What size speakers do you want to limit this too?
Thanks for the reply guys, PA sounding there's no depth I bought a cheap Berry 15 HD EQ and done nothing to the sound very little. I trim it down around 1kHz -10 on the eq for feedback. I set it flat at first but did not do anything to the sound. I followed the plans to the T, I put in 1 1/2" thick pillow wool stuffing all inside. Distortion is probably high on this setup, I even bought a new 200 watt studio monitor amp SLA2. I will post pictures tomorrow. The 1" horn and 6.5" horn combo is not sounding good either, although the bass has a little omp on certain recordings. 1" is Eminence loaded on a small horn Apt 80 sounds awful it sounds like narrow hf range.
I really loved my PA grade SP2-XT in my living room @ 1/4W to 70 W max. So did the burglar that carried them off to his fence. 2" horn plus 15" woofer. Off axis dispersion is important indoors; when I was 12' away one box was about 30 degrees from my ears, and Peavey had a plot of that in their spec. I had them up on poles at the narrow end of a 14'x33'x11' room.
I picked up a pair of smooth 22XT drivers & horns on Ebay for $140, but I need to build an ugly box with no pawn shop value for the 15" driver. That is 54 to 1200 hz. Don't know what Peavey had for a crossover, I should have taken it apart when I had them. Also I don't know how Peavey got a sealed cabinet +- 3db down to 50 hz.
Before I build a box I have to replace the power saws the burglar carried off, and the worktable he pulled up out of the ground that was in the way of his Jeep Cherokee.
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This is probably *close* to what you have in mind. Kappa 15LF woofers, Beta 8 mids, and Selenium compression driver. These used to be for small PA duty but have been decommissioned as “home” speakers. Right now they are being used as shop speakers driven by 200 watt TUBE monoblocks. With rock/folk/country music it sounds like you’re right there in the club with the band. There is a project on the horizon to build an upgrade - with the same woofers and cabinet tuning, but with a stack of six HM130Z0 mids and an Aurum Cantus G1 ribbon (already have the MF/HF drivers, just no room in the current house).
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The trouble with PA is that it has to play loud, mainly because the space it plays in is huge compared to a home listening room. I have heard high end Hi-Fi used as a PA at RMAF and it sounded awful. It just wasn't adapted to the job.
In PA systems crossover points are often chosen to protect the drivers, not always for the best SQ. There are compromises made for playing very loud that don't have to be made in a domestic environment.
Back in 1987 I wanted to build and tour a Hi-Fi PA, something that sounded as good as the Magnaplanar Tympani II but suited for PA work. I ended up with a pair of highly modified Altec A5 with the 1505 horns. Still one of the best speakers I've ever heard and the best I ever build (I had super-star help). Great sound and better than my goals, but not very practical for a small touring PA. 🙂
I have used a lot of high end PA gear, Meyer, D&B, L-Acoustics. But in today's market the Danley SH50 and SH96 are the closest to Hi-Fi in PA that I've heard. That's a direction to look in.
In PA systems crossover points are often chosen to protect the drivers, not always for the best SQ. There are compromises made for playing very loud that don't have to be made in a domestic environment.
Back in 1987 I wanted to build and tour a Hi-Fi PA, something that sounded as good as the Magnaplanar Tympani II but suited for PA work. I ended up with a pair of highly modified Altec A5 with the 1505 horns. Still one of the best speakers I've ever heard and the best I ever build (I had super-star help). Great sound and better than my goals, but not very practical for a small touring PA. 🙂
I have used a lot of high end PA gear, Meyer, D&B, L-Acoustics. But in today's market the Danley SH50 and SH96 are the closest to Hi-Fi in PA that I've heard. That's a direction to look in.
I'd say my own PA system manages the HiFi trick.
Mains: 2x Faital 10FH520, 1x 18Sound ND1460 on an RCF HF94. Crossover at 1.2kHz-ish for a nice directivity match.
Subs: Beyma 15P1200Nd - as many as needed. Ported, tuned to 40Hz.
Power and processing from Powersoft T-series amps. T604 for bi-amped mains, T602 for subs.
Flat frequency response 40Hz-17kHz, and flat phase curve from 600Hz upwards - the joys of FIR processing.
I could probably work the phase curve an octave lower, but the primary use case is live music, so latency gets large. 600Hz is a reasonable compromise, with something like 2ms of latency incurred.
Chris
PS - There aren't many HiFi systems I'd attempt to use for PA - dome tweeters would do a great impression of a fast-blow fuse.
Mains: 2x Faital 10FH520, 1x 18Sound ND1460 on an RCF HF94. Crossover at 1.2kHz-ish for a nice directivity match.
Subs: Beyma 15P1200Nd - as many as needed. Ported, tuned to 40Hz.
Power and processing from Powersoft T-series amps. T604 for bi-amped mains, T602 for subs.
Flat frequency response 40Hz-17kHz, and flat phase curve from 600Hz upwards - the joys of FIR processing.
I could probably work the phase curve an octave lower, but the primary use case is live music, so latency gets large. 600Hz is a reasonable compromise, with something like 2ms of latency incurred.
Chris
PS - There aren't many HiFi systems I'd attempt to use for PA - dome tweeters would do a great impression of a fast-blow fuse.
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That is almost exactly what I had except it was a single of each driver in each cab. I had 4 cabs though.
Passive crossovers for a 3-way like this are really hard to do well, and even when you get it technically right some in situ DSP processing goes a long way to dialing in the sound. The "too much mid, not enough highs" of a flat PA speaker can be really fatiguing without this last step.
The passive crossover took almost a year, a lot of measurements (a lot of “pssssht!” tones out on the lawn - neighbors thought I was crazy) and three (yes three) sets of different woofers to dial in to my satisfaction.
$700 USD seems like a pretty thin budget for Hi Fi quality PA at just about any room size, IMHO.
I spent about that on just the horns and drivers (1,2 to 14kHz) for a 100 to 250 head club PA, and those were 1976 dollars!
Happily, prices are better today -- but will be surprised if they're enough better to meet your SQ objectives.
Cheers
I spent about that on just the horns and drivers (1,2 to 14kHz) for a 100 to 250 head club PA, and those were 1976 dollars!
Happily, prices are better today -- but will be surprised if they're enough better to meet your SQ objectives.
Cheers
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Yep that sounds about right, I lost track of how many times I reworked the crossovers in mine or how many mid and high drivers I went through. Those boxes are long gone now(built them back in the '80s) but the 8" mids and CDs live on in a set of 2-ways in my living room.
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I am trying to upload the video I did Thursday before my Friday gig. I can't seem to do it here so you can hear what I mean. I have it on my facebook though.
wg_ski those speakers seems on budget I may go higher if the ribbons will do the trick, but use of passive crossovers and a nice eq like the DBX231 with FBS may do well for my purpose, single drivers in a fairly slim tall cab with a vent in the lower rear then a top hat. Looking also BP 18Sound plans double 18" new plans from them. Thanks😉
I’d be a bit worried about a ribbon in true PA work, but some line arrays do use them. And the G1 is pretty robust. That version is for a “PA level home stereo”, sort of going the opposite direction. The original version with the compression driver sounds *very* good - the magic really is in the crossover. The CD is the limiting factor - it’s not going to do squat above 14k. I bet I could rework the crossover around a B&C DE250 to get more top end. If I were starting from scratch with the same goals I’d probably start there.