Hi, I am new to speaker building and decided to make a pair of Frugel-Horn Lite speakers using Fountek FE85 drivers. I got one finished with the specified damping (felt and fluff) installed. I assembled the other one, and out of curiosity did not install any damping material. Tested both (see below - lower curve is the non-damped speaker). The damped one is louder but both have an (what I think) is an alarming drop at 5kHz. I don't know what to make of the results. I would very much appreciate any advice/ideas for a new speaker builder.
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MattyJ,
Are you able to take a measurement of the drivers on a test baffle (no cabinet required)?
Are you able to take a measurement of the drivers on a test baffle (no cabinet required)?
The FH itself really only affects below about 300 Hz. The rest is the driver.
How does it sound?
dave
How does it sound?
dave
Thanks Zman01!
Is a test baffle a piece of plywood with a hole cut for the driver? I could easily make one. What would I look for in the testing?
Is a test baffle a piece of plywood with a hole cut for the driver? I could easily make one. What would I look for in the testing?
Thank you planet10!
The damped cabinet sounds kick *** with the exception of it being light in the mid-high range as the data shows. I love the bass response. Super Clean and surprising considering such a small driver. Is the drop in the mid-high due to the driver or is there something I can adjust in the cabinet to make the change? I did order some different drivers to see how they respond.
Thank you for your help!
Matty
The damped cabinet sounds kick *** with the exception of it being light in the mid-high range as the data shows. I love the bass response. Super Clean and surprising considering such a small driver. Is the drop in the mid-high due to the driver or is there something I can adjust in the cabinet to make the change? I did order some different drivers to see how they respond.
Thank you for your help!
Matty
There is little you can do except starting to ad EQ. Probably more sensible to consider a better driver. FE855.2/3. is the cheapy, but even the FR88ex has some HF issues (i have a batch of those boxed and ready to ship out). My favorites are FF85wk and Alpair 5.2/5.3 (CHN-50, cheapy equivalent [in that respect the same market niche as teh FE85], us really quite close). There are some fairly easy tweaks you can do to the Fostex to ameriolate most of its issues, Markaudio is really good out of the box (but after break-in).
Which begd sthe question… how many hours on yoir FE85?
dave
Which begd sthe question… how many hours on yoir FE85?
dave
Staggering past this fine day (stuck lecturing away from home with the square root of jack 'net access).
As noted, it's nothing to do with the cabinet I'm afraid -that's just what the FE85 does. See attached quasi-anechoic, courtesy of Timothy Feleppa, in a slightly more realistic graph scale / range & presentation. Driver is from a different batch, so some differences in the 4KHz region but the general trend with mode around 4.8KHz & reduced output to ~10KHz is still present.
As noted, it's nothing to do with the cabinet I'm afraid -that's just what the FE85 does. See attached quasi-anechoic, courtesy of Timothy Feleppa, in a slightly more realistic graph scale / range & presentation. Driver is from a different batch, so some differences in the 4KHz region but the general trend with mode around 4.8KHz & reduced output to ~10KHz is still present.
Attachments
Thank Scottmoose and Planet10!, I am going to try some different drivers. The one of the Fountek FEFE85 has about 40 hours on it the other is new. FE85response from Timothy is reasonably similar to what I am seeing. I have a path forward thanks to your help!
Thanks Again!
Matty
Thanks Again!
Matty
