Hello all. Long time lurker, first time poster. I've had this account for quite awhile but decided to try and utilize the knowledge that some folks may give me in constructing a new speaker.
Long story short, I grabbed a pair of C-notes from PE this year and while I quite enjoy pretty much everything coming out of them, I feel bass and mid bass isn't rendered quite as well as I'd like, and frankly I think I'm just not that big of a fan of small speakers. I think I mostly purchased these out of boredom rather than to fill a use case. I've gotten to the finishing stage and it's been a disaster, the first time I'm attempting to paint a speaker. I have lost all interest in finishing the cabinets as I know they will not come out to a satisfactory level, I very much prefer wood veneer and have great luck in applying it, unfortunately do to the rounding I did over the whole cabinet veneer isn't really an option anymore.
Anyway, I'm at the stage where I'm considering woofers to take over the lower end of things and utilize the DSA135 and ND25fw for the mid and top end. I have a measurement mic and DATS, so far only utilized to make crossover modifications to already built DIY kits by importing measurements into Vcad.
Right now I'm looking at the peerless 830668 as a great candidate. I'm curious to hear your guys thoughts on a this idea and if you have any recommendations for 8"-10" woofers to utilize in this build.
Long story short, I grabbed a pair of C-notes from PE this year and while I quite enjoy pretty much everything coming out of them, I feel bass and mid bass isn't rendered quite as well as I'd like, and frankly I think I'm just not that big of a fan of small speakers. I think I mostly purchased these out of boredom rather than to fill a use case. I've gotten to the finishing stage and it's been a disaster, the first time I'm attempting to paint a speaker. I have lost all interest in finishing the cabinets as I know they will not come out to a satisfactory level, I very much prefer wood veneer and have great luck in applying it, unfortunately do to the rounding I did over the whole cabinet veneer isn't really an option anymore.
Anyway, I'm at the stage where I'm considering woofers to take over the lower end of things and utilize the DSA135 and ND25fw for the mid and top end. I have a measurement mic and DATS, so far only utilized to make crossover modifications to already built DIY kits by importing measurements into Vcad.
Right now I'm looking at the peerless 830668 as a great candidate. I'm curious to hear your guys thoughts on a this idea and if you have any recommendations for 8"-10" woofers to utilize in this build.
There is a recent thread on PETT asking the same thing, may be if interest.
https://techtalk.parts-express.com/forum/tech-talk-forum/1493110-c-note-3-way-ideas
https://techtalk.parts-express.com/forum/tech-talk-forum/1493110-c-note-3-way-ideas
That thread is actually mine, but I chose to abandon the idea of adding a separate cabinet to the c-notes. I'm also hoping posting here will get some other suggestions.
Did you mean to have someone design a 3 way crossover, using/modifying c-note original filter?
edit: picking woofer is the least of a problem
edit: picking woofer is the least of a problem
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I plan on designing the filters myself after measuring everything in box and importing to vcad, standard stuff I suppose. I am not sure how much of the original filter will be of use. This will be a bit of learning process for me.
I'm not trying to discourage you from using a 10" but how a speaker is voiced affects the bass.
Below is the FR of the DSA135 + ND25FW with a passive crossover. Plot was made with speaker in 4pi.
The bass is about 5dB less than the midrange. No issues for me. I actually prefer it this way. I favor midrange over bass.
https://ampslab-spk.com/2020/08/23/hummingbird-ta/
Here is another plot voiced like the Harman Curve. It sounds totally different. Bass is now more pronounced. Same drivers, same box.
https://ampslab-spk.com/2022/09/05/biamp-hummingbird/
Think a 10" is a good idea.
In full space below 200 hz
everything drops like a rock.
Be nice to find a 10" with more sensitivity
than the midrange to maybe help things out.
Think the peerless driver you show
is in the 88 dB range.
A Dayton equivalent is pretty much half the
cost. Such as the DC-250-8
That would work. But same problem
Sensitivity is low and in full space.
Might not fill in the low end as much as you
would want.
Believe it would be easier to use another Dayton Driver.
in the same price range. As the peerless.
Since your already in the 80 to 90 dollar price range
with the Peerless
Might as well use the Dayton DS270-8
Sensitivity is closer to 90 dB.
Likely make crossover easier to design.
And will have more bass in full space
having higher sensitivity than the mid.
since the baffle will be wider for the 10"
very likely the baffle step for the midrange
will be relatively lower and more friendly
far as finishing the cab and rounded edges.
it is somewhat common to paint the baffle
and the roundover. Then just use
veneer for the sides.
In full space below 200 hz
everything drops like a rock.
Be nice to find a 10" with more sensitivity
than the midrange to maybe help things out.
Think the peerless driver you show
is in the 88 dB range.
A Dayton equivalent is pretty much half the
cost. Such as the DC-250-8
That would work. But same problem
Sensitivity is low and in full space.
Might not fill in the low end as much as you
would want.
Believe it would be easier to use another Dayton Driver.
in the same price range. As the peerless.
Since your already in the 80 to 90 dollar price range
with the Peerless
Might as well use the Dayton DS270-8
Sensitivity is closer to 90 dB.
Likely make crossover easier to design.
And will have more bass in full space
having higher sensitivity than the mid.
since the baffle will be wider for the 10"
very likely the baffle step for the midrange
will be relatively lower and more friendly
far as finishing the cab and rounded edges.
it is somewhat common to paint the baffle
and the roundover. Then just use
veneer for the sides.
New box, don't think you could fit anything else in the c-note boxes.
Thank you for the tips there White Dragon!
No discouragement at all! I appreciate the info. I will say I'm pretty aware of the low end affecting the voicing of a speaker, I was running some corrective EQ on the cnotes and part of that was a LF shelf to bring back the midbass and bass to a degree that sounds correct to me, I generally find the harman room target to be pleasing to my ears. I'm not really chasing more bass per se but more that larger woofers and cabinet seem to just render bass much differently and generally to my ears. The mid bass is a big one and I haven't found any small speakers that do that right for me in my spaces.
Thank you for the tips there White Dragon!
No discouragement at all! I appreciate the info. I will say I'm pretty aware of the low end affecting the voicing of a speaker, I was running some corrective EQ on the cnotes and part of that was a LF shelf to bring back the midbass and bass to a degree that sounds correct to me, I generally find the harman room target to be pleasing to my ears. I'm not really chasing more bass per se but more that larger woofers and cabinet seem to just render bass much differently and generally to my ears. The mid bass is a big one and I haven't found any small speakers that do that right for me in my spaces.
My recommendation would be a bass module. Easy to swap out and replace, doesn't require as much work, disposable. Redesigning for a new baffle would be tough. Using the existing crossover, adding a highpass filter to the woofer around 600hz where it runs out of steam and swap to a competent larger driver. Powering this separately will also bypass a lot of your sensitivity problems and open the door to more room EQ.
Bass is difficult. If your preference is in the 100Hz region, you may want to consider two units of the 7" Seas U18RNX instead of a single 10".
You'll get better attack and clarity.
The Peerless NE180W and the Anarchy 708 are good contenders too.
Cross them between 125Hz to 250Hz to the DSA135.
Thought I'd follow up. I've had some practice designing a series of 2/3-ways for a home theater setup. My preference would be to use the same drivers for phase/sensitivity simplification. You can do this, but there's a lot of sacrifice. The two-ways will not extend deeply and won't cross to the subwoofer LFE correctly. To put it simply, a midrange is a midrange and a woofer is a woofer. There may be overlap, but the designs will be fundamentally different, with different advantages. Troels has a whole essay on the subject. It's worth a read.
http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/why.htm
http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/why.htm