First speaker build - wish me luck

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#61
Are you planning on just using a stock crossover and load with any of your driver/ horn choices, whatever they may end up being? You have said that you're a beginner, and no one is talking about measurements in box, and on horn. Are you wanting to learn that, as well as purchase a measurement setup, and learn crossover sim tools? If you grab an off the shelf Eminence crossover and slap it on a pair of drivers, you may not get your expected, or hopeful results. I don't have much interest, based on my level of knowledge or experience, to do that, if I am wanting top notch sound. That's why I recommended a pre existing design. If you are willing to do all the learning, researching, and experimentation for fun, and looking long term, then great. If you are just wanting to build a great looking, to you, speaker based on high end drivers, and have it sound great and be done, I still think that it would be a better outcome to have a well done crossover for your particular speaker. The crossover is where the magic is made.
 
#63
The thing is you already have the 12” active subs and the 2” horn and you are looking for a 10” midbass and a compression driver to match what you have. This will be custom made in any case and I’m sure the only way it might be a success is to have flexibility in gains and eq (much like PA people do in new locations). A mic and a sine sweep is all you need (again much like PA people on the road do). If you now start to look at a coaxial compression driver and a 15” midbass to fit the 12” sub and existing horn things start to get not only very complex but also expensive and non traditional. You haven’t said anything about amps or active crossovers, source etc. you need to design the whole system not only some speakers that look cool. 2-way passive plus active sub is fairly easy if you allow some flexibility in gains. 3-way passive plus active sub suddenly complicates things a lot more. Lots of more static crossover parts that costs. Assembly of those. Simulation and measurements. You need to stick to some requirements or prepare for a project costing a lot with many detours. It’s a cool project if you have the time money and patience for it but you need to set the limits yourself. Start by drawing everything from source via amps to gains eq, crossovers and drivers. A simple two way is a good place to start as first project. Not too expensive and decent results. Stock crossovers aren’t so bad IMO especially if you have the possibility to eq on the source side or use amps with inbuilt DSP like some Crowns. Happy to help more but please try to set your requirements and system setup ideas. 4-way is tricky and expensive. What’s the budget. 2k? Simple is almost always better.
 
#64
I'm actually going to build something very similar to this..
 

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#65
But your horn is a lot bigger and you have 12” subs in addition. A simple 15” + horn there is a lot of designs available but not necessarily with the sub you have and the horn. Still what about amps and source, budget etc. you may want to read some of the stickies to learn the steps of a design.
 
#66
Let’s say your target is 120dB peak dynamics and the drivers are 90dB for the sub, 100dB for the midbass and 110dB for the mid/high you would need 1000 watt for the sub (+30dB = 10^3 watt), 100 watt for the mid (+20dB = 10^2 watt) and 10 watt for the highs (+10dB = 10^1 watt). This can be done active or passive but you already see the problem if you add another driver in the mix, you need to have a strategy for amplification and eq/gain before going much further. Power handling will be depending on crossover points say 100Hz and 1000Hz and the slopes, and where you decide to go active. As your sub is 650 watt I would assume you would need at least 100 watt for the top.
 
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#67
OK so excuse my n00bness (and thank you for your patience)..

Currently i have a pair of harbeth (85dB 1w/1m) running with active 650w stereo subwoofers (amps built into subs). The Harbeths are powered by a 100w SS Yamaha Stereo amplifier (AS2100), the subs run from the pre-out of the amp. The gain control on the subs amplifier is at the 7pm position - basically as low as it can go, with insane amounts of bass for my listening space. The subwoofer crossover goes up to 120Hz, I currently have it set at about 60Hz for both subs.

The new design I am proposing is a 2 way speaker - 1 driver using a horn- drivers that are way way more sensitive than the Harbeth, but essentially the same 'set up'. I realize a lot of the magic in speaker design is measurement, proper crossover design, and I want to learn all of that in time, but fundamentally is there any reason that what I am proposing wouldn't work? Whether it sounds good or not is another question and that'll be part of the journey for me.

To reiterate

a HF horn that handles 800hz + up (using an azura 550 (Hz), 320mm opening, 130mm deptth)
a LF 10" (or 12") that does 800hz + down (I am realistic about low freq expectations in a small enclosure)
2 stereo subs that I already own that are active with 650w per sub, currently fed by the pre-out of an amplifier - baring in mind these go louder than I would EVER need in my listening space.

As for budget, I don't have a constraint.
 
#68
Ah this clarifies a lot. Gain will be your biggest issue. Getting the drivers to match levels. The pre out of the Yamaha have no separate gain but the sub amp do. It is hard to guess how much gain you would need for the sub to be at the same levels as the 2-way PA - this is your first challenge. I’m afraid the sub will be 5dB too low looking at my previous assumptions of power and sensitivity, these subs are not PA I assume. Yes they can play loud but the PA will be a lot louder. Remember that your new tops will be 15dB more than your old and you have no way to adjust its gain for anything but the horn. The second issue is that the Yamaha does not have any eq or filters for the top meaning the 10” midbass needs to handle also sub bass and your crossovers for the horn must be accurate from start. The 10” might get overheated or mechanically broken due or distort to the fact it should be limited below 100hz but isn’t, which again will pull a lot of unnecessary power from the Yamaha. It’s not optimal to be honest. Most PA 10” is not made for the deepest bass they expect a subsonic filter at 60-100hz to perform as indicated. I think your only option is to build either a larger PA and skip the sub, or build a system of lower sensitivity and higher full range power handling.
 
#69
That would absolutely work. As far as how will it sound? You can get another amp to feed one of your drivers and use the Yamaha for the other, and get 4 channels of active crossover to play around with. You can try different slopes, gains, eq etc. If you have a measurement mix and run whatever program you choose, you could, over time, get to a crossover setup that works well, then transfer that data into a crossover sim to play with designing a passive crossover if you want. Read up on why and how to use a tweeter protection cap so you don't damage the compression driver by accident. Read up on high pass filters for your 10 to relieve it of low end to let it play cleaner mids too, since your subs will be running low end duties.
 
#71
It depends on the SPL target. If you want the 10" to play 118dB at 100Hz (@100 watt) you need to filter below 60Hz or the excursion or heat may destroy it, its not made for sub. I doubt the Yamaha can play 100 watt clean though, I think 110dB peak and 104dB RMS is more realistic and whether the Faital can deal with that 20 watt at 20Hz try with simulation in the box you had in mind. I wouldnt recommend it as it will most likely distort the midrange. The high frequency driver will never be a problem here. LPad and 12dB passive HPF and maybe a bulb will protect it of anything. Finding the weakest link is the trick of indentifying max SPL. The drivers is not the problem, its the missing active crossovers, amps and gains which will be your trouble below 800Hz, and also EQ above 800Hz might be a problem as we have no idea how the 2" will work in that horn. As Drummer sais, another amp and an active crossover with EQ would give you alot more flexibility for trail and error without losing all you money.
 
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#73
Your room was 14x14m2? Remember 118dB would be at 1m peak pushing the yamaha to extremes. I wouldnt be surpriced if you would reach that levels when you can. at 10m it wont be that high.

I still think you need to draw a system drawing like I tried to show, looking at max SPL for each driver and how to adjust the gains accordingly either passive (HPF, LPAD) or active (for the mid and sub) using an active crossover:

980014d1630601632-speaker-build-wish-luck-active-passive-hybrid-png
 
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#75
Wait, was it 14 feet? very different 🙂
Then go ahead and try, nothing to lose by trying 😉
40 clean watt from the Yamaha would give 98+10+3+3 = 114dB peaks and 108 RMS (-6dB).
Im sure the faital 10" can deal with that (not sure at below 50Hz though).
As will the sub (90+10+10+3+3 = 116dB, 400 watt) and definitely the HF using a proper passive XO at 800Hz and LPAD.
You could also have passive high pass for the 10" using a large coil but its expensive and a power hog for the yamaha.
You still need EQ though for the complete system 😉
Good luck, cant wait to see it (and its measurements)
Late posting here now, lots of rambling. Good night 🙂
 
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