Going old school

There's nothing stopping you from ordering them from overseas, something many of us have to do almost every time we want a driver.

From Faital’s datasheet:
IMG_0108.jpeg


Looks like good inductance control, and first break up at 3Khz.

Basic system sensitivity in 2pi in black trace. Brown trace is with a 1st order high pass, on a micro sized cabinet with baffle the size of A5 paper (sorry my North American friends- that’s 5 3/4” W x 8 1/4” tall; or about half size of US “Letter”)

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Enough X-max and power handling to hit Maximum SPL in 1.4L (0.05cu ft) cabinet

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So it’s a true 4” Mid-range, with good sensitivity, good from 250Hz to 2.5KHz, a copper cap for inductance control and low HD, and a reasonable price.

I've requested for a pair of the 4FE42 via the Oz distributor, and this now available for preorder in from the Retail arm here:


https://djcity.com.au/product/faital-pro-4fe42-4-inch-1200w-4-lf-driver-4-40-w-94-db-8-ohm/

Whilst you’re looking for old school, here’s
an 18” subwoofer with a 4.5" VC, ferrite motor, double roll surround, aluminum demodulation ring, 12.75mm xmax (39.5mm VC height, 14mm gap) Fs if 34Hz, Vas 159.9L, & EBP 79.

http://www.sbaudience.com/index.php/products/subwoofers/nero-18sw1900d/



Sealed box in www.data-bass.com style "standard 4 cu ft box for 18" subwoofers" showing basic system sensitivity:

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BR 4.5 cu ft PA style music "subwoofer" (-3dB 40Hz, -10dB 30Hz), with subsonic filter:
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Seriously (!) and not-polemically (!) asking: What are the merits of going old-scool? Apart maybe of feeding nostalgy in old guys (I know very well about nostalgy, because I belong to the oldguys / nearfossile section)? Are there any acoustical merits in doing so?
 
No merits.

I can't build a TV for cheaper than I can buy one. One day audio will be the same. So I'd happily go new school.

Iron nitride magnets? 256 channels of DSP and 256 channels of amplification? 4" drivers that give as much output and clarity as an 8"? Scalable amplification from 1/10/100/1000W with 99% efficiency? Holoplot?

Looking forward to the day I can get live/reference levels without having to see the speaker.
 
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I think I've settled on 3 variants of this Old School idea. First will use the new Dayton AMT, Faitalpro 4FE42-4 mid, and Beyma 8P300Fe/N woofer. I need some ideas on getting "the look" of something vintage from the 70s. Post your favorites!!

I also need advice on the grill. I'm going to get some vintage grill cloth, but will not be doing a typical grill frame because I don't want to use an inset baffle. I plan to do some sort of thin frame mounted 3/4" or so away from the baffle on standoffs. i may use magnets on the standoffs and baffle to attach it. Any ideas hos I might construct something like this?
 
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I plan to do some sort of thin frame mounted 3/4" or so away from the baffle on standoffs. i may use magnets on the standoffs and baffle to attach it. Any ideas hos I might construct something like this?
I did exactly that a while ago. I used a thin sheet of birch multiplex and cut the frame of this. The standoffs where made with a combination of magnetic screws with a flat head so the front of the frame remained flat. I also added some magnetic nuts on the screw ends to give the magnets a bit more to hold on. The cloth was wrapped around the frame and glued on the back of the frame. Don't glue on the front, as it will may through the cloth and look ugly. The magnets were glued into blind holes applied from the inside of the baffle, so they are invisible from the exterior.
 
Have you ordered this yet?

“Faitalpro 4FE42-4”

I autotraced the SPL chart and it’s not as smooth as I originally thought. I guess I wasn’t paying attention to the 100dB vertical scale. 🤣

I’ve already ordered mine so I’ll let you know in any case.
 
I did exactly that a while ago. I used a thin sheet of birch multiplex and cut the frame of this. The standoffs where made with a combination of magnetic screws with a flat head so the front of the frame remained flat. I also added some magnetic nuts on the screw ends to give the magnets a bit more to hold on. The cloth was wrapped around the frame and glued on the back of the frame. Don't glue on the front, as it will may through the cloth and look ugly. The magnets were glued into blind holes applied from the inside of the baffle, so they are invisible from the exterior.

Pics?
 
I need some ideas on getting "the look" of something vintage from the 70s. Post your favorites!!
Most were just rectangles, and sort of “chunky” (ratio) at that - the AR5 being the most obvious.

Mid-late ‘80’s throughout the ‘90’s is where you really start seeing some iconic shapes other than non-traditional HiFi speakers from much earlier periods like Quads (or latter Dahlquists trying to look like Quads).
I also need advice on the grill. I'm going to get some vintage grill cloth, but will not be doing a typical grill frame because I don't want to use an inset baffle. I plan to do some sort of thin frame mounted 3/4" or so away from the baffle on standoffs. i may use magnets on the standoffs and baffle to attach it. Any ideas hos I might construct something like this?
Given this info. my favorite on a fairly classic rectangle is the stand-off baffle of ‘90’s ATC speakers which would allow a frame over the stand-off baffle.

Though to large, (make it smaller with a similar rectangular ratio which is more ‘70’s-ish for the stand-off baffle), think of it like this contemporary ATC that looks like a better version of something from the ‘90’s:

https://atc.audio/hi-fi/loudspeakers/legacy-editions/scm150aslt-le/

There is ‘70’s precedent for this as well:

https://www.usaudiomart.com/details...s-vintage-70s-great-condition/images/1080957/
 
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A classic 70's look is a box, with dimensional ratios of 1 : 1.67 : 2.67, with the smallest dimension being the depth. Walnut veneered on sides and top, with the baffle and rear panel painted black or covered in black laminate. Sharp edged on all corners. A grill cloth of tweed, or that JBL-foam.

Speakers in the 70's were set on the floor, no one used speaker stands. When listening to the speakers, we sat on the floor so that the tweeter was at ear level... or even laid on the floor between the speakers. Remember, it was very rare for anyone over the age of 35 to have any interest in Hi-Fi. Most audio enthusiasts were pretty young, so sitting cross-legged on the floor seemed very normal. It did not matter if our musical tastes were aligned with Joni Mitchel, Black Sabbath, John Denver, P-Funkadelic, or Led Zeppelin... the process was the same.
 
For me it would be something that looks like JBL L100, golden ratio wide box on small stands tilted up just a little bit. And it must be big. Made of maple and mahogany. In my dreams I would use green cone GPA 416 for bass, something like white banana looking cone - Satori PNW maybe? ...and some modern beryllium tweet... It would be hommage to gud ol timez as a mix of Altec Lansing, JBL lookalike and Yamaha beryllium monitors.....

Price would be ridiculous of course and maybe physically impossible to execute... 🙂

In reality I have plan and already drivers on stock for something similar but cheap trickish. Two greencone SB20FRPC30-8 fullrangers as bass units, small yellow Fostex FE126 for mid and don't know yet which tweet...that golden Audax would be maybe nice looking complement and we could even out everything to real 92 dBWm per speaker. Two of these would be thunderous in room...
 
Thinking about this a bit more... if the midrange is at 92.5 dB, the woofer will need to be up to 6 dB higher (98.5 dB/2.83V) to make up for the baffle step loss. Either you go (a lot) bigger than 8", use a very large box, or don't go low.

But it greatly depends where you cross over. Both the mid and bass units can share their part of baffle step loss.

I would wonder how is the loss above the shroeder frequency (of the room)
 
Mattstat's post made me think of the recent GRS replacement for Klipsch. It is 15" and 97db sensitivity. They don't post their usual "recommended box size" and if I remember correctly I put it into WinISD and the box needed to be BIG. Likely won't work for you, but the high sensitivity jumped out at me so I wanted to mention it.

https://www.parts-express.com/GRS-K...oofer-for-Klipsch-Speakers-292-830?quantity=1

Yes, many old school drivers return ridiculously huge cabinet sizes when simulated. But when you scale the cabinet down, you find that the increase in f3 is not linear. The equation (from memory) is f3'=f3(ideal)*square root (Videal/Vactual) where f3(ideal) is f3 of "ideal volume" (Videal) and Vactual is the actual volume of the cabinet.

In other words, if f3(ideal) = 40 Hz with a 4 cubic foot cabinet, then f3' = 60 Hz with a 1 cubic foot cabinet. You have to juggle the numbers to see what you can get away with.