KISS: or the art of the 2.5 way

Just wanted to get back to something simple for my new home. I started with my super lightweight bamboo enclosures filled with my custom FR151's, along with a miniDSP 2x4HD, and it's sure fun, but as an incorrigible DIYer: I wanted another project. 😱

So, using the same 2x4HD, what are the options?

Well, i'm not a big fan of 2-ways... It's either fullrange or 3/4 ways.

But what about a 2.5-way?

A 2.5-way is the poor man's 3-way, which means I use the highpass channels to feed both the mids and tweeters, and I finish the job with some basic passive xovers (6db/oct in my case, cannot be simplier).

I'm not saying it's an easy task to make it work properly nor that the results can compete with an elaborate 4-way system, but it can be excellent for the money/time spent.

So here is my new little 2.5 project:

Tweeter: RAAL 64-10 (ribbon)
Midrange: Visaton B200 (widely used as a fullrange)
Sub/woofer: JL audio 8W1v3 (4 total)
Dayton 12'' passive radiator (tuned @ more or less 33hz)
Very thin on-wall enclosures, made of 10mm bamboo

MiniDSP: 315hz xover @ 48db/oct BW
Tweeter/mid @ 4.5khz @ 6db/oct
Amplifier: ICEpower

Basically, I chose a recipe with what I had on hand. But first I designed the project using (2) TW1 subwoofers and finally added bamboo panels to modify the whole thing to fit (4) 8w1v3, for a better 150-300hz response, which is not the Visaton's forte and even less the TW1's...

After few hours spent on the measures and EQ, I can say: mission accomplished. 🙂
Now, all I need is to finish the job with some protective grill to cover that DIY mess 🙄


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Nice and thin! Got to love bamboo.

Visually it's kind of messy; that's a lot of black to have scattered left-and-right as it were. I'm sure it's for design reasons but I feel like they'd be less imposing if the drivers were more vertically aligned (maybe even just the JLs).

Sorry if that sounds like more criticism than praise; I just don't have any feedback on the more technical parts of the design. They look well built and I bet they sound wonderful.