New Markaudio Drivers

ujju3doc,
Thank you for such a nice and helpful reply.i'll do a bit more reading and see
Finesse and accuracy almost sums me up, at least in my head..!
I'll do a bit more reading and see where that takes me.

oldspkrguy,
If you want to send me some money I'll get you some and deliver them personally. Failing that, is it worth asking KJFaudio - Markaudio MAOP 7 Full Range Speaker Driver | KJF Audio to let you know when he has some in stock as I believe he can post abroad. Be grateful you don't want the 11's, which are over £700..
 
Hey folks

I'm delighted to tell you guys that I just finished my Alpair 11ms Frugel-Horn XL and currently going through warming up the speaker.

I couldn't have completed this task without the help of this forum members especially planet10, orangeart and Scottmoose. I will be always grateful to you guys.

Initial impressions are very positive.

Sound stage is wide and I can clearly see the point source benefits mentioned by Mark Fenlon.

Treble is running a bit low at the moment, it might turn a bit more bright after the warm up I assume. Might be to do with my tube preamplifier treble roll off as well

Bass is already pretty deep going. The character of the bass is very similar to what comes from a subwoofer. Subtle room filling bass but at the same time very deep and sustaining.

Overall sound signature has a certain cohesion to it. All the frequency ranges comes out very balanced and synergistic.

Will post further impressions as the speakers warm up.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_20200916_083957.jpg
    IMG_20200916_083957.jpg
    351.2 KB · Views: 497
  • IMG_20200916_084111.jpg
    IMG_20200916_084111.jpg
    296 KB · Views: 504
  • IMG_20200916_084220.jpg
    IMG_20200916_084220.jpg
    382.6 KB · Views: 487
  • IMG_20200916_084306.jpg
    IMG_20200916_084306.jpg
    366.6 KB · Views: 495
  • IMG_20200916_084458.jpg
    IMG_20200916_084458.jpg
    288.6 KB · Views: 483
Berlyassocial,

Beautiful build, congratulations!

What amplifier are you using? As you already mentioned, the FH-XL can dig impressively deep with the right driver.

kp93300,

Plans are available from Planet10 - my understanding is that you need to make a donation to diyAudio and then share the receipt/proof with Dave, then he will provide you with the FH-XL plan set.
 
Berlyassocial - looking very nice !
What veneer did you use, and how did you finish it ?
I have just bought a pair of the same, but mine were orangeart's own ones he used for demonstrating, and have the MAOP 11's in them - while I've only managed a couple of hours listening time, they compare very well to my existing speakers that cost over £3200 new...
 
Berlyassocial - looking very nice !
What veneer did you use, and how did you finish it ?
.

in fact, what I've used is wooden finish vinyl wrap. In my opinion vinyl wrap performs as well as veneer in terms of finish and looks.its not easily scratchable and is quit thick as well. just you have to do some preparation on the surface you are going to wrap it which was done by the person who build the cabinet.
 

Attachments

  • IMG-20200905-WA0043.jpg
    IMG-20200905-WA0043.jpg
    78.1 KB · Views: 565
berlyassocial,

The cabinet maker did a good job with both the cabinets and the vinyl wrap.

Did you slightly rebate the drivers or they are flush-mounted on the front baffle? I am asking because I haven't not seen these new Mark Audio drivers with slimmer bezels in real life, so difficult for me to be 100% sure.
 
Update on the impressions of alpair 11ms

Now well past 10 hours the treble is more clear and bass has increased aswell.

The treble is not overly bright and is very natural and has a good amount of sparkle to it.

One thing that didn't really standout is the negative camber dispersion benefits which was advertised by mark audio. Even with negative camber cone you have to be sitting reasonably center to obtain a good sound stage.

The bass is way more than you expect from this size of a driver. Well defined deep bass. If you have these speakers on Frugel-Horn XL placed in a room with around 16ft length and 14 ft width with reasonable amount of fabric based furniture and speaker placed for corner loading then you have no need for a subwoofer. To hear the deep bass from the frugal horns your listening spot should be around 12 to 14 feet away from the speakers.

These speakers do not seem to be very easy to drive for low powered amps. Because the 3 way I had before fhxl had more spl at similar watts. It might be due to some other factors of the cabinet which I might not be informative enough to understand.

Overall this is a fantastic marriage between fhxl and alpair 11ms. These pair easily outperform brand produced loudspeakers which are 3 to 4 times the price interms of Soundstage, detailing, listening fatigue and even bass performance I would say. Atleast to what I've heard which includes Qacoustics bookshelf and tower, B&W bookshelf, vintage 3 ways, canton bookshelf, acoustic energy tower

But again these brand produced speakers I mentioned before beat alpair on power handling.

So if you are okay with 30 to 35 watts listening and ready to dedicate ample amount of time and thought process in building the cabinet then do go for these because all those efforts will be worth it when you listen to these at last. These have a talent to put a smile on your face.