I need new speakers for my living room. The room is 14 x 40 feet, with a 10 foot ceiling. Speakers will be located in the corners, halfway up the wall, firing in the long dimension. Listening preferences range from acoustic jazz and classical to roof-raising DJ dance parties. I will use a DSP crossover, and subwoofers for the bottom octaves.
A synergy horn looks like the right kind of speaker to control directivity in this long and narrow space. I've seen a few projects here that look promising, but threads are hundreds of posts long and I don't have time to wade through them all. I understand the basics of the synergy horn but not enough to design my own. I am looking for an evolved DIY design I can build with minimal development. I have a woodshop so complex cabinets are no problem. Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Tom
A synergy horn looks like the right kind of speaker to control directivity in this long and narrow space. I've seen a few projects here that look promising, but threads are hundreds of posts long and I don't have time to wade through them all. I understand the basics of the synergy horn but not enough to design my own. I am looking for an evolved DIY design I can build with minimal development. I have a woodshop so complex cabinets are no problem. Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Tom
Tom,
Most of the Synergy type builds have been around 90 x45 degree nominal dispersion, a few are in the 50 x 50 degree range.
The narrow dimensions of your room call for more like 20 x 15 degrees.
You'd be better off starting from scratch using Bwaslo's calculator to dial in a proper design.
Having success with the two-way SynTripP design, it's 2x10" format with a 3" diaphragm HF driver of choice would work well for you with a minimum of design work.
I have a pair of un-used B&C DE90TN-8 HF drivers that would work well for that type design, PM if you are interested.
Cheers,
Art
Most of the Synergy type builds have been around 90 x45 degree nominal dispersion, a few are in the 50 x 50 degree range.
The narrow dimensions of your room call for more like 20 x 15 degrees.
You'd be better off starting from scratch using Bwaslo's calculator to dial in a proper design.
Having success with the two-way SynTripP design, it's 2x10" format with a 3" diaphragm HF driver of choice would work well for you with a minimum of design work.
I have a pair of un-used B&C DE90TN-8 HF drivers that would work well for that type design, PM if you are interested.
Cheers,
Art
Thanks Art.
I found Bill Waslo's spreadsheet, at some point I'll have to delve into that, and Horn Response as well.
For a horn with such extreme directionality as you recommend, some dimension has to be massive, correct? About how big of a beast would I be looking at here, if I used your 2 x 10" drivers?
Also, I have read that horn-loaded compression drivers lack a certain amount of smoothness or finesse in the upper octaves compared to "hi-fi" stuff... I've really only heard crappy-to-decent PA rigs with horns, but what about a good driver in a proper design?
- Tom
I found Bill Waslo's spreadsheet, at some point I'll have to delve into that, and Horn Response as well.
For a horn with such extreme directionality as you recommend, some dimension has to be massive, correct? About how big of a beast would I be looking at here, if I used your 2 x 10" drivers?
Also, I have read that horn-loaded compression drivers lack a certain amount of smoothness or finesse in the upper octaves compared to "hi-fi" stuff... I've really only heard crappy-to-decent PA rigs with horns, but what about a good driver in a proper design?
- Tom
I use 90 x 60 degree K-402s in a listening room that's 15.5 x 40 feet (9 feet high). They work extremely well on the short wall corners and center wall. Personally, I would not prefer a narrower coverage for my room. My listening distance varies from 10' (main LP) to 35' (cooking, etc.) and it fills the room with sound from wall to wall. With a three-across array (L, C, R), there is no sweet spot--the sound is everywhere good.
YMMV.
Chris
YMMV.
Chris
It may not be as narrow as you'd ideally want, but you might want to consider Art's SynTripp, as it is a rather well-worked-out 2-way design with lots of documentation. Some directivity (particularly controlled) is better than none. I think if your seats are toward mid-room (not a bad idea, anyway, as it gives you nice delayed reflections from the back and sides) that even 90 degree unity/synergy horns would do pretty well (it's what I would do). You could also consider my SmallSyns design, though more work than Art's horn (and it uses a compression tweeter, which you say you might not favor).
Tom,
Low frequencies require large mouth dimensions to retain coverage control, narrow angles require deeper horns if the mouth dimension is large. Bill's spreadsheet can give you the size of any coverage angle and control frequency you wish to maintain.
The horns will appear to be "too big of a beast", or "way big of a beast" if you want narrow pattern control to below 400 Hz ;^).
Compression drivers on constant directivity horns require EQ to be "smooth", once EQ is applied, they can sound quite "hi-fi", and can go far louder than single dome tweeters.
Cask05 points out that wide dispersion "fills the room with sound from wall to wall", which raises an entire discussion of room treatments, direct to reflected preferences, coverage level from front to back, etc.
If your location for critical listening or home theater is at a distance around 10', as his is, a 90 degree horizontal dispersion makes sense for the couch.
My SynTripP (90x40) cabinets have similar dispersion to Cask05's 90x60 K-402s. The K-402 horns do have a slightly smoother polar response than a two-part conical horn, but I doubt that would make much difference in a 14 x 40 room, given all the different reflections that we hear. To really mess with everything proposed so far, in my larger living room, about 24' x 15', I have compared my SynTripP to (cheap) a "full range" driver line array, and prefer the line in the corner for even coverage of the room from near to far.
Art
Low frequencies require large mouth dimensions to retain coverage control, narrow angles require deeper horns if the mouth dimension is large. Bill's spreadsheet can give you the size of any coverage angle and control frequency you wish to maintain.
The horns will appear to be "too big of a beast", or "way big of a beast" if you want narrow pattern control to below 400 Hz ;^).
Compression drivers on constant directivity horns require EQ to be "smooth", once EQ is applied, they can sound quite "hi-fi", and can go far louder than single dome tweeters.
Cask05 points out that wide dispersion "fills the room with sound from wall to wall", which raises an entire discussion of room treatments, direct to reflected preferences, coverage level from front to back, etc.
If your location for critical listening or home theater is at a distance around 10', as his is, a 90 degree horizontal dispersion makes sense for the couch.
My SynTripP (90x40) cabinets have similar dispersion to Cask05's 90x60 K-402s. The K-402 horns do have a slightly smoother polar response than a two-part conical horn, but I doubt that would make much difference in a 14 x 40 room, given all the different reflections that we hear. To really mess with everything proposed so far, in my larger living room, about 24' x 15', I have compared my SynTripP to (cheap) a "full range" driver line array, and prefer the line in the corner for even coverage of the room from near to far.
Art
Thanks for your responses Art.
I have been eyeing your SynTripps (and Keystones) for a while, as PA for larger parties and concerts, but they (and any synergy horn system, I guess) would be too much for my living room and my budget! Someday soon I hope...
The line source is a good alternative. It certainly can be done on the quick and cheap, and it has a small footprint. I think that's what I'll go for.
I have been eyeing your SynTripps (and Keystones) for a while, as PA for larger parties and concerts, but they (and any synergy horn system, I guess) would be too much for my living room and my budget! Someday soon I hope...
The line source is a good alternative. It certainly can be done on the quick and cheap, and it has a small footprint. I think that's what I'll go for.
I wouldn't say particularly quick or cheap, lots of drivers, wiring, holes and chamber dividers.
Since you have been considering the TC9FD-18-08, do realize it takes around 40 of them to equal the output of the 2x10" SynTripP, and you'd run out of line height in your room long before equaling the output of Cask05's 2x15" K-402s.
That said, 8 of the TC9 per side would easily hit 100+dB in the top end at around 3 meters, loud enough for any indoor party I'd throw.
Add subs to taste..
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I would use that TC9. I was thinking 25 per side, there's actually a soffit at 8 feet I need to clear. Should be plenty loud, but you are right, not exactly cheap.
How many drivers of what size are in your line? Do you hear the vertical comb filtering in your room or are those concerns maybe overblown?
How many drivers of what size are in your line? Do you hear the vertical comb filtering in your room or are those concerns maybe overblown?
My old place in San Diego was the size of a shoebox, and Danley SH50s worked nicely in that space. I wouldn't sweat the coverage angle, I think what's more important is how LOW you control the pattern, not necessarily how NARROW the pattern is.
For instance, in this setup, pictured above, the room was so small I literally couldn't get both speakers in the picture.
A conventional two-way speaker doesn't control directivity at all, so you get tons of reflections off the floor, ceilings and side walls.
In a controlled directivity speaker, even a modest waveguide can keep output off the walls down to 2khz, and a big constant directivity speaker like the SH50 can do it all the way down to 500hz.
How low you want to go is really going to depend on how big of a cabinet you can tolerate. I sold my Summas largely because they just dominated my entire living room.
To answer your original question, if it were me, I'd build Bill Waslo's Small Syns. I've heard the Danley SH50, I've heard a couple of Bill's speakers, the Small Syns exceed the SH50 in some respects. Overall, I'd say they're equally nice, the Small Syns do some things that the SH50 doesn't.
One of these days, we should bring back the Lambda Unity Horn. The dude that sold it died, so the design is offline, but we could pull it back via the Wayback machine. It's a great speaker and it would be fairly easy to recreate in 2018. Call it "Lambda Unity Horn 2018" or something. We'd need a different compression driver, but all the other components of the design are still for sale, seventeen years after the speaker premiered.
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I've built an embarassing amount of waveguides, and everything I've seen points to the fact that you really need to treat the compression driver and the waveguide as a single unit, and it's pretty darn difficult to get world-class response above 2khz with a conical horn.
To my ears, that's one of the reasons the Waslo Small Syns is so good, that SEOS waveguide is really nice.
Having said that, I think the SH50 and the Small Syns are really close in performance. To my ears, the trebl on the Small Syns is more "hi fi", but the SH50 images like you wouldn't believe. I believe that's because it's waveguide is so darn big.
If you wanted to build something that beats them both, I think you would need to build a very large waveguide and 3D print it... which is exactly what Bill has been doing lately.
Basically you have a couple of requirements battling each other in this design; a big waveguide gives you awesome imaging. But it's very difficult to build a giant waveguide out of anything but wood. Even building it out of wood is difficult. In the entire world, there are only a handful of waveguides that are bigger than 15" in diameter. You can't just go on Parts Express and order a 30" waveguide, you'll probably need to build it or print it.
Up in Silicon Valley, Magico has been building megabuck speakers for tech millionaires with money to burn. They even built a giant aluminum horn for $600K. But they should've paid us a visit first, it would work a lot better if it was unitized.
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On the left is a Danley SH50, on the right is a Gedlee Summa
I also traded in my car(!) to get something big enough to move the SH50s, and brought them over to Sheldon's house, to see how they campare to the Lambda Unity Horn.
Bushmeister's horn implementation is pretty nice - uses a COTS waveguide.
A Bookshelf Multi-Way Point-Source Horn
A Bookshelf Multi-Way Point-Source Horn
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