Buy the drivers, wood, and other supplies and I'll build them.
What happens when Flint makes a Line Array?
- Thread starter Flint
- Start date
Buy the drivers, wood, and other supplies and I'll build them.
Two nights ago I sat down in front of these speakers (moved my formal dining table away in order to sit in what I consider the ideal spot in the room), and cranked the living hell out of the most recent remastered version of Quadrophenia. While there were obvious issues with the sound, mostly in the midrange which made vocals sound a tad distant, the overall experience was phenomenal. The bass was extremely impactful, hitting my body hard as heck and shaking my bones. I heard details in things like Keith Moon's bass drum technique I had not clearly made out before. The ambience sounds throughout the album, like the ocean surf sounds that permeate most of the recording, and rain, concert audiences, and even simple intentional studio noise, was lifelike in my house. And the dynamic range seemed limitless. With my SPL meter set on Slow, C-Weighted, and held in front of me the typical readings while the entire band was driving along like a freight train were in the 104dB to 109dB range, yet the system, room, and my own ears felt more loudness could easily be attained.
Basically, 32 smallish cheap speakers were sounding better than most commercial speaker systems costing significantly more in terms of loudness, dynamics, scale, bass impact, and lifelike experience. They were not analytically accurate (which is my typical measurement of quality), but they can bring a lifelike performance into my house.
Basically, 32 smallish cheap speakers were sounding better than most commercial speaker systems costing significantly more in terms of loudness, dynamics, scale, bass impact, and lifelike experience. They were not analytically accurate (which is my typical measurement of quality), but they can bring a lifelike performance into my house.
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Well, sorta. In terms of frequency response I can use a passive crossover to make them "flat". However, because they are open baffle, and thus di-polar, the room plays a massive role in the sound quality because of sound bouncing off of everything in the room in and out of phase. So, no matter how "flat" I can make them in terms of frequency response and phase response as the sound comes off the speakers, the room reflections will futz with what one's ears hear. There will always be nulls and nodes throughout the room at all frequencies and the sheer height of the speakers will always impact the sound as you move closer and further from the speakers (because the distance from the ear to the top speaker will always be greater than the distance from the ear and the middle speaker - and that will vary greatly depending on the listener's position).
Basically, I am going to use a passive crossover to get these as "smooth" sounding as possible, but they will never be analytically accurate in the same way my main speakers are.
That said, what these do to performances which are intended to sound "live" is amazing. Because of the way the sound propagates into the room and seems to "wash" over the listener, it is as if the band is in the room with all the room's reverb and acoustic pros and cons. It is lively, loud, dynamic, and truly in your face. I grew up with two full 8 foot grand pianos in my home and still get to hear those pianos regularly when I visit my mom. No "perfectly accurate" speaker I've heard has made a piano recording sound like the friggin' piano was in my living room like these have - even with their flawed response issues and other things. That is what excites me about these. They are far from perfect sounding, but the experience is deeply engaging, especially at high SPLs.
I am going to do my best to get a relatively flat response at the listening position (which I have to define because anything I do to make them sound flat at 13 feet will make them far from flat at 8 feet). Then, if I decide I want to continue with the experience, I may actually keep them and build my front room around them as a "permanent" installation.
MakeMineVinyl
Well-Known Member
Since the yardstick isn't analytically accurate sound, may I humbly suggest using a vacuum tube amp to drive them and a turntable (or maybe even open reel tape!) as the source?
Actually, I've been considering that. Money is an object, though, so I need to find a good deal on such an amp.
MakeMineVinyl
Well-Known Member
A used Dynaco Stereo 70 can be found cheap. And unbelievably all of the major parts such as transformers and filter capacitors are still being manufactured!
I built at least 5 Dynakit Stereo 70 amps back in the day when I was learning this stuff. I've also repaired more than I can remember (my memories of those tasks all blend together). I still have a couple of tube testers and could probably make one work again if I can find one to fix up. I just need to find a steal on one.
team_tsp
Active Member
MakeMineVinyl
Well-Known Member
I've found that tube testers are essentially useless unless you need to characterize and sort through lots of tubes in order to grade them. For just repairing an amp you can do better by a good visual inspection followed by using the tube in-circuit and measuring how the amp performs. The 7199 input tube for the Stereo 70 is no longer made, but an excellent and very cheap replacement is the 6GH8A which only requires a few pin swap modifications at the tube socket. I've done this myself and it works extremely well, and it is the standard mod to Dynaco amps these days.
The 16 full-range speakers are wired all together where each set of four is wired in series to make a 32 ohm load and then the four sets are wired in parallel to get an 8 ohm load. Basically, in electrical terms, they are effectively one speaker. I then put a crossover on the entire 16 driver array and then a crossover will go onto the tweeter array so I can wire them to one amplifier. This isn't rocket science, really. It is your standard speaker wiring stuff.
Razz
Well-Known Member
Nothing standard about a 16 full range speaker array....
But the wiring is. Here's the diagram - the crossovers themselves are not yet designed.
I am working on the tweeter array baffle today.
I don't know what you are suggesting with the wiring.
He’s suggesting wiring them in parallel.
Razz
Well-Known Member
That's how I imagined doing it.
Actually I imagined 1 very powerful amp for each 16 speaker array with 1 single connection.
Razz
Well-Known Member
... with the crossover connected at the point of the tweeter