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kipperj
03-22-2012, 10:58 PM
Am I the only one who doesn't have folded sub enclosures? What am I missing out on? Can they easily be built?

unsafe8989
03-23-2012, 03:15 AM
Am I the only one who doesn't have folded sub enclosures? What am I missing out on? Can they easily be built?

www.billfitzmaurice.com/ What Music will you be playing?

Incognito
03-23-2012, 04:31 AM
Am I the only one who doesn't have folded sub enclosures? What am I missing out on? Can they easily be built?

There are plenty of reflex sub users here but horns are a good option to consider since they have certain benefits that reflex subs don't benefits from. Check the link provided by unsafe8989 for decent DIY horn loaded designs that are easy to build, also have a check of the stick thread (The Return of the BFM Thread (http://www.djforums.com/forums/showthread.php?205-The-Return-of-the-BFM-Thread)) here in these forums on the subs in question.

windspeed36
03-23-2012, 05:22 AM
This is no doubt going to be the beginning of a very long thread but how come the pro grade subs are all DR? I get the point of some of them being used in line arrays ect but out of the big ones: EAW, L'Acoustics, Meyer and JBL(to some extent) (there are more big brands but these are the ones that sprang to mind) - only EAW offers folded horn tour grade subwoofers.... You would think that there would be more available due to grounds tacking.... However Cardoid ground stack arrays on a delay might just work better? I don't know....

kipperj
03-23-2012, 06:28 AM
There are plenty of reflex sub users here but horns are a good option to consider since they have certain benefits that reflex subs don't benefits from. Check the link provided by unsafe8989 for decent DIY horn loaded designs that are easy to build, also have a check of the stick thread (The Return of the BFM Thread (http://www.djforums.com/forums/showthread.php?205-The-Return-of-the-BFM-Thread)) here in these forums on the subs in question.

What kind of benefits? I read through a couple of pages of the BFM thread. It seems to be a lot of talking about specifics (like types of folded enclosures). Would I get more output with a folded enclosure? I corner load my subs. Would there be any benefit to switching up? I play mostly pop, country, rock.. no mixes or techno, just straight tracks.

windspeed36
03-23-2012, 06:30 AM
What kind of benefits? I read through a couple of pages of the BFM thread. It seems to be a lot of talking about specifics (like types of folded enclosures). Would I get more output with a folded enclosure? I corner load my subs. Would there be any benefit to switching up? I play mostly pop, country, rock.. no mixes or techno, just straight tracks.

Folded horn subs Im pretty sure have a longer throw distance but I think they may have a difference frequency response vs spl sorta thing. Like they get really loud but only at certain frequencies...

Bill Fitzmaurice
03-23-2012, 07:33 AM
how come the pro grade subs are all DR? They cost half as much to build. And not all are DR. The best are folded horns.

Folded horn subs Im pretty sure have a longer throw distance but I think they may have a difference frequency response vs spl sorta thing. Like they get really loud but only at certain frequencies... Complete myth. Why explained here:
http://billfitzmaurice.info/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=999

Phil Lewandowski
03-23-2012, 01:37 PM
Folded horn subs Im pretty sure have a longer throw distance but I think they may have a difference frequency response vs spl sorta thing. Like they get really loud but only at certain frequencies...

Hi windspeed36,

Here is a post from David Gunness (Used to be with EAW a while ago and designed their horn subs back then) talking about what you are mentioning. Hope this helps:




A "long throw" speaker is normally considered to be a high-directivity speaker. Vertically, because it projects a tight beam, you're able to "throw" the sound over the heads of the nearest listeners without killing them with SPL. Horizontally, it sends less energy into the sidewalls of the room - so the reverb picks up more slowly as you walk toward the back.

When it comes to floor-stacked subs, neither of these effects apply. All of the listeners are in the direct path of the subs, so there is no throwing it over their heads. Also, all subs have wide patterns, and nearly all rooms have relatively long reverb times at low frequencies - so the effect of low frequency directivity on the distribution of reverb in a room is usually insignificant.

What is important is the area of the wavefront where it exits the box. In order to squeeze 100 acoustic Watts out of an 18-inch woofer, the sound pressure has to be extremely high at the surface of the woofer. If the same 100 acoustic Watts comes through a 3-foot by 3-foot horn mouth, the sound pressure will be much, much lower at the mouth (nearly 10 dB less). A hundred Watts is a hundred Watts, so at 50 feet, both systems will produce the same SPL.

The difference then, is that for a given SPL at distance, the SPL down close to the speakers is much lower for the horn than it is for the direct radiator. That means the horn produces less SPL variation from near to far - than the direct radiator does. Some people would call that "throw". Incidentally, this form of "throw" works the same indoors as it does outdoors.

David Gunness






~Phil

Phil Lewandowski
03-23-2012, 01:41 PM
Am I the only one who doesn't have folded sub enclosures? What am I missing out on? Can they easily be built?

Between direct radiators and horns they are pretty much just different tools. Horns are nothing new at all, but there have been "advances" in the past 10-15 years and people looking to make them even more accessible to the public. You are not missing out on anything per say, but the bigger question is to find yourself a good sub for the job, no matter what the design ends up being.

There can be good and badly designed horns, just as there are good and badly designed direct radiator.

I personally started off with a couple small horn subs (Growlers) 5 years ago, and they worked well. After a couple years of searching for a great smaller value sub, I ended at the SRX718. It is sad to see the SRX series die and being replaced with a heavier line of speakers because of the price of neodymium. But so far the SRX718 is still my favorite value sub; in the under $1000 range and under 100lbs range.
------


So what would I suggest to someone like you looking for subs? List your absolute top budget for subs and what their uses will be and then you go about looking for the best tool for the job, at the best value as well.

~Phil

Incognito
03-23-2012, 04:19 PM
What kind of benefits? I read through a couple of pages of the BFM thread. It seems to be a lot of talking about specifics (like types of folded enclosures). Would I get more output with a folded enclosure? I corner load my subs. Would there be any benefit to switching up? I play mostly pop, country, rock.. no mixes or techno, just straight tracks.

Horn benefit from mutual coupling in that they will give you the same SPL gains as a direct radiator but horns will go a step further in also extending the lower frequency range it is capable of covering once coupled (& it gets better with larger arrays of horns). Horns have much better directivity then direct radiators do but a well designed horn will also exhibit less distortion then direct radiators (another plus is you won't have to worry about port noise with a horn).

kipperj
03-23-2012, 10:54 PM
These are all great points. Anything else anyone would like to add? It's really helping!

DJ Higgumz
04-12-2012, 10:28 PM
the reason big companies don't make horn loaded cabs is marketing. first it is a mindset of consumers that you need an 18. incorrect, but if they want to sell they need to fit an 18. but that creates a problem. if you had an 18 you would need a massive cabinet, because what determines extension is the length of the horn path, not cone diameter. so, to have an efficient cab, you would want a smaller driver, meaning less space wasted in rear chamber volume. not to mention the massive cone and motor strength needed to operate the 18 in the high pressure throat of a well designed horn. thats where Bill's designs come in. he uses small high excursion affordable drivers to acheive golden sound. yes golden. not to mention the supercharged spl and extention, but with horns you can hear defined notes, not just a bunch of boom and muffled basslines. the folds in the horn filter the distortion of the speaker, which is where people say it has a different tone. people question if they are so good why arent they used by pro touring companies? because of their lack of awareness, and they can't buy them. the ones that you can buy are marketed ones with 18s, where you dont get the efficency with a 15 or 12 loaded. so they put the shadow on horns that they are too bulky. i'm afraid this is my last post on this forum, my thread about using safety cables turned into a gang war, i've had it with the close minded users on this forum.

Bill Fitzmaurice
04-13-2012, 07:18 AM
i'm afraid this is my last post on this forum, my thread about using safety cables turned into a gang war, i've had it with the close minded users on this forum.That's a childish attitude. Yes, there are long winded jerks who don't actually know what they're talking about yet will argue on endlessly anyway. You put said jerks on your ignore list, and continue to provide factual information to those who are interested in learning and not arguing. When you just pack your bags and leave the jerks win.

GaFFLe
04-13-2012, 10:38 AM
That's a childish attitude. Yes, there are long winded jerks who don't actually know what they're talking about yet will argue on endlessly anyway. You put said jerks on your ignore list, and continue to provide factual information to those who are interested in learning and not arguing. When you just pack your bags and leave the jerks win.
Yeah... I say ignore them and keep offering up your opinions and advice. You helped me with your advice and sound practices with the Pro Audio stuff.

djpenguin
04-13-2012, 12:01 PM
Folded horns put out higher SPLs at the front of the cabinet, but you have to put the rest of the rig on a slight delay in order to time-align the whole signal (because of the time it takes for the sound waves to travel down the horn to the front of the cabinet.)

Bill Fitzmaurice
04-13-2012, 01:19 PM
Folded horns put out higher SPLs at the front of the cabinet, but you have to put the rest of the rig on a slight delay in order to time-align the whole signal (because of the time it takes for the sound waves to travel down the horn to the front of the cabinet.)
Delays of up to 30ms are inaudible in the sub-woofer bandwidth, so if you have the capability to delay the tops fine, but if not don't worry about it.

DJ Higgumz
04-13-2012, 02:16 PM
I'm just afraid all the fanboys will associate that thread with the knowledge I share, then bringing there hate to the other thread. I'll stick to the audio threads, that should filter a couple of them out

djpenguin
04-13-2012, 02:52 PM
Delays of up to 30ms are inaudible in the sub-woofer bandwidth, so if you have the capability to delay the tops fine, but if not don't worry about it.

Granted, my experience is limited, but when working with a system consisting of a set of flown Turbosound tops and Cerwin-Vega folded-horn bins, there was a noticeable difference between having the system time-aligned and not time-aligned. Without the time alignment, the lows sounded flubby and not very clear. YMMV.


I'm just afraid all the fanboys will associate that thread with the knowledge I share, then bringing there hate to the other thread. I'll stick to the audio threads, that should filter a couple of them out

Fanboys of what? I browsed through your other thread after seeing it mentioned here, and you were definitely being dismissive and at points acting like a jerk. It's a mistake to view this place (or any other anonymous forum) as an echo chamber for your thoughts and ideas, interpreting any disagreement as "hate." If you want advice, ask for it, and don't be surprised if it's not all people blowing sunshine up your ass about how great your ideas are. It's not personal, and acting like it is personal only leads to bad things.

If you would like to be a respected contributor to this forum (or any other), it's pretty simple. If the question asked is technical in nature or otherwise has only one right answer, don't chip in unless you KNOW the answer. Don't turn minor disagreements into major personal battles. Don't let something said by an anonymous stranger that you will likely never meet in real life get under your skin. If you're angry, get up and walk away from the computer. Come back and comment when you're calm. Last, and most important, never do anything on this list (http://www.cracked.com/funny-3809-internet-argument-techniques/).

Bill Fitzmaurice
04-13-2012, 05:23 PM
Granted, my experience is limited, but when working with a system consisting of a set of flown Turbosound tops and Cerwin-Vega folded-horn bins, there was a noticeable difference between having the system time-aligned and not time-aligned. Without the time alignment, the lows sounded flubby and not very clear.That's an odd setup, like caviar and beer. In any event with flown tops and ground stacked subs one would expect the tops to be further away from the listener than the subs, and the path length of C-V horns is way too short to make much difference in that respect. In this case I'd expect that the subs would have needed the delay, otherwise the lows would lead the midbass, mids and highs and that would result in the perception of flabby lows. Perception, because the information that provides the ear/brain with pitch, timbre and definition even in the sub bass comes from the midbass and mids.

DJ Higgumz
04-13-2012, 05:54 PM
Dj penguin- nice name! Yea I read over it again, I'm embarrassed of the posts, I don't get angry much and when I do I act stupid.