Update on my A26s. I moved my system to a smaller room (~ 12 x 14.5’) and now get greater extension when running the A26s full-range. In my larger room, they didn’t extend low enough to forego a sub. Also, I switched out the 15ohm resistors for the 12ohm. This produces a better balance in the smaller room which is contrary to what I expected. I continue to be impressed by the value of these speakers, much more so in the smaller room. Magnepan .7s and Vandersteen 1Cis were what I considered the best values in <$1500 speakers, but in smaller rooms, that honor rolleyes to the A26. Caveat being that modifications to the standard kit are required.
The big question I still have is how does Madison’s A26 compare to the original Dyna A25. Has anybody compared them? I have a nice pair of A25’s that I use in my den. I have wondered if the A26 kit would be an improvement but I haven’t seen any comments about how they compare.
I had the A25 recapped along the A26. the A26 are in another realm of SQ. The A25 are good decent budget speakers. The A26 are a modern speaker. the treble is SOTA, the mid is excellent and the bass will make most 2-way sound ball-less. The A26 do share the same coherency and naturalness of the original. This is due to their first order xo i suspect. Make sense, I run my A26 without subs and I dont feel like im missing anything in the bass. its only really the last octavve (20hz-40hz) that the A26 would benefit from a sub. I also ended up with the 12 ohm (no toe in).
Yes, fortunately, the tweeters are of such high quality that I can tolerate the higher treble energy more than I can with most speakers. Dynaudio’s Esotar has nothing on this tweeter.
There's quite a bit of discussion on larger enclosures here as well as on diyaudio. Do any of you have firsthand experience dropping the A26 kit into larger volume cabs?
no but i have designed and built speaker enclosures for other projects and ran the numbers on these woofers. madisound sells the woofer as a stand alone driver and has all of the required acoustic parameters for it. using any available online enclosure calculator or spreadsheet and the provided acoustic properties you can predict bass response based on sealed or ported enclosure and enclosure volume as a variable
I'm planning on doing this early next year. In the link I supplied above, user planet10 actually provides some blueprints for larger enclosures. The intent of my question was not to force you to "prove it", but just that I'm eager to hear firsthand listening impressions. BTW Avanti, I'm also in Chicago and also running some Pass gear (although mine is a DIY F5 and none of the Pass Labs variants)
No, neither if ordered with the cabinets. The cabinets are made by Source Technologies in Connecticut. The kit comes with crimp-on spades but they’re a little finicky. I used Mil-spec butt splices to join the wiring to the capacitors and used solder to connect the other end of the capacitors to the binding post terminals. You can instead run a short strip of wire between the binding post terminals and capacitors, using spades on the end that connect to the binding post, and a butt splice between the other wire end and capacitor lead. I don’t know how they perform if put together with strict adherence to the original design, however, the pair I built doesn’t do scale any better than my Spendors. They actually sound a bit smaller and don’t dig nearly as deep. My pair that’s packed full of GR Research’s No-Rez material probably has similar scale to your Harbeths. Less damping material would probably improve that aspect but possibly at the cost of midrange clarity.
That went over my head as I'm unfamiliar with most of the terms used here. But if it's a single jigsaw puzzle type of assembly, it'll be easy to figure out. Internal construction isn't something I'm especially fussy about; only the end result, in this case the sound. If soldering is merely optimal but everything can nevertheless be assembled in a tool-less fashion, that's perfect. I was more concerned about the ability to switch resistors, though it seems the 12 ohms (default) ones are preferred in most cases anyway.
The resistor is simply a matter of screwing it between the upper and lower binding posts as you would a factory jumper/bridge. In theory, the only tools you need to complete the project are a screwdriver, a decent crimp tool, a wire stripper, and something to cut the driver gasket material. I should forewarn you that I believe my heavily damping the cabinet and back-wave of the mid-woofer is the main reason my pair can compete with British monitors in the midrange. The standard kit would most certainly have been inferior in that regard.
All I can say is at first, stock, the Seas A26 are great. With a simple Roxul safe and sound 4 inch thick covering the entire back wall, midrange is seriously improved. Pretty sure the "no-res" is about the same acoustic principle? maybe it adds some damping to the cab All in all, I feel the main "mod" the stock cab need is simply absorption of the back wall. That said, I think the bbc mids are slightly better, but the treble is not, here the A26 win easy and the bass is a tie. not bad for a 1k speaker that compete with 3, 4, 5 k speaker. not sure id take my previous LS5/9 over the A26.
I don't know. It has ~ 1" of fairly dense open-cell foam bonded to the bituminous layer. In addition to the No-Rez on all sides of the cabinet (except front baffle), I added 3 layers of the kit-supplied foam to the rear baffle to damp the back wave. That improved the midrange clarity considerably. However, I do think all that foam robbed the speakers of some bass extension.
without the foam is the midrange too hot (midrange reflects off of rear baffle and back through the driver cone) or too much bass and warmth obscuring the sound?
I think it's too much reflection off the rear baffle. It wasn't a tonal balance issue but a clarity/realism issue.
never tried these but many people in mobile audio swear by them or try to duplicate the concept DIY. i wonder if many speakers could sound better by breaking up standing and internally reflected waves by other than the typical poly batting or foam. if your bass is losing extention it might be because added foam increases theoretical cabinet volume and may be out of whack with the tuning of the ap vent. 12″ Deflex PowerPads | Product Catalog
Fun thread and hopefully will get more people interested in DIY'ng, whether it 's speakers or electronics. I've built my share of speakers over the years and until recently the back deck, a Workmate, and a used $70 Ryobi table saw was my "shop". Electronics bench is still a folding buffet table in the spare bedroom. You get a $50 circle jig from Parts Express and a $50 router anywhere and you're set. You don't even need a bunch of expensive clamps, just drywall screws. I do agree with Avanti1960 that many DIY designs can benefit from larger sealed cabinets, assuming the T-S parameters work out. The more gradual roll-off of bass is more pleasing to my ears. Not long ago I acquired a pair of 12" woofers, V12RXC2 that were all over Ebay for $20 per and, depending on who you believe, are either Utah made by Altec or Altec made by Utah. Cheap stamped baskets, a smallish motor and paper cone combine for 95dB efficiency. I put them in 2.5 cu. ft. sealed cabinets with the wonderful SB Acoustics SB Acoustics SB29RDAC-C000-4 Ring Dome Tweeter SB Acoustics SB29RDAC-C000-4 Ring Dome Tweeter which is 93dB and has an Fs of 600 Hz. A .5mH coil on the woofer and just a cap on the tweet for a 2200Hz crossover. Simple. They sound great if not nearly as refined as my 4Pis. Helluvalot of fun to build, too.