Another video of Seawave Accoustics horn speaker. Nice sound! I may try to have a chance to audition this speaker when I visit Korea next year.
Very nice. The speakers at 29:30 would have been part of an RCA PG-140 series system—which included everything required for theater sound, from projector soundhead to speaker. Field-coil drivers, horns, and more start on page 11 of this RCA catalog. Unlike WE, RCA is achievable by mere mortals—with mid/high-frequency horns and compression drivers (permanent magnet models, anyway) regularly showing up on eBay and audio sites. Bass horns are another story … but bass horns are always another story.
Gotta be honest here, @thomaskong … I don’t know whether these guys sound more arrogant or more lost. Or maybe it’s a language thing. Is there a better translation (or interpretation) available? Or does one need to make such ridiculous claims in order to justify a $130K price tag?
I knocked together some temporary horn/driver platforms this weekend in order to experiment with a pair of repro Klangfilm tractrix horns made of “artificial stone” by (the former) Stereolab in Munich. I’ve had these horns for ages … probably since reading this report by Joe Roberts (of Sound Practices fame): I’ve never really done much with them, though—until now. Here’s my little weekend project: Building blocks for the platforms are from the optomechanical field. Once you accumulate enough of these pieces, you end up with a big kid’s Erector Set—super-fun! Horns have 2” throats, so out came the JBL 2441. Excellent driver with an exit angle that’s copacetic with the tractrix flare rate (as per Bruce Edgar). This is the HF horn that was used in the Klangfilm Eurodyn and Bionor theater systems. (I believe. My Klangfilm history probably isn’t what it should be.) I tried this new top end in a few different configurations relative to the midbass horn—which required time aligning top and bottom (digitally) with each change. I ended up preferring the 2441/Klangfilm combo oriented much lower than I thought I would (left-hand photo)—but, that’s where it integrated best. Meanwhile, Otto (on right) was like, “damn, this horn is smooooth. Joe Roberts was right!” (Seriously, his assigning these to the “stratosphere of horns” is probably warranted … they’re really good.) @Larry I or @Salectric (or anyone else in the know, obviously) … does Deja Vu dip into the Klangfilm realm—or are they pretty exclusively focused on American and Japanese gear? Joe Roberts is obviously from the DC area, so it wouldn’t surprise me if there were some local influence down your way. Whatever the case, Klangfilm remains pretty mysterious to most of us here in the US. Anyway, just another possibility for anyone looking to experiment with their top end…
@Jim Hodgson I can’t say I have ever seen or heard any mention of Klangfilm horns at DejaVu. I suspect there just aren’t enough units in the US. As you know there’s a finite number of all these vintage horns and drivers; there’s no way for the supply to keep up with demand.
David Karmeli might be able to help. He has a good set of Bionors that went via Germany to Japan, and are now here in the States. Happy to put you in touch with him once the holiday gloss is over. The fact that you have these parts laying around in "inventory" is pretty cool in my book....
@Jim Hodgson With all of our modern technology, you would think it wouldn’t be difficult to make horns and drivers that would be exactly the same as ones from the 1930s to 1960s. Forget trying to surpass the originals, just make an exact replica. Unfortunately this must be a lot harder than it appears. GIP is an exception. They made careful studies of the 555 and came up with replicas that by most accounts are just as good as a WE original. However, I understand they tried but were unable to duplicate the sound of the 713 permanent magnet driver. Line Magnetic also makes a replica of the 555 but it hasn’t had as favorable reaction as the GIP. Horns are also problematic. A number of enthusiasts have made replicas of WE classics, both metal and wood models, but few claim their modern build sounds the same as an original. I have been following the efforts of a couple people who are making replicas using 3d printers. The horns look authentic but it’s hard to see how they could sound the same as a metal horn with the same dimensions. In post-war Japan, YL made a number of unique horns and all of the ones I’ve heard sound excellent. DejaVu tried to build a replica of one of the best models using the same materials and dimensions but Vu says it didn’t sound as good as the original so the project was shelved. I really don’t know why originals from decades ago would sound better than a carefully engineered replica made today. I don’t think engineers back then knew more than we do today and they weren’t mystical geniuses who had some secret sauce to make good sound. And materials science wasn’t more advanced back then. So I just don’t understand why some older units (not all) sound so good, but they do.
I know about zero concerning other vintage stuff like WE and RCA. But, it is my understanding that some of these bass horns were made of paper mache and not even metal.
@SandAndGlass I am not sure what paper mache consists of but the WE 6368 horn which I heard recently is made of a paper/fiber/resin material. Somewhat fragile I suspect and it looks odd, but it sounds great.
Deja Vu does not work with Klangfilm horns. They work almost entirely with vintage US and Japanese horns and compression drivers. They work with some currently manufactured woofers and G.I.P. reproduction drivers. G.I.P. only makes replicas of field coil drivers. They do not make permanent magnet reproductions. Supposedly, they tried to make permanent magnet Western Electric drivers but they did not meet G.I.P's standards. As Salectric mentioned, YL use to make great sounding drivers and horns. These are not replicas, but they are inspired by Western Electric. When it comes to compact and practical horns, it is hard to find anything that matches the YL gear. Given how big and impractical the design of the Western Electric 15A horn, I've heard several clones that sound remarkably good. There are some clones of 22A horns out there and some of them are good sounding too. Someone in France makes a clone of the 13 or 14 horn, which is remarkable because they are gigantic and made of many complex pieces of wood (I have not seen nor heard these).
Thanks, @Bill Hart … I’d appreciate that. In particular, I’d like to get his take on the slight mismatch that occurs when a typical 2” driver (with 49mm diameter exit) is connected to the 2” Klangfilm horn (with 52mm diameter throat). I guess if you’re going to be off one way or the other, that’s the right direction to be off (i.e., narrower exit —> wider throat entrance would be preferred to the reverse). But, 3mm may be too big a step in such a crucial area. Which highlights a real issue with repro horns and drivers, right? Oftentimes the connections involve something proprietary or at least non-standard. Doesn’t do you much good to obtain an unobtainable horn when the only driver that fits correctly proves to be even more unobtainable. I’d also like to get his opinion on matching one of the large format TAD compression drivers to the Klangfilm horn. Those drivers are not affordable for me as an experiment … they’d have to be a pretty sure bet. My concern stems from reading (years ago—details forgotten) that the TAD drivers’ exit angle is problematic on Edgar’s round tractrix horns; not sure what that implies for the Klangfilm version. As my only experience with anything YL, I had a pair of 1800G tweeters a few years ago. But, one of the diaphragms had been damaged in shipping, so I never heard them as they should have been. Pretty little things that seemed to integrate very easily. I’d love to try them (or similar) again. Beyond that, I guess the larger horns show up on HiFiDo and other Japanese sites once in a while. Shipping charges are a harsh reality, though. Not to mention the issue I highlighted above: how to mate a driver I might already have (e.g., 1”, 1.4”, or 2” in various bolt patterns) to a horn that may not conform to one of those standard throat measurements and that typically wants a threaded driver with an unknown (to me) thread count/pitch?
@Jim Hodgson I do appreciate the problems in sourcing vintage drivers and horns especially from foreign countries. Too much demand for a limited supply. As for the hole-matching dilemma, you may find that can be resolved with adaptors. For example, a few years ago I wanted to try my previous YL drivers (D3500) which have a 1" threaded throat on an Altec 32 horn instead of the YL horn. I found some aluminum throat adaptors at Parts Express which were a close fit for the YL drivers. The threads were not an exact match but at least I was able to try the different horn. Later I tried the same adaptor plates on WE 32A horns which have a different mounting hole pattern. No problem---the adaptor plates are aluminum and it was easy to drill new holes. Your question about drivers and horns with different throat diameters also ties into this. The WE horns have a .7" throat whereas the YL D3500 has a 1" throat. For what it's worth, I didn't notice any problems with this mismatch. I only used that setup for an hour or two so perhaps I would have noticed something with longer term listening, but with that caveat I would be surprised if a 3mm mismatch caused you any grief.
When using the Altec 902 or 908 driver on a small format Altec horn there is a 1/8" mismatch as well. The 802,806 and 808 drivers have a 1" exit to match those horns perfectly. The 902 and 908 drivers have a 7/8" exit. So to use 902 drivers on 811 horns I machined 3/4" thick adapter plates with the hole going from 7/8" to 1", the flare angle matched very well. BillWojo
I didn't realize that the 902/908 drivers had a smaller exit. I never paid any attention (I have them both on the 511B horns). Since these are standard Altec horns and drivers, I wonder why they would build them in that manner?
That's a good question, I suspect the flair angle was more important to the engineers that the exit diameter. If you compare the length of a 802 driver to a 902 driver it's about 3/4" longer on the 802. And that's what my adapters are thickness wise to my 902 to get the exit opened up to 1" and it seemed to match the flair angle on the 902 horn. Another interesting tidbit, the hard to find 909 drivers used on the smaller MantaRay horns has a 1" exit despite being a 900 series driver. Those 909 drivers sounded pretty damn good when bolted to a set of 32 bent horns. How much of that is due to the special aluminum diaphragms used in them is up to question. These were tested on top of a A7 cabinet at my buddy's house. We were both smiling! For home use I always remove the bug screens, not likely to get a hornets nest in my house. BillWojo
I had the 802 driver in the home A7-500-W version and the 808-8A in my original A7's, back 50-years ago. I took immediate notice in the overall change of design on the 902/908 drivers. I considered that it may like the upgraded counter weights for tone arms. Instead of longer cylinders, they are made of a heavier metal, are shorter and taller. A friend of mine brought me a pair of NOS 811B horns and some kind of drivers from the 800 series. These are completely brand new, maybe the only ones now in existence? The drivers have no identification on them whatsoever. I'm guessing that Altec made them for an OEM use?
More than likely they were made for a OEM or even used in a Altec speaker. They were cutting cost as they neared the end and stuff like decals were just an added expense. It would be interesting to see what diaphragms are in those drivers. That could tell you what the model is. The Altec PN starts with 319xxxxx if I remember correctly. When they went to the ceramic magnet 900 series the entire motor was redesigned, to retain the 1" outlet and keep the same flair angle they would have needed to add 3/4" to the length of the driver. That would have added to the cost. From what I have read on Altec history, the bean counters started having more say in the designs than the engineers. At that point JBL took hold of the pro market and Altec never recovered. BillWojo
True, but there were many factors involved. PA systems changed over the years from metal horns, like University, used in ballparks to larger systems, driven a lot by rock concerts in the late 60's. In the 70's we began to see a growth of other companies entering into the act. Altec products were used at Disneyland and at Disney World during the 70's. They had also developed a large diverse product line. Altec boards, were used in the armed forces radio stations, like in the movie, Good Morning Veitnam. Many things, including mostly market changes, effected the company. It had grown too large. When the Vietnam War ended, the government was no longer buying this equipment. JBL was gaining a hold in control rooms with their studio monitors, which before was almost exclusively Altec’s domain. Tubes were being replaced by SS products which required completely new engineering. Shure was selling a lot of mikes and PA systems for portable and small club use. The SM7 was introduced in the mid 70's and fast became a fixture in studios. Altec's market was high quality large cabinet theater speakers. As the 70's progressed, that market was changing. Theaters were now being found in shopping mall's where space was at a premium. There was no longer large spaces behind movie theater screens for large Altec cabinets. Disco's tore through the nation in the late 70's. The demand was not for high quality sound as it was for loud sound. This included sound beyond what traditional 2-way PA systems offered. Huge bass subwoofer cabinets were being used in clubs, along with super tweeters like JBL. Traditional Altec products and their markets were being left behind...
Natasha ask me "What you are gonaa do now?" I may do some tube rolling depending on my mood and music. With RCA 805 tubes in Line Magnetic 508, it sounds fast and lively with sharp focus. But with National Union 805, it could sound slightly softer. Although Altec A7 can do boogie without subwoofer, Scaena two 18 inch subwoofers seems to add more solid foundation. I am using Papc1 active croosover. The source is ripped CD stored in Cocktail Audio x50d. It goes through Denafris Gaia DDC and then to Dave and Mscaler. I use Dave and pre and Dac. Both Scaena subwoofers and basshorn of Altec A7 are driven by two separate Crown XLS 2502. Fostex supertweeter got connected at 9k hz using 2.2 uf Mundorf oil capacitor. The nice thing of Altec A7 and Scaena subwoofer combination is that I can play music loud as I want without any dynamic constraint.
