Heres a render of one tower idea. . . (1 Viewer)

[Ron D Core]

Hey everyone! I’ve been reading and posting in this forum for about a month and I couldn’t think of another place with so much helpful info Anyways, I wanted to share my idea with everyone so I could get some feedback and helpful criticism as well. I already have all the drivers but the subs which I plan to order with a couple weeks. The mids and highs consist of two Focal 8V5411’s, two NV 4242’s and one TC90TDXB tweeter per speaker. I haven’t decided on crossover points yet, but I know the 8’s will go down to about 70 Hz with maybe 3rd or 4th order crossovers. All crossovers will be Linkwitz Rileys. Each BPD 1201 will be run by a PE 250w plate amp. I just ordered those on sale The mains will be run with about 100 watts rms. The tweeter will be flush mounted. What do you think? Should the 8’s be included in the D’Apollito configuration, or should they just sit below everything else? I’d like to keep the tweeter about 3.5 feet from the base.

 

[Cam S]

Ron, those are absolutely incredible looking speakers, my god!!!! Are those actual pics of the speakers or are they rendered, because I can't tell!

I hope you have LOTS of pics when you start building them!

Is the one on the left finished in a chestnut burl???

 

[Ron D Core]

I made them in 3D Studio Max 4. They one on the left is just a burl oak bitmap. I doubt I would actually use oak burl though.

 

[Ron D Core]

I dont know how it would be done, but the JMLabs look may have its advantages.

 

[Cam S]

I still can't get over how good those things really look!!

How much do all the drivers cost?? I'm guessing this is an all out speaker?

 

[Ron D Core]

Yeah you can say that, im trying to keep the whole project under $2000 which shouldn't be a problem. The Focals ran almost $700 and the BPD's are $91 each. I know the kind of sound im looking for and I know how to it. In the end, I'm confident that they will sound like they cost 3 times as much as I payed for them. Ill end up spending the next two or three months playing with ideas and experimenting before I actually have a finished product. I have give myself something to do over the summer other than work

 

[Chris Tsutsui]

U sure u want the tweeter in the middle and not higher? I would do more r&d before investing $2000 on a loudspeaker design.

How about separates, like one tower for the tweeter and mids, the other tower for the woofer/sub. Then you can adjust their position to change the soundstage.

Just looks a bit bunched in one tower.

Nice rendering btw.

 

[Ron D Core]

Well I know how the drivers sound already. Thats why I picked them. The tweeter should be pretty much level wich the listener's ears. In this case right where they are at 42 inches high is just right IMO. Just remember how tall these are, they are about 5 1/2 feet tall. They are monsters man. The scale is very close. But yeah my plan is to build a number of test boxes and woofer boxes, some separate and some in the same encloser to get something satisfactory. As far as sound stage is concerned, I just want to maintain the point source illusion through the tweeter in the middle configuration. My main goal is LOTS of sound. I want it well balanced with a wide dynamic range, and very articulated. These drivers are very capable of that.

 

[Jeff Rosz]

hello ron,
looks good. whats the front to back dimension on those towers? have a tuning point in mind for the sub section? the reason i ask (maybe its just hard to tell in the rendering) is because it looks as though the port tube and the sub driver would be intersecting. i know its just prelim stuff but that kinda caught my eye.

 

[Hank Frankenberg]

Given the critical nature of subwoofer placement, you might consider putting those drivers in one or two separate cabinets that you could move to an optimum location. Then, you're free of vibration-induced coloration of your bass and midrange and could really optimize the towers with thicker walls, more bracing, etc.

 

[Ron D Core]

For the subs, I plan to to have the low pass around 60-70 hz. I have considered the satellite sub route, but I will be putting these a small room. Yeah these things will be way too big for the room in the first place to get full potential out of them. I wouldn't be able to to have the satellite subs and towers on the same side of the room. As far as the dimensions is concerned, this should give you a good idea of there size, that guy is 6ft tall. I'll render a semi satellite sub idea.

 

[Dave Poehlman]

What's the interior going to look like? I assume the sub will be chambered separately from the other drivers.

Perhaps you could offset the tweeters to break up standing waves on the baffle front?

I think those look great!

 

[NickSo]

Holy crap, Im in drafting right now working with 3D Studio Max, and ugh it looks like crap lol...
Damn, those are NICE! Photorealistic!

 

[Ron D Core]

I figured something sort of like this for the interior...

I plan on doing pretty much the entire box with a 1" + .75" MDF with an extra thick baffle. The interior dividers will be 1"MDF I may put some cross bracing in the sub side, I'll make it up as I go along, as with most other things. All the walls will be lined with Dynamat and acoustic foam. I will just play with Polyfill until it sounds right. The sub/port placement could be played with as well when the time comes I guess. And as far as the tweeter baffle goes, the Focals have an inverted dome and don't display the same diffraction, and baffle step characteristics as most other tweeters, so it will do ok as is. But I guess I could expirement with it alittle with some scrap wood. Speaking of drafting, I have a drafting final in 5 minutes!

 

[Demetri K]

It's all in the textures and lighting!!! That design looks sweet though!! good luck with it!!!!

 

[Ron D Core]

The more I think about it, the more I lean closer to the idea of using satellite woofers for the flexibility and ease of design.

 

[Brian Bunge]

The more I think about it, the more I lean closer to the idea of using satellite woofers for the flexibility and ease of design.

Not to mention that you'd need to add a lot of bracing to the enclosure based on the cut away pic you've provided above. But damn, those do look good!

 

[Seth_L]

Did you want to be able to move them? 1.75" thick MDF in a speaker that large will be very heavy. Something on the order of nearly 200 lbs each.

Seth

 

[Jon Hancock]

Very nice looking renders, a lot prettier than what I get out of AutoCAD!

You've got a pretty nice shot at a great speaker, here.

A point to consider, I think you may have problems with finding a low restriction 90 degree bend for your port. Also, a 12" woofer ought to be run with a minimum of a 4" port with flares, but 6" would be better. It might be worthwhile to consider using 2" spikes or lifts to get the cabinet off the floor, and exit the port through the bottom. This will also help supress upper midrange port resonance, besides giving you more freedom in the port diameter and length.

The crossover is going to be a "fun" project in itself, as that's a lot of crossover points to deal with. Usually I don't do multiway with anything less than four octaves on the midrange driver, which helps avoid interaction with the LP and HP networks. The first cone mode for the 8V5411 is just under 1 kHz, so you may want a somewhat lower crossover, so that it can be adequately attenuated. The 5411 and your "subs" should be crossed over where they will have close to an octave of clean overlap in performance so that the electrical crossover will dominate; otherwise, you'll have integration problems. 70 Hz may be a little low, since you'd want them flat to more than half an octave below that. Maybe with juggling the chamber size of the 8's and the Fs and Qtc, it will work out.

Actaully, I don't agree with the idea of separating the bass and mid units; it creates more problems with integration, and you will usually find that placement such as Cardas recommends works well throughout the bass and low midrange- from one location. If you don't plan on having these well out away from the walls, then you'll need to give some thought to how you adjust the baffle step compensation to work with the positioning you decide to use.

Good luck with your project this summer, and let us know how it develops and turns out.

Regards,

Jon

 

[Ron D Core]

Thanks for all the comments guys. When it comes to size and weight, I'm not too concerned, I have friends I would make help me out I think what I will end up doing, is playing with the numbers and some test enclosures until i get a desirable performance. I'll then draw up an isometric view in Microstation or AutoCAD of the real thing and re-post it to see what everyone thinks.