The Negatron.... (1 Viewer)

[NBPk402]

I am currenly working on building a new Home Theater in Mexico. This one will not be a dedicated HT, but a HT in our living room. Currently I have the following equipment:

AUDIO
Yamaha cxa 5100
Yamaha P2500s (2)
Nobsound mini amps (4)
Xilica xp4080
3 Klipsch K402MEHs with EV DH1A drivers, and Emminence Kappa 15C woofer (2 per speaker)
Klipsch RP160Ms (2 in HT, and 2 on our loft dance floor)
Klipsch RP150Ms for heights
Musical Fidelity Phono preamp
Pro ject RPM Carbon turntable

VIDEO
Samsung 65" 4k
Pioneer bdp 80
XBOX ONE
PS3
MISC
Modified Cisco switch
Dune HD PRO 4k Premium
Dune HD PRO 4K
I7NUC
Asus Mini VIVO
Celeron NUC
SENNHEISER XX6 Headphones
Schiit Magni Heresy headphone amp
Monoprice 12 gauge speaker wire
Hockey puck feet for speakers, and various equipment

IN PROGRESS
Cabinets for the left and right K402MEHs
DIY 6 channel ICEPOWER BTL AMP for the front 3 channels
2 4 channel Icepower amps amps for surrounds and surround rears
DIY bass traps for the front corners

ROOM DIMENSIONS
19' wide
40' long (includes dining room, kitchen, and hallway)
32' high Boveda ceiling (concave)
Walls are 1' thick brick and stucco
Black Contera marble floors
Front wall has 10' tall glass doors, and the left side has 1 glass door
Front wall has 13' tall black stage curtains wall to wall
Left and right wall have 13' tall black stage curtains that are 10' wide

 

[NBPk402]

Some pics of my amp that we are working on...
The amp is made with 3 asx50, and 3 asx125 Icepower amp modules. All are being setup for BTL mode (balanced). The smaller amps will be for the front 3 channel k402MEH horns, and the larger amp modules qill be for the dual 15" woofers in each speaker. Input for the amp will be Neutrik XLRs, output will be Speakons, power will be via 3 Powercon connectors, and on/off will be via 3 power buttons on the front of the amp. We also have 2 LEDs per channel that we will either use to indicate power or maybe 1 watt of output (If I can figure out how to do this). We are powering up the amp this way so we can individually power on or off. The amp will not be done for another 60 to 90 days as we are awaiting the screw type Neutrik XLRs to arrive from Ghent Audio.

 

[NBPk402]

Fired up the new amp tonight and it sounds great. Tomorrow I will make a couple of new power cables, and 2 more speakon cables. Then I will use it until I get around to setting up the LEDs.

 

[NBPk402]

Just got the 2nd cabinet back from my carpenter.

 

[NBPk402]

I will be doing some upgrading over the next few months...

Ordered:
Minidsp ddrc88m (never should have sold the 2 I had in my last HT)
2 Pass ACA stereo/mono amps

Diy projects:
2 2' x 2' MEHs modeled from the small side of my k402 MEHs. These will use the same drivers, but the horn will be made of MDF.

Selling:
4 Klipsch rp160Ms
Musical Fidelity MX VYNL phono preamp
Yamaha CXA 5100 preamp
Xilica xp4080 crossover
Some Icepower asx20btl, and asx125SE/BTL amp modules
Dune HD PRO 4K PLUS media player

 

[NBPk402]

Today a friend of mine helped me get our valances completed.

 

[NBPk402]

New woofers for the MEHs have arrived and they dig deeper than the kappa 15Cs do. I also did some sanding on my MEH plaques for the speakers. Also some measurements.

 

[NBPk402]

I hope to have at least one pair of the MINI MEHs completed (at least the horn part), by the end of January...as I have 2 clamping molds ready. I also am building a full size MEH out of wood...just like the MINI but full size. In addition... I have one k402 horn left and will be building an identical cabinet to my k402 MEH center channel for it (the center and the identical original will become surrounds most likely...I have to complete all of them and see where I like them best, as the left and rights have angled sides...as will the new wood versions).

The current plan is to have 7 MEHs in the room...4 made from original k402s, 1 made from wood (full size), and 2 mini MEHs also from wood.

 

[NBPk402]

Speaker progress is delayed a bit. I stopped it because a friend was supposed to do some metalwork on my cases... I figured while the amps were down is the perfect time to reconfig the amps. Well it has been 3 weeks now, and some parts I ordered and paid for were cancelled by the seller for the mods, with other parts enroute...my friend who for 3 weeks has been delaying the metal working, and decide with COVID he does want anyone conducting business with him. So I had to come up with another way to get the modifications done, and I decided to mix and match all my amps with aluminum, and mahogany wood.

So today I went to another friend's house to work on the wood portions. We now have all the wood pieces cut for all the amps (next week we will be making the wood front and back panels for the Roon Server/endpoint).

 

[NBPk402]

Today I sold 1 of my DDRC88Ms, and my Yamaha cxa5100 AVP, and ordered a Marantz av8805a...now I can have more channels and also Auro3d.

 

[NBPk402]

Update: I have come up with a new design for a rack inside of a cabinet. The new design will keep all the equipment concealed, free of dust (I know it will not be 100% free of dust, but it will be considerably better than my current setup), and will provide cooling . The rack shelves are made of 1 1/4" wide steel plate that has been cut, welded, and painted with charcoal grey metallic automotive paint by a body shop. The rack shelves are completed and each of the metal rack shelves will be supported by 7 1 1/4" Parota wood rods. each of the rods has a 1/4' 3" long piece of allthread, attached via threaded inserts on each end of the rods. 1st step for assembly will be to attach each of the 7 rods the topside of the bottom of the cabinet via 7 1/4" allthread and then 7 hockey pucks swill be attached to the bottom of the cabinet. once this is done, I will lay 1 metal shelf on top of the 7 Parota rods, and then lay a 1" thick Parota wood shelf on top of the metal shelf. Next, I will screw the next 7 rods through the metal shelf to the 1st layer of 7 Parota wood rods... then I will keep doing this until all 4 shelves and the top and bottom Parota is completed. Then we will measure the distance from the top of the bottom piece of the cabinet to the bottom of the top piece of the cabinet (for the construction ofslatted panels).. The front and sides will be made of 1 Parota wood frame that has black grill cloth attached to it, and then 1x1 strips of Perota wood will be run vertically with each piece separated by approximately 1". I have not decided if i want the rear to also have slats or just a frame with grill cloth, yet. The cabinet will be a bit over 6' wide x 4' high, by 28" deep. I will also be installing LED lighting facing downward from the top of the cabinet.

The end of the month we will be building a pair of Joseph Crowe subwoofers. The cabinets will be made of plywood and then wrapped with 1" Parota wood. Sometime next moth they subs should be ready for testing, and then the cabinets will be sent to my carpenter to mod with Parota wood.

Then the long awaited MEH wood horns will be started. The first 1 or 2 will be made of MDF stacked layers, and if they come out as expected, I will try 2 or 3 of them out of stacked Parota wood. The MDF versions will be painted to match the charcoal grey shelves. The last part of the the horns will be to try them cabinet less, and if i like them that way they will be complete...if not I will make cabinets out of MDF for the 2 MDF horns and paint them to match the MDF MEH. Then I will look at how the Parota horns look with a mdf cabinet. If the contrast looks nice I will most likely stop there.

 

[NBPk402]

A few pics of one of the new shelves. The wood will rest on top of the metal piece...pic is for measuring where the holes for the uprights will go.
The long open slot is the rear of the rack and is for wiring.

 

[NBPk402]

Test assembled today...next I am having more dowels made (this time some 7") so I can reduce the height a bit before the cabinet sides are made. then I can have 12 component which each component having its own shelf, and the remaining components will share shelves. next will be the cabinet doors, sides and rear pieces. ventilation will be concealed and flow front to rear.

 

[NBPk402]

Update...new f20 subs to be used for a 3 way MEH. New Mesquite amp cases and Celestion axi2050 compression drivers coming next week. Quick REW autotune with my old compression drivers....blue channel is right channel and autotune was not done, just crossover set.