High Efficiency 4 way speaker project

[ADPully]

After owning a bastanis setup for a few years I fancied a change so earlier this year I invested in some GPA 390-16 midband Compression Drivers. For HF I have some RAAL lazy ribbons. Bass is Open Baffle 2 x 15" Hawthorne Augies. I have just got the system running.
At the moment FR duties are divid out

Augie bass 20Hz -380Hz -Active via a Behringer DCX2496
GPA Midband - 380Hz - 7Khz
Lazy Ribbon Treble 7KHz - 25Khz

Apart from a bit of volume levelling and the odd crossover tweek the bass and treble of my new arrangement are reasonably well sorted. But the midband is all all a bit naked and ragged sounding, decent enough and showing real potential but of course its meant to have a horn on the front . In terms of efficient speaker systems I have past experience at home with Bastanis, Avantegarde, KHorn and Hedlunds and this (I hope) will stand me in good stead.
I have read anecdotally that its best to use the midband driver as low as possible so initially I am looking at some very large midband horns. I do have concerns that my 16 x 12 room wont be large enough but I wont really know until I try.

I am currently in progress of sourcing these and hope to have a few sets to compare in the next week or two.

[paulf-2007]

nice andy, keep us posted, be interesting to see the horns and what they cost. Want to share info regarding supplier and cost?

[ADPully]

Update - Ive ended up sourcing two maybe different horns. One set arrived today - Multicells MDF jobbies from ebay - Very impressed so far with these.
They look like this.

Approx 600mm x 400mm front footprint. I would call them very domestically workable
Tomorrow all being well with citylink I have some larger 760mm x 600mm open type midband horns from a now closed Imax theatre arriving arriving for me to try.
However unfortunately it looks I will most likely not get home to try them until friday evening.

In terms of the sound quality these new horns were were very plug and play. I went through the whole evening not feeling that I needed to change the FR balance at all. That said I an sure there are minor tweeks will improve things further. Compared with no front horn the whole sound stage now projects out much better in the room now, the upper bass has filled out, a slight feeling of occasional piercing has disappeared and overall there is a real sense of homogeneousness going on. The output volume available from my 1.5w amp simply put is just staggering - I was listening to things very loud maybe the loudest ever in my den and still there clearly was plenty of headroom left on the amp. I am very pleased I did not win a second Transcendent SE OTL I was bidding on that sold on ebay yesterday.

[gthang]

Multicells horns look cool they remind me of concerts and nightclubs. Are you going to paint them?
I'm looking forward to having a listen to this Andy

[anubisgrau]

uberkul, and you are probably safe from a poor hf response of multicells with RAALs.

now you need proper bass bins - onken or VOTT to boogie!

[speedysteve]

Great. There is something scientific about multicells isn't there. They look so purposeful.
Looking forward to seeing the midband horns.

[ADPully]

Gordan hi, You may be correct on this. I have had a listen to some large bass bins with 15"ers in they are very good I could end up there for sure.
OB bass is lots softer than a large cab but is cheap to get sorted but does play a nice tune for starters.

[ADPully]

Graham - I hope you can find the time to pop around this coming weekend?

[anubisgrau]

can you let us know more about these multicells and how's the craftmanship? i too noticed them on ebay but wasn't entirely convimced from the pics. also i'm not sure about the mdf thickness though this may not be an issue once they are sand filled. however the price was good so it was worth trying. for me personally the multicells rank the highest on the scale of horn fetishism along with sato horns and just looking at them (if not doing too many things wrong and they probably don't if used on a narrow, lowmid to midrange) would be a great joy. btw they are made by the same guy who made 18-cells for romy in his S3 fed low mid channel

[paulf-2007]

Hi Andy, what frequencies you running through the multicells

[SMEagol]

wow they are the nuts. did the cash arrive okay? Sent Saturday...

[ADPully]

Paul - Only up to 7k max
Gordan - I will post better pictures at the weekend and measure a few thicknesses for you - My impression is the build quality is very good they guy was a cabinet maker and they are made from thick enough material and ribbed when needed to be decently stable. He even made up prior to me winning the auction some non standard 1.4" adaptors Im delighted with them.

Actually I was wondering if the maker might be prepared to try his hand at some MDF conicals?

[ADPully]

Chris just checked - yep money arrived today

[SMEagol]

Right, I'm off down the One Pound Bakery then...

[AmDismal]

Actually I was wondering if the maker might be prepared to try his hand at some MDF conicals?

I saw the listings for the multicells, and was tempted a few times! Be good to have some proper contact with the maker, if I do decide to get something like them, especially if he can make other stuff. It's good to have contacts of mad people willing to make mad things for mad horn lovers!

[ADPully]

Since I have a foot in - I will make a point of contacting the guy and let you know.
Arrggh Im away from home tonight and the Imax cinema midband horns have arrived at pully towers.
Im hoping they will work out OK also.
Im now planning to skulk off from work early tommorrow at 3pm -Im desp to try all these horns out

[paulf-2007]

whats the cut off at the lower end.

Paul - Only up to 7k max
Gordan - I will post better pictures at the weekend and measure a few thicknesses for you - My impression is the build quality is very good they guy was a cabinet maker and they are made from thick enough material and ribbed when needed to be decently stable. He even made up prior to me winning the auction some non standard 1.4" adaptors Im delighted with them.

Actually I was wondering if the maker might be prepared to try his hand at some MDF conicals?

[anubisgrau]

i believe that altec multicells these are build upon ( 1505 i think) are 300hz or so - i've been in touch with the guy who built these and he can custom built anything though he wasn't keen on bigger, 18-cells than can be loaded lower as he had plenty of problems when he built them from plywood. i think you are safe from at least 450hz on with these, though you dont fully exploit a low mid potential of the altec driver that can be loaded lower for a home app...

[ADPully]

Paul - Wot he said

[ADPully]

Next up the Imax horns. Ha, they dwarf the multi cells. The guy selling these quoted the size 30" x 24" which is 762 x 610 they actually measure up at 810 x 681 long short they appear quite a lot bigger than I had in my minds eye. They are very workable for me and to Gordans point above they clearly will exploit more of the driver lower frequency range.
Its been a bit middle of the roadsville Arizona recently at pully towers so Im pleased have a little genuine nonsence going on.
This was a joint venture with a fellow wammer who may fess up at some point.