Page 1 of 1

panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2018 3:16 pm
by JR.
https://redirect.viglink.com/?format=go ... 0353142%2F

Here is a video of a panel at a recent industry trade with current industry heavyweights.

Tom Danley on the far left is a serious speaker guy making remarkable horn speakers with multiple drivers that seamlessly combine into one point source. Second from the far right David Gunness pioneered some remarkable signal processing to clean up transient time smear and other problems.

Kind of long with few dumb questions in there from the audience but enough good stuff to hold my interest.

Perhaps TMI if you are not a speaker guy. i am not one but understood enough to enjoy it and get some of the inside jokes they bantered back and forth. They are all competitors, but share a common interest in good sound.

JR

Re: panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2018 5:00 pm
by billshurv
Thanks, will take a watch of that if when have some spare minutes. I have a lot of interest in the work that Tom Danley has done. A couple of people have made DIY Synergy horns and they work really well. If I were to build pair of speakers it would be of this type. But first I need a room big enough to actually fit them in!

Re: panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2018 6:17 pm
by JR.
yup TDs speakers are great for listening from a 1/4 mile away. :lol:

I suspect he will eventually get around to making some smaller boxes for the rest of us...

I'll bet he has a righteous home system. 8-)

JR

PS; Gunness is no slough either. It was funny to watch that panel... they probably separated TD and David on purpose, but you could tell from the banter that it was them against the old school.

Re: panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2018 7:38 pm
by billshurv
He did threaten it, but I don't think Tom has much time for the average audiophile :)

Couple of links to Danley inspired DIY designs
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-wa ... tions.html
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-wa ... eaker.html

Other than size there is a lot to like about this approach. The first one btw is heresy to many as doesn't use a compression driver :)

Re: panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2018 10:47 pm
by mediatechnology
Thanks for posting this JR.

I didn't watch the whole thing yet but there was one part where one of the panelists said something to the effect: "Your company made some real crap in those days and so did we." I loved the candor.

I met Paul Klipsch in person during an AES presentation in Dallas where he talked about the Klipsch horn and directivity.
Paul explained directivity with typical back-country Arkansas simplicity: "High frequencies are like a flashlight beam: Low frequencies are like molasses on the kitchen floor."
The visual stuck with me.

This should be just as interesting.

Re: panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2018 9:21 am
by JR.
It was pretty obvious that they were operating at a higher level than most in the audience on the subject, and a couple times had to translate their shorthand comments for the audience. It looked like they were having fun, at least most of them.

====

TD is pretty generous about sharing his wisdom and when he was briefly at loose ends before the founding of his current company a decade ago or more back he shared a group project (folded horn?) subwoofer design free for the sound reinforcement community to use if they had the proclivity to make some saw dust. There is still a forum dedicated to that project and documentation.
https://www.prosoundweb.com/channels/li ... _and_more/

Image These boxes are physically large to deliver good low end but designed so they can even be arrayed (mouths together) in groups of up to 4 for even lower frequency horn tuning.

There are lots of these out in the wild. I haven't built my own speakers since the 70's. Many in the sound reinforcement industry appreciate this simple*** but effective design. I am not very enthusiastic about copies of his commercial designs.

I am glad to consider TD a friend while I haven't even communicated with him for several years, yes he is surely busy. I still bet he has a kickass home system.

JR

*** perhaps not trivial but TD is one guy who can do that math properly.

Re: panel of speaker horn gurus

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2018 8:15 pm
by billshurv
I've come across a couple of people on the internet who use SH50s at home. Too big and too 'different' for most people to get their heads around for domestic use, but I think they are the missing piece of the puzzle in terms of the next steps forwards in reproduction. Last 10 years or so have been good for advances in speaker technology and the trickle down to things we can actually fit through our front doors is slowly happening :)