new living voice prototype horns

Hi Joel

Check these out .

 

Ah. I like it. The appartment looks French, somehow... Anyway, those amps also look like they are WE. Rare, highly sought-after and very expensive beasts... The woofers in the wall are a bit wimpy looking, though (although in the context of the room they are probably exactly what's needed).
Here's a page of ALE horniness. Enjoy

 

It seems to me there are two approaches in the rise to these highly efficient loudspeakers. The first approach expressed by the living voice and the traditional Altec way of 2 or 3 way horns. The second is the (British?) tradition going back to the Lowther and Tannoy of single horn loaded full range drivers.

I am chatting to a guy with these http://www.thehornshoppe.com/ about a bespoke amp. Any of you with any experience with them.

Richard

 

The amps are WE 43As Horns are 15As- not many in Europe and in use.

 

Hiya

Vitavox is the British equivalent of Altec Lansing, and also produced some very good 2/3/4 way horn systems.

Typically the larger setups were used for applications such as large music venues, cinema's, that sort of thing.

Smaller 2/3 way set ups were used in recording studio's, homes of the well heeled etc.

Vitavox also produced a lot of equipment for the MOD.

Some Vitavox speakers:

http://website.lineone.net/~empson/Systems.html

and really cool, some big stacks for festivals..

http://website.lineone.net/~empson/PApics.html

cheers
chris

 

There is a third way...

The Duplex aka coaxial speaker.



This is one of my Altec 604-8G drivers currently "resting" at home. One day (maybe soon, but I've been saying that for a while) they will go back to work, maybe in as part of a pair of Stonehenge Vs
These are great speakers and probably the longest-lived of any single speaker design, as they were in more-or-less continuous production from the 1930s to the late 1980s (and at least one version is again being produced).

Baudrillard:
That WE setup is really neat. WE is probably the ultimate Japanese audio cult - where old and very rich guys end up after they've been through the upper circles. I could host the closeup if you don't have the space/bandwidth for it.

 

I should apologise in case anyone actually noticed- I posted twice earlier in this thread with non-sensical posts, very late on a Friday night when slightly worse for wear in the alcohol department. Have deleted posts.

 

Its fun I was involved in this sort of thing back in Tresham days. Even sat in on the desk at a couple of concerts, but I never translated it to hi-fi. They have always been ridiculously large and ridiculously expensive for home audio in most UK homes. But these things with Fostex drivers look very interesting as it is bringing the possibilities back to normal mortals. I am thinking of ordering a couple of drivers from Wimslow and having a play. Again any experience or comments would be most welcome.

Richard

 

Go for it, always post when you are pissed, you never know what insights you might come up with

Richard

 

.

 

I've heard you can get 95% of the performance of those mega bucks Ale hi pressure tweeters from some vintage examples at a fraction of the cost.

 

Richard

Have a look here for some inspiration

http://fullrangedriver.com/gallery/

and here for discussion

http://fullrangedriver.com/forum/

I'm not convinced that removing the crossover is enough of an advantage to make the use of compromised 'full range' drivers entirely worthwhile, but they can be fun although the better efforts I've heard have generally been quite large. I haven't yet heard a smaller one that really satisfied. However I once built a pair very similar to the hornshoppe ones using a little 3" Visaton FR driver which were quite entertaining when placed in corners.

Another one people like is the Hammer Dynamics design. A friend has them but I haven't heard them.

http://www.hammerdynamics.com/

rgs
Murray.

 

You could probably get 100%+ of the performance using good modern drivers TBH. Vintage drivers tend to be not cheap, especially if they need bringing back to spec.
But this is audio, and none of this has much to do with logic. If it did, we might all be running ME Gethains with DSP EQ. Heck, that's another possibility.

 

True.

 

Thanks Murray

I have my own peculiar ideas remember the cubes? I think you may have heard some down in Herne Bay. Anyway I am into semi omnis with forward HF reinforcement, but they wont be cubes more like tubes Just A bit of fun for entertainment, very unlikely to be production potential, even if that good I don't really have the time.

Richard

 

Joel,

Interesting W15a replicas Here

That looks like an interesting Jazz club!

 

Wow!!

Has anyone here been to a venue like that in Japan with a valve/horn system?

 

I'd be fascinated to hear the WE horns shown above.

I've read (many times) that horn colouration (aswell as of course efficiency) multiplies the more bends/corners you put in a horn... in which case, I'd expect that to be mega efficient, but coloured as hell.

I'd still LOVE to hear a pair.

I'm also of course not dismissing them... I've never heard them

 

Excellent thread. I must go to Nottingham soon (not something I ever thought I'd say).

Joel, how was Kimura? Has he finished his turntable yet? And what's with that attempt at a beard

-- Ian

 

That may be possible.