Floor Standing speakers.

[chad.SQ 0]

At my house, I have these Kenwood floor standing speakers. It has 3 different looking tweaters, and 12"woofer. Then I look in my KEF rear speakers, and it has 1 speaker which has a tweater in the middle of a little 6" woofer. Obviously, the Kenwoods sound a lot better. BUt I am confused. I want to build my own, but why are there 3 different looking tweaters? I know that the frequencies are seperated by a crossover to the different tweaters, but when I search around for tweaters, I dont see tweaters being seperated by the frequency it plays.

Help?

[chad.SQ 0]

And what is the difference between cone, dome, horn loaded, and ribbon tweaters? And what makes a tweater professional?

Edited July 2, 2008 by chad

[MikeS 0]

The KEF's are coaxial, the tweeter is in the center to simulate a point source response.

The Kenwoods are big 4-way or a glorified 3 way. One of those drivers in the Kenwood ishould be a midrange, with probably two tweeters.

A two or three way speaker is the most standard design......the Japanese made lot's of "Kubuki" speakers from the likes of Sansui, Kenwood, and Pioneer in the late '60's, early '70's.

The design is stupid and pointless, it was just marketing BS.

[chad.SQ 0]

So basically, 3/4 way speakers sound better. But does that mean i buy 2 of the same tweaters with the same everything, then a midrange separated by the crossover?

Edited July 2, 2008 by chad

[Robert_J 0]

So basically, 3/4 way speakers sound better. But does that mean i buy 2 of the same tweaters with the same everything, then a midrange separated by the crossover?

A 3 way speaker will sound better than a 2 way IF it is properly designed. The majority of the 3 ways speakers on the market are crap. Open your speaker up and take a look at the crossover. It probably has 50 cents worth of iron core coils and electrolytic caps. A properly designed 3 way crossover will probably cost more than the all of the drivers combined.

The crossover is the heart of a quality speaker. A good one can make average drivers sound outstanding. A bad one can make the most expensive drivers in the world sound like crap.

-Robert

[chad.SQ 0]

Does the woofer count as a way? Like is 1 tweeter, 1 mid, and the 12" add up to 3? Or is 3 way 2 tweeters, 1 mid, and then the woofer is just separate. The Kenwoods have 2 tweeters, 1 mid, and then a 15". I want to build something similar. But the only problem I am having is what kind of tweeter gets what end of the high spectrum? Or is what I am thinking pure nonsense...

[KU40 173]

So basically, 3/4 way speakers sound better. But does that mean i buy 2 of the same tweaters with the same everything, then a midrange separated by the crossover?

You have this backwards. Generally you want to have 2 woofers with one tweeter if you're going to do this sort of thing due to tweeters being more efficient than the woofers.

As for your question about 3/4 way, yours are 4 way. The woofer does count.

Don't do any more than a 3 way. To keep it simple as your first project I may suggest just doing 2-way with a tweeter and mid. Is this for a home theater I take it? Do you have a separate subwoofer? If so, that 2 way is all you really need. If you don't have a subwoofer you can put one into the same general box as the mid and tweeter, but you have to remember to isolate the chambers for the different speakers. Also don't forget that if/when you put the mid into a box, the enclosure for it has to be calculated as well.

[chad.SQ 0]

I'de rather do a 4 way. I dunno, with the help of this forum I know I can do it. And this is a 2 channel system. Primarily for music, but also for movies. No I dont have a seperate subwoofer. I want to include the woofer in the general box.

Is the type of tweeter that i should be looking at? http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cf...tnumber=272-125

If not, can I be recommended another?

[JimJ 11]

Eh, more drivers doesn't always make things better

I'd echo the sentiment in this thread and highly recommend starting out with a 2-way design for your first build. Jumping into a 3-way build with no prior experience is a good way to get overwhelmed with all that you're trying to do.

[todd.brust 29]

Not to hi-jack the thread, but what is a good program to model crossovers? I know LEAP is a standard but a little on the spendy side and a little overkill for anything I may ever do.

As for the the question on hand, Stick with a two way for your first project for ease of design. And a two way will be much easier to change if need be.

I have not seen too many speakers that expand more than a 3 way. A few old Sansui and other japanese brands doing 4 ways and of course my DQ-10s doing a 5 way

[chad.SQ 0]

Ok, a 2 way. A tweater and a mid. Should that just be a bookshelf speaker along with a separate subwoofer?

Edited July 3, 2008 by chad

[slim2fattycake 85]

there are many 2 way floor towers. i am actually get a pair of two way floor towers in the mail soon.

[chad.SQ 0]

But the tower would be just a look thing. Wouldn't it?

[///M5 2,833]

I am actually curious about your perception of the Kenwood's sounding better than the KEF's. It is possible, but I am skeptical.

Definitely do a 2 way, as a first step I guarantee you can't design a good sounding 3 way and really guarantee failure on a 4 way.

[chad.SQ 0]

Is the official 2 way meaning 2 speakers? 1 tweeter and 1 mid? Or can it also classified as 1 tweeter and 2 mids at the same crossover point

[///M5 2,833]

Don't take offense at this, but with the way you are asking questions you should really only do 1 mid and 1 tweeter in a classic 2 way. Everything else will make them sound worse and not better unless you really know what you are doing and have good measuring gear and more importantly good measuring know how. On top of this, I would highly encourage you to stick to a paper cone or similar forgiving mid otherwise I would expect highly that the crossover that you design will not be sufficient to deal with the anomalies of the speaker cone.

[chad.SQ 0]

I understand what you are saying ///M5. I am asking so many questions because I have a passion for audio, and I am willing to do what it takes to learn. This forum is the only thing I got. None of my friends or family are even close to interested in audio in any way. And I refuse to talk to a Best Buy sales person who only wants his commission. I'm only 17, and I work for everything I have. I don't have a lot of money to do a number of trial and errors. I want to build these speakers on a learning process, but I also prefer not to learn over a huge mistake. If there is anything you can do to help me achieve my goal, I will really appreciate it. All I'm asking for is help.

I hope what I said makes sense.

[MikeS 0]

I am actually curious about your perception of the Kenwood's sounding better than the KEF's. It is possible, but I am skeptical.

Definitely do a 2 way, as a first step I guarantee you can't design a good sounding 3 way and really guarantee failure on a 4 way.

The Kenwood's are likely are a little more efficient than the KEF coax, and being a floorstander with a (15?) woofer they probably have a bit more prominent bass. And have a larger sound overall.

Whether they have a better sound quality....who knows.....

[MikeS 0]

I understand what you are saying ///M5. I am asking so many questions because I have a passion for audio, and I am willing to do what it takes to learn. This forum is the only thing I got. None of my friends or family are even close to interested in audio in any way. And I refuse to talk to a Best Buy sales person who only wants his commission. I'm only 17, and I work for everything I have. I don't have a lot of money to do a number of trial and errors. I want to build these speakers on a learning process, but I also prefer not to learn over a huge mistake. If there is anything you can do to help me achieve my goal, I will really appreciate it. All I'm asking for is help.

I hope what I said makes sense.

Maybe try a speaker kit offering of some sort. You can maybe find something within your budget, you won't have to go through trial or error with driver selection, enclosure and crossover design.

And even with a kit you will learn things, it's a good way to get started.

Unless you have ways and the tools to build enclosures, and the time and patience to learn passive crossover design, or willing to invest in the modeling software to design passive crossovers. But if you got enough passion, you'll figure it out.

Do some google searching with some keywords related to speaker passive crossover or other related keywords.

Your choice of the kit being a bookshelf, floorstander, 2-way, 3-way, MTM, coaxial....is entirely up to you.

The larger three-way or MTM floorstanding kits will be way more spendy, however.

[Robert_J 0]

2 way, 3 way, etc is the number of different passbands the frequency range is split into. 2 way speakers have the incoming signal "split" into highs and lows by using the internal crossover. 3 way has high, mid, low. It has nothing to do with the number of speakers used. A popular speaker is the D'Appolito design or the MTM design. It uses a midbass on the top and botton of the baffle with a tweeter placed in the middle. It gets its name from its designer Joseph D'Appolito.

Since you want to learn, start reading. There are some great internet articles on the research done by Theile and Small as well as Hoffman and his Iron Law. Once you finish that, the Loudspeaker Design Cookbook by Vance Dickason is required reading for every speaker designer.

For hands on learning start by building a kit or use a proven design. Especially one that has the entire process documented. You learn what the designer did and how it impacted the sound. One design that is very popular with the car audio guys is the Dayton 8. It's big and loud but has surprisingly good quality.

Finally, and I hate to say this, you will not learn full range speaker design hanging out here. There are forums at DIY Audio, Parts Express and HT Guide that cover full range design in much more depth. Plus some the guys that are on those forums have been building speakers for over 30 years. I built my first speaker in 1987 and I still learn a little each day from those guys.

-Robert

[chad.SQ 0]

Thanks Robert. I have been reading about that Dayton 8 design and I think I will try that one as my first DIY project. Also about the crossover I hope it goes well. I think I've spent maybe 5 hours reading about crossovers today. As far as everything goes, I think I have one final question before I start my project. If I have a receiver that gives out 100 watts per channel. And if I have a tweeter thats RMS is 50, and 2 mids that are 60 watts RMS a piece. Is the power handling of the whole speaker 170 RMS? So I add everything together? So if I have 3 drivers 100/3 equals 33 watts a piece?

[KU40 173]

you don't add power together for different speaker types because they are playing different frequencies. So the power handling of the tweeter is still 50 and the mids are still 60 apiece. Which you will be overpowering the tweeter. For multiple speakers of the same type, however, yes you do add their power handling together. So your two mids could handle 120 watts between them. Luckily most tweeters are more efficient than the mids so the power difference and the efficiency should about even out. You can also get an L-pad for the tweeter to turn its level down, or build some attenuation into the crossover if you deem it needed.

[95Honda 486]

For your best bang for the buck buy one of the MTM Partsexpress kits, you can't go wrong, and you can't screw it up for your first project. They have reall good instructions and also have tutorials to help you learn why things were designed the way they were. They are almost set up like an educational project, really.

Honestly, if you think the Kenwoods sound better than anything KEF, you are are probably more interested in volume, in that case try and choose something with at least 7" or so woofers, you will be happier. If you try one of the smaller kits with say 5 or 6.5s, consider a sub, there are also decent kits on there for a few hundred bucks that would be really great as first projects.

If you try and design it yourself, keep it simple. There is no reason to have more than a 2 way or a 3 way at most. When you pop off a grill of a speaker like a Kenwood, Sony, Pioneer etc and you see a bunch of tweeters and mids, it isn't to make better sound, it is so the guy popping the grill off of the speakers thinks he is getting more for the money... Also, most of the time you see 2 or more identical woofers (8+) inches, they are usually passive radiators and they aren't there for the benefits of a passive radiator, they are put there so when you pull off the grill you are like "wow, 2 12" woofers, sweet".....

Also, check out the Zaph Audio website. He has a bunch of no BS, solidly engineered speaker systems you can build for low cost.... His stuff would probably outperform just about anything you could buy under a few grand, except in the area of sheer output... But if you are only looking to get loud, that is a whole different ball game...

[MikeS 0]

KABUKI!!!