AudioNervosa
Systemic Development => Speakers => Topic started by: Nick B on November 01, 2017, 09:12:53 PM
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Having heard the Tang Band W8-1808s at my buddy Gary’s house, I ordered a pair and will get them this Friday. Parts Express has a 45 day return policy. As I have no experience with full range drivers,
I wondered what other drivers might be recommended including those that have mods done to them.
I saw a slow motion video on YouTube showing the motion of a full range driver and I’m amazed the sound is as good as it is....
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Bump .... (my first order with Parts Express and the packaging was poor)
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nick, just a "fyi" - the pure audio project speakers i heard at the caf, which i thought were fantastic at any price, used the tb w8-1808 drivers:
http://www.pureaudioproject.com/trio15tb-open-baffle-speakers/ (http://www.pureaudioproject.com/trio15tb-open-baffle-speakers/)
doug s.
Hey Doug,
Thanks for the info. It appears we don’t have many single driver afficicanados here, so I’ll experiment on my own. After a few woodworking glitches...don’t try and cut plywood free hand with a Rotozip....it appears I’ll have my Tang Bands running today or tomorrow. I expect they’ll perform very nicely, but I will contacting this site to explore other options as well.
http://www.commonsenseaudio.com/nirvana.html
Nick
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WHAT ???? I love my single driver widebanders. Gimme 2W amp and 100db efficient speakers any day of the week.
charles
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WHAT ???? I love my single driver widebanders. Gimme 2W amp and 100db efficient speakers any day of the week.
charles
Who knew ??? 😉
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High sensitivity is where it's at for me, too. :thumb:
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After a number of woodworking fiascos, the Tang Bands are mounted ..... in ugly enclosures. The quality of work is not good. Anyway, I haven’t played music in days so the McCormack amp, dac, Auralic Mini streamer and Uber were stone cold. Of course, the Tang Bands had zero hours on them. After plugging everything into the Uber, I started to listen and it wasn’t pretty. After an hour, things smoothed and the sound was much better. Right now, it sounds a bit etched and thin in the midrange. I’ll play the McCormack a bit more and then switch to the Temple Audio Bantam amp. The Bantam is a class T I believe and the combo rocked at Gary’s house a few weeks ago. He put 200 hours on his TBs It’s so nice to pick up the new speakers and not strain my back. My wife loves the look of an open baffle.
Will report as things develop.
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I’ve decided to go a different direction and returned the Tang Bands to Parts Express. I’m ordering the Mark Audio A10P drivers and they’ll be modded by Dave Dlugos. These are the same modded speakers that Gary...aka gander...now uses. Gary pretty much has a “golden ear” and I really trust his judgment. The cost including mods is $370. The bass response is improved over the Tang Bands.
I’m still deciding on a cabinet and it’ll either be a flatpack or a finished product. The cabinet will be a standmount which my wife and I both prefer. It won’t be open baffle. I prefer a cabinet not to exceed 35 lbs. My hunch is that this will work beautifully.
Once the speaker project is done, I’ll go on to the amp and finally the dac.
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I did the same thing with my Tang Bands. Hooray for PE 45 day return policy!
Audio hope is dope, and reality often doesn't match our expectations.
I'm in the same boat at the moment, I just bought some speakers that I've wanted for years, but they're not what I expected. It's disappointing, but that's the nature of this game. Everyone is different and what works for some doesn't work for all.
Years ago I built 3 planet10 speakers for Feastrex full range drivers, and they sounded excellent! Really good solid musical bass for such a tiny speaker. I can heartily recommend the reflex-horn type speakers designed by him and scottmoose.
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I did the same thing with my Tang Bands. Hooray for PE 45 day return policy!
Audio hope is dope, and reality often doesn't match our expectations.
I'm in the same boat at the moment, I just bought some speakers that I've wanted for years, but they're not what I expected. It's disappointing, but that's the nature of this game. Everyone is different and what works for some doesn't work for all.
Years ago I built 3 planet10 speakers for Feastrex full range drivers, and they sounded excellent! Really good solid musical bass for such a tiny speaker. I can heartily recommend the reflex-horn type speakers designed by him and scottmoose.
Good to hear your results with the planet 10 speakers. Gary really likes the bass on these little speakers. I think it’ll be very good, but ya never know. At least it’s not much of a risk financially. I’d like to get it all resolved so I get can to my ultrasonic record cleaning project and finally set up my analog again. Then I’ll get to fixing all the corrupted tags on the CDs.
That’s the current plan, but heck, that’s also been the plan for the last ten years :duh
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It would take me 10 years just to do all that. :-({|=
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So is it soup yet ??
charles
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So is it soup yet ??
charles
It’s warming up.... Called Parts Express today and they already gave me a refund. So I’m gonna place the order for the Mark Audio drivers. I’m just about there picking a cabinet. Too bad I can’t get it by Christmas 🎅🏽
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Now you will need subs. GR Research OB baby. If lazy SVS or Rythmic. I need spellcheck.
charles
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Now you will need subs. GR Research OB baby. If lazy SVS or Rythmic. I need spellcheck.
charles
No subs, Charles. I really want to keep things simple and adding more cabling and having a sub..or two..would take up more space. Gary tells me his Mark Audio drivers produce enough bass, so that should be quite sufficient for me.
Nick
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Nick, if you want to do a "quick 'n nasty, drop in" enclosure for that driver, the PE BR-1 https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-br-1cab-br-1-6-1-2-2-way-speaker-cabinet-pair--300-645?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=pla (https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-br-1cab-br-1-6-1-2-2-way-speaker-cabinet-pair--300-645?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=pla) would work.
Unless you have 100 tweeters laying around like I do, you would also need a pair of these https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dc28f-8-1-1-8-silk-dome-tweeter--275-070 (https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dc28f-8-1-1-8-silk-dome-tweeter--275-070) to fill the hole. Around $100 total. Not an uber finish, but certainly better than raw MDF. :D
It's made for a 165mm woofer, the Alpair is 164. The port is not perfect but it will work just fine for that 0.5cu ft.
No routing, no cutting. Screw in drivers, add a bit of damping, wire to terminal on back and fire up.
You can even connect/utilize the tweeter later as a supertweeter if desired, to add a bit of air >12k or so.
cheers,
AJ
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Nick, if you want to do a "quick 'n nasty, drop in" enclosure for that driver, the PE BR-1 https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-br-1cab-br-1-6-1-2-2-way-speaker-cabinet-pair--300-645?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=pla (https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-br-1cab-br-1-6-1-2-2-way-speaker-cabinet-pair--300-645?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=pla) would work.
Unless you have 100 tweeters laying around like I do, you would also need a pair of these https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dc28f-8-1-1-8-silk-dome-tweeter--275-070 (https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-dc28f-8-1-1-8-silk-dome-tweeter--275-070) to fill the hole. Around $100 total. Not an uber finish, but certainly better than raw MDF. :D
It's made for a 165mm woofer, the Alpair is 164. The port is not perfect but it will work just fine for that 0.5cu ft.
No routing, no cutting. Screw in drivers, add a bit of damping, wire to terminal on back and fire up.
You can even connect/utilize the tweeter later as a supertweeter if desired, to add a bit of air >12k or so.
cheers,
AJ
AJ, that is a very, very interesting idea and simple and inexpensive. I’m going to check it out. As to the tweeter cutout, I might just use a decorative cover of some sort.
Thanks!
Nick
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So is it soup yet ??
charles
It’s warming up.... Called Parts Express today and they already gave me a refund. So I’m gonna place the order for the Mark Audio drivers. I’m just about there picking a cabinet. Too bad I can’t get it by Christmas 🎅🏽
I will be very curious as to your upcoming review of the Mark Audio drivers. Never tried them, but a simple physical inspection show a well though out and well truned piec.
Party on!!! :beer:
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I have been talking with Nick, and the drivers I got are the Mark Audio A10P 6 1/2 inch drivers, with the “enable” modification by Dave at planet10-HiFi.com.
Bottom line, I highly recommend this driver. I get loads of detail, a very warm sound and plenty of bass. However…
First of all, according to Dave, this is probably the maximum size that he would use for details and definition, and sufficient bass. I got my pair and I have been playing them for about a month, and I just today put them into new larger cabinets of my own design and they sound better than I have ever heard before. So they are really great drivers.
However, just dropping them into a premade speaker cabinet with premade 5 1/2 inch cut outs will not work with these drivers. If you look at the Mark Audio diagram and specs for the speakers, it looks like it should be a perfect 5 1/2 inch cut out hole. However, this is wrong. I tried this size cutout in another cabinet and it totally does not work; It is too big. They require a 5 1/4 inch cut out which will allow them to seat in snuggly. And you want them snug. The screw in holes are right next to the edge of the cut out, which I don’t appreciate but it is what it is, so the cut out hole cannot be even a tiny bit too big, or one or two of the screws will try to screw in to air. So unfortunately it is not necessarily true that a standard cut out will always work. You have to always look at the speaker itself and try it.
Of course, if a hole is a bit too small you can always make a little bigger. But if the hole is too big you cannot make it smaller. Kind of like cooking and putting in too much salt.
Another thing about these drivers, while they sound better than any driver I have used yet, the frames are actually scientifically designed and made of plastic! So you can’t just screw in screws with some kind of power driver. And you need a metric hex key of the correct size. The screws are included with the speakers. FYI. Some of the oddest speakers I have come across, but they seem to work really well. Caveat emptor.
Gary
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I have been talking with Nick, and the drivers I got are the Mark Audio A10P 6 1/2 inch drivers, with the “enable” modification by Dave at planet10-HiFi.com.
Bottom line, I highly recommend this driver. I get loads of detail, a very warm sound and plenty of bass. However…
First of all, according to Dave, this is probably the maximum size that he would use for details and definition, and sufficient bass. I got my pair and I have been playing them for about a month, and I just today put them into new larger cabinets of my own design and they sound better than I have ever heard before. So they are really great drivers.
However, just dropping them into a premade speaker cabinet with premade 5 1/2 inch cut outs will not work with these drivers. If you look at the Mark Audio diagram and specs for the speakers, it looks like it should be a perfect 5 1/2 inch cut out hole. However, this is wrong. I tried this size cutout in another cabinet and it totally does not work; It is too big. They require a 5 1/4 inch cut out which will allow them to seat in snuggly. And you want them snug. The screw in holes are right next to the edge of the cut out, which I don’t appreciate but it is what it is, so the cut out hole cannot be even a tiny bit too big, or one or two of the screws will try to screw in to air. So unfortunately it is not necessarily true that a standard cut out will always work. You have to always look at the speaker itself and try it.
Of course, if a hole is a bit too small you can always make a little bigger. But if the hole is too big you cannot make it smaller. Kind of like cooking and putting in too much salt.
Another thing about these drivers, while they sound better than any driver I have used yet, the frames are actually scientifically designed and made of plastic! So you can’t just screw in screws with some kind of power driver. And you need a metric hex key of the correct size. The screws are included with the speakers. FYI. Some of the oddest speakers I have come across, but they seem to work really well. Caveat emptor.
Gary
Thanks for the heads up. It seems nothing is easy nowadays. I’ll check all this out. I sent an email already to Mark Audio and their mailbox is full. I could do a Bose boombox or just imagine how good everything sounds until I get a new speaker. Now that would be cheap!
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Typically in Audio, I think that “easy“ is run-of-the-mill, mediocre, middle of the road average stuff that they think will appeal to most people. The last 10 percent is always a tough road.
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Let me clarify this. Easy doesn’t necessarily mean mediocre, but... I have found that easy generally works 90 percent of the time, or adds complexity. My system is moving closer and closer to simple (Active crossover with multiple drivers, multiple amps, extra interconnects and extra speaker wires to single drivers with one amplifier and no crossover), and it is sounding better and better. IMHO
Gary
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Thanks for the input and clarification, Gary. You have a great knowledge base with all of the experimentation you continue to do. Your enthusiasm is constant and you always look for ways to make things sound better....and your system always sounds quite good!
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I reached out to Dave at planet10 hi-fi about the Mark Audio A10P driver cut out size being too big in the posted spec, and I was right, in that the actual cut out size should be smaller. Dave provided me with an updated spec for that driver showing the smaller cut out size. The older spec on the Mark Audio website is incorrect. The correct cut out is about 5 1/4 inches, not 5 1/2 inches. I went by their posted spec and made a 5 1/2 inch cut out for that driver and discovered that (1) the cut out size was too big, and (2) once you cut a hole too big you cannot make it smaller! In this case one or two of the screws tried to screw into air because the hole was too big. Also a problem with this driver as I think I stated, is that the screw in holes are right next to the edge of the cut out hole, so the cut out needs to be snug. First time I have ever seen this kind of thing.
In this case, if you didn’t already have the A10P driver and try it, you would never know there was a problem until it was too late and you bought a premade cabinet with a hole that is too large. This is true of premade cut outs in premade cabinets. They make those for a specific driver, but that may not be right for your driver. So, unless the cut out hole size in the premade cabinet is exactly what you need, either it will be too big and you may not be able to use it at all, or it may be too small and you still have to take a jigsaw and make the cut out a little larger.
What a fun hobby!
Gary
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...Kind of like cooking and putting in too much salt.
Gary
Oh contraire, Gary! If you've got a pot of soup, stew, etc... that's too salty, drop in a couple of peeled potatoes. They'll soak up the extra salt. Then just pull them out of the pot and toss them. Viola! Dinner is served and saved. :D
SN
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Nice one Bill! :thumb:
I always wondered why leftover potatoes always need more salt.
Thanks Gary for sharing your expertise with 10P. I want to try that bad boy. I like that it has no wizzer. It's always a good idea to wait for your drivers to arrive to measure them before cutting the hole. And it's always good idea to set the circle jig 1/16" too big instead of risking being 0.001" too small.