High Efficiency Speaker Asylum

Steve Schell - lets hear about your new Karlson setup

75.109.11.25

freddyi

Hey Steve - your horns look FAB - K's might be kit (?)

whats' going on so far in the system including amplification and source material?

how does it sound and how does Mr. Karlson's 1951 speaker invention hold up against reflex and horn? (- will Rich shake his head?)

Follow Ups:

RE: Steve Schell - lets hear about your new Karlson setup - Steve Schell 21:26:01 06/21/07 (2)
Freddy, this hot lights and rubber hose treatment must be part of the Karlson Army boot camp.

After fitting the Ks with the freshly reconed RCA MI-9444 field coil woofers, I grabbed stuff from here and there to put together a quick system. RCA 1950s MI-9594 60 degree radial horns were fitted with MI-9584 phenolic permanent magnet mid drivers. Two mismatched Altec 500Hz. crossovers were pressed into service. An old Philips DVD player was hooked up to two channels of a Pioneer Elite M72 four channel amp. It is a hulking thing, and manages to sound pretty good for a solid scrape amp.

The system sounded clear and punchy, very pleasing for such a hurried lash up, but was dull on top. An added pair of offshore ring radiators provided the final touch and the system is quite listenable. The best part is probably the tight, punchy bass, thanks to John E. Karlson- what a guy.

It is surprising what can be accomplished by stacking up this old industrial gear. Very few rooms at a hi fi show will even begin to approach the jump factor and overall liveliness of a system like this.

I'll have to check these bass cabs against the Lansing Iconic bottom end to see how the K stacks up to bass reflex; they're both pretty good using big honkin' field coil 15s, but I'll bet the nod will go to the Karlson. The clarity and impact in the mid and upper bass doesn't compare to an ambitious bass horn, especially one using a bass compression driver. The ratio of performance to size is pretty high with a Karlson based system though.
- Steve, we gotta talk about room treatment! - Ivan303 05:52:46 06/23/07 (0)
  Just a thought. ;-)
  
  Nobody here but us chickens.
  _________________________
- RE: Steve Schell - lets hear about your new Karlson setup - freddyi 05:48:30 06/22/07 (0)
  hey Steve - sounds like a pretty good lashed up rig - for dynamic woofer on cheap, Altec 421 go well with K15 and big radial horns seem ok.
  did other companies make copies of those RCA horns?
  new K-coupler can probably be built within limits to taste and could be fun to make (?????)
  K15 has only about 2 cubic feet coupler and Acoustic Control's little midbass 115BK (which may be clearer in upper bass) only 1 cubic feet coupler - there's no gain other than coupled cavity but the cone doesn't move much under really hard drive and I would use 500 watt peaks if amp sounded good nuff.
  it takes some bracing on larger K - almost bet John Karlson would say - don't forget to use at least 3 coats of shellac up front (to preserve the K-effect and balance)
  (will be interesting to hear Rich's take....)
  
  Edits: 06/22/07 06/22/07

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