24 Crazy-Ass Hi-Fi Systems

[Thomas_A]

Old picture, ”crazy” project. Bo Hansson of Rauna speakers had something similar.

Edited text: wrong reference to picture, as noted in following posts. Not Bo Hansson.

 

[DanielT]

Old picture, Bo Hanssons horn DIY…

View attachment 244175

Thomas, did you ever visit Bo Hansson's home and listen to his horn?

#626 page 32 in this thread:

Unusual Speaker Designs

These 11.25 inch tall speaker cabinets are truly "Bookshelf Speakers", but what makes them unusual is that they were designed to place in a bookshelf and blend in with the books already there. They were made by a company called Stanford Advanced Acoustic Technology which was affiliated with...

audiosciencereview.com

HiFiForum.nu - Legenden lever!!! Hemma hos Bo Hansson.

www.hififorum.nu

Bo Hansson (producent) – Wikipedia

sv.wikipedia.org

 

[MAB]

Thomas, did you ever visit Bo Hansson's home and listen to his horn?

#626 page 32 in this thread:

Unusual Speaker Designs

These 11.25 inch tall speaker cabinets are truly "Bookshelf Speakers", but what makes them unusual is that they were designed to place in a bookshelf and blend in with the books already there. They were made by a company called Stanford Advanced Acoustic Technology which was affiliated with...

audiosciencereview.com

View attachment 244201

HiFiForum.nu - Legenden lever!!! Hemma hos Bo Hansson.

www.hififorum.nu

Bo Hansson (producent) – Wikipedia

sv.wikipedia.org

Not sure if these qualify as crazy, and they are from before Bo Hansson at Rauna, but I do have a pair of the original concrete Rauna Freja (aka Swedish Tombstone):

 

[MAB]

Old picture, Bo Hanssons horn DIY…

View attachment 244175

Maybe I am confused, isn't this Royal Device, in Italy? Was Bo Hansson involved in this crazy project? I don't know too much about Bo, and next to nothing about these crazy horns, just wondering!

 

[Thomas_A]

Maybe I am confused, isn't this Royal Device, in Italy? Was Bo Hansson involved in this crazy project? I don't know too much about Bo, and next to nothing about these crazy horns, just wondering!

Perhaps I made a mistake, let me check. Bo Hansson did build his basement made as large horns however.

 

[DanielT]

Maybe I am confused, isn't this Royal Device, in Italy? Was Bo Hansson involved in this crazy project? I don't know too much about Bo, and next to nothing about these crazy horns, just wondering!

Perhaps I made a mistake, let me check. Bo Hansson did build his basement made as large horns however.

This is what it looked like at Bo Hansson's home.Horn opening in the floor in the living room:

Here, newly produced Rauna concrete speakers, two-way speakers:

Rauna Vidar:

SPECIFICATIONS​

Principle: Two-way bass reflex with reversible port. Phase-aligned drivers

Drivers: One 5.5-inch long-throw woofer, One 1-inch soft-dome tweeter

Frequency response: 48 Hz – 22.000 Hz +/- 3 dB

Sensitivity: 86 dB

Crossover: 4000 Hz

Impedance: 8 Ohms nominal

Dimensions: H x W x D: 345 x 255 x 255 mm. Bottomplate: W x D: 140 x 210 mm

Weight: 13 kg each unboxed

Rauna Vidar - HIFI STÄLLET

Finns för Demo i butiken Vidar’s enclosure is molded out of a specially-formulated concrete, resulting in a uniquely inert and sonically “dead” box. The speaker cabinet is irregularly shaped and internally damped to further minimize reflections and internal resonances. The shape of the Vidar...

hifistallet.se

Edit:
They weren't Crazy-Ass, but still the brand lives on after Bo Hansson's passing...

 

[MAB]

Perhaps I made a mistake, let me check. Bo Hansson did build his basement made as large horns however.

That might be a picture of Royal Device, Roberto Delle Curti...

ROYAL DEVICE by Roberto Delle Curti Hi-Efficiency Loudspeakers Audiophile speaker systems High fidelity systems Sistemi di altoparlanti hi-end HiFi ed Alta Efficienza Lautsprecher Diffusori acustici stereo Enceintes acoustiques

'+'

In any case, certainly crazy!

 

[Thomas_A]

This is what it looked like at Bo Hansson's home.Horn opening in the floor in the living room:
View attachment 244207

Here, newly produced Rauna concrete speakers, two-way speakers:

Rauna Vidar:

SPECIFICATIONS​

Principle: Two-way bass reflex with reversible port. Phase-aligned drivers

Drivers: One 5.5-inch long-throw woofer, One 1-inch soft-dome tweeter

Frequency response: 48 Hz – 22.000 Hz +/- 3 dB

Sensitivity: 86 dB

Crossover: 4000 Hz

Impedance: 8 Ohms nominal

Dimensions: H x W x D: 345 x 255 x 255 mm. Bottomplate: W x D: 140 x 210 mm

Weight: 13 kg each unboxed


View attachment 244206

Rauna Vidar - HIFI STÄLLET

Finns för Demo i butiken Vidar’s enclosure is molded out of a specially-formulated concrete, resulting in a uniquely inert and sonically “dead” box. The speaker cabinet is irregularly shaped and internally damped to further minimize reflections and internal resonances. The shape of the Vidar...

hifistallet.se

Yes. I will edit my post. Bosse did have large horns built in the basement but the picture may be another one.

 

[Mr. Widget]

Always thought horn speakers performed best with low power class A amps?

Works for me.

But then so does Class D.

 

[Thomas_A]

Thomas, did you ever visit Bo Hansson's home and listen to his horn?

#626 page 32 in this thread:

Unusual Speaker Designs

These 11.25 inch tall speaker cabinets are truly "Bookshelf Speakers", but what makes them unusual is that they were designed to place in a bookshelf and blend in with the books already there. They were made by a company called Stanford Advanced Acoustic Technology which was affiliated with...

audiosciencereview.com

View attachment 244201

HiFiForum.nu - Legenden lever!!! Hemma hos Bo Hansson.

www.hififorum.nu

Bo Hansson (producent) – Wikipedia

sv.wikipedia.org

No I never visited him. I have not been around much but I visited Olle Mirsch once to buy some kits. I got a glimpse of his super Rondo speakers. Really beautiful. Only one piece made.

 

[MAB]

Always thought horn speakers performed best with low power class A amps?

Actually it's the inverse, Class A amplifiers perform best with horn speakers.
Other speakers they just overheat, run out of power and distort.

 

[Suffolkhifinut]

Actually it's the inverse, Class A amplifiers perform best with horn speakers.
Other speakers they just overheat, run out of power and distort.

Always horn speakers were super efficient? Allowing low power input for a high volume output.

 

[MAB]

Always horn speakers were super efficient? Allowing low power input for a high volume output.

It's a joke with some grains of truth. Of course you are right, not all horns are efficient. But Class A... inefficient.

 

[Suffolkhifinut]

Actually it's the inverse, Class A amplifiers perform best with horn speakers.
Other speakers they just overheat, run out of power and distort.

Don’t really know what you mean by this, any chance you could explain?
Thanks

 

[MAB]

Don’t really know what you mean by this, any chance you could explain?
Thanks

Apologies, it is a snarky statement about Class A. Yes, lemme explain, then you can yell at me if I get it wrong!

Horns and other efficient speakers can be driven by any good amp of any type, Class A, A/B, D, etc. Horn speakers, or any speaker for that matter, don't sound any different driven by Class A so long as the amps have reasonable performance and are matched for volume, and the Class A isn't driven beyond it's narrow performance envelope.
Class A by virtue of the exceptionally low efficiency can really only drive efficient speakers effectively, unless you listen at unrealistically low volume, or don't mind listening to the Class A amp distort as it reaches max power, which kind of defeats the purpose of Class A in the first place. I have two Class A amps, one is actually switchable to between Class A and Class A/B, the Class A mode has 1/4 the power and about twice the heat, so perhaps 8x less efficient than Class A/B... The sound is the same, but with only 30 Watts available needs to be paired with high efficiency speakers.

Occurs to me, I need to stop cracking jokes...

 

[fpitas]

Apologies, it is a snarky statement about Class A. Yes, lemme explain, then you can yell at me if I get it wrong!

Horns and other efficient speakers can be driven by any good amp of any power, Class A, A/B, D, etc. Horn speakers, or any speaker for that matter, don't sound any different driven by Class A so long as the amps have reasonable performance and are matched for volume, and the Class A isn't driven beyond it's narrow performance envelope.
Class A by virtue of the exceptionally low efficiency can really only drive efficient speakers effectively, unless you listen at unrealistically low volume, or don't mind listening to the Class A amp distort as it reaches max power, which kind of defeats the purpose of Class A in the first place. I have two Class A amps, one is actually switchable to between Class A and Class A/B, the Class A mode has 1/4 the power and about twice the heat, so perhaps 8x less efficient than Class A/B... The sound is the same, but with only 30 Watts available needs to be paired with high efficiency speakers.

Occurs to me, I need to stop cracking jokes...

Yes, to flog the poor joke further. My horns take about 20mW average at 85dB where I listen. Obviously, lots of power is not required, even allowing for enormous musical peaks.

 

[Mr. Widget]

Apologies, it is a snarky statement about Class A. Yes, lemme explain, then you can yell at me if I get it wrong!

Horns and other efficient speakers can be driven by any good amp of any type, Class A, A/B, D, etc. Horn speakers, or any speaker for that matter, don't sound any different driven by Class A so long as the amps have reasonable performance and are matched for volume, and the Class A isn't driven beyond it's narrow performance envelope.
Class A by virtue of the exceptionally low efficiency can really only drive efficient speakers effectively, unless you listen at unrealistically low volume, or don't mind listening to the Class A amp distort as it reaches max power, which kind of defeats the purpose of Class A in the first place. I have two Class A amps, one is actually switchable to between Class A and Class A/B, the Class A mode has 1/4 the power and about twice the heat, so perhaps 8x less efficient than Class A/B... The sound is the same, but with only 30 Watts available needs to be paired with high efficiency speakers.

Occurs to me, I need to stop cracking jokes...

Keep the jokes coming...

I mostly agree with your post above. You can have a high powered Class A amp, but the room will get massively heated, your energy bill will go up, and the amp(s) will cost a bundle.

As for sounding the same? Big debate there... been going on for decades.

 

[Suffolkhifinut]

Apologies, it is a snarky statement about Class A. Yes, lemme explain, then you can yell at me if I get it wrong!

Horns and other efficient speakers can be driven by any good amp of any type, Class A, A/B, D, etc. Horn speakers, or any speaker for that matter, don't sound any different driven by Class A so long as the amps have reasonable performance and are matched for volume, and the Class A isn't driven beyond it's narrow performance envelope.
Class A by virtue of the exceptionally low efficiency can really only drive efficient speakers effectively, unless you listen at unrealistically low volume, or don't mind listening to the Class A amp distort as it reaches max power, which kind of defeats the purpose of Class A in the first place. I have two Class A amps, one is actually switchable to between Class A and Class A/B, the Class A mode has 1/4 the power and about twice the heat, so perhaps 8x less efficient than Class A/B... The sound is the same, but with only 30 Watts available needs to be paired with high efficiency speakers.

Occurs to me, I need to stop cracking jokes...

Or my sense of humour needs working on!

 

[bloodshoteyed]

This looks rather... crazy ass;

JSmith

BYOL*?

*(bring your own lube)

 

[Waxx]

This is also a crazy, a 5million speaker casted in 24 karat gold... The "Hart Audio D&W Aural Pleasure"

and to stay on the theme, the summum of ugliness and bad taste... The Audiovisual Art Fusion, custom build for one of their clients. If you need to ask the price you're not rich enough to buy it they say...