Classic housing, modern drivers: Satori / Wavecor monitor

[spendormania]

Hi. This is the documentation of a two way monitor. A cardioid subwoofer will be added later.

The bass is a Wavecor WF182BD_11:

WF182BD09_10_11_12

The tweeter is a Satori TW29DN put into a Monacor waveguide:

https://hificompass.com/sites/default/files/documents/satori_tw29dn_rev-1.pdf

Let's start with the enclosure. After beeing 25 years a satisfied user of a Spendor BC1 mk3 and the succesful built of a LS3/5 clone I decided to go with a BBC-like enclosure.

Here's a pic of a stripped Spendor BC1 mk3:



The main ingridiences of those classic enclosures are thin but highly damped walls, beechstrips and the omission of further bracing.

So i started with the cutting of the strips.



After that, i put Alubutyl on the walls, three layers with 2,1 mm.



Every wall got an additional 2mm HDF plate and 10 mm felt acoustic damping layer.



First step was drilling of the Neutrik connectors hole and the mounting of cover and bottom.





An unexpected guest was interested in the work too ;-).



Glueing of the front strips was next, then the side walls were applied.





to be continued.

 

[spendormania]

I missed taking routing pics, but here's a pic of the speaker without any cosmetic work and with the testing baffle. Don't be surprised about the vertical listening position. This is my test to check if the dispersion working well.



To the tweeter. Because of its popularity and undeniable quality the DXT is the tweeter of choice for a lot of people. But after hearing it in different speakers, I decided to choose another one. In my opinion, the DXT adds a certain kind of sound. It's hard to desribe, but for me there is a "black background" in the music that shouldn't be there. What does that mean? It's like a room in the room, a kind of pronounced instrument separation, putting defined space around them that leeds to misinterpretation. I felt it was a sound signature telling you that there's a certain tweeter at work. You hear it the first time and you say "wow". But that's not the way it should be, the music should stay in focus not the reproduction.

Different people, different opinions, that's mine. This Satori tweeter in the WG300 does it not. Beeing a compromise too, it's adding air above 5.000 Hz instead. I like this with my old ears, but i'm shure other people coming to other verdicts.

Here are some measurents: horizontal 0-90, 0 vs. 15-90 and waterfall. Perhaps there's additional damping work to do in the midrange, but more later.

 

[headshake]

the DXT adds a certain kind of sound.

You can see it in the decay:

See how it steps down? I think this is what you are hearing. It is the part's decay that is playing in every sound decay. Compare this to a silk tweeter: