Not exactly "vintage" but Dunlavy's literally rock

audioguy

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I have been a Dunlavy fan for a very long time. I have owned most of the line (2 pair of SC-VI's, 2 Pair of SC-V's, SC-IVA's, SC-IV's; SC-III, SC-1A's' SC-I's). That I was a dealer for 5 years certainly played a role.

Like many of us, I was on the speaker hunt for a very long time. I had been through the larger Theils, Apogee's, B&W's and Wilsons and was never completely satisfied.

I then heard a pair of SC-V's at a friend who was also working with me at SigTech and was BLOWN away, went home and ordered a pair of SC-VI's. I was so enthusiastic for this product that I "sold" more than the local dealer and was given the dealership. I've been a Dunlavy user every since. The only thing that would get me to shift is moving to a more current speaker that has available replacement parts.

There are a LOT of great things about these speakers. Technically, they are spot on. Measurements (impulse, step, phase, frequency) are the best I have ever seen. Sonically, I LOVE the sound. They have been criticized for being to lean on the top, but I did not find them that way.

They have been also criticized for using inexpensive drivers. I had that discussion with John while I was in Colorado Springs and he showed me the measurements of the drivers he was using versus MANY that were being used in much more expensive speakers as well as drivers that some of the manufacturers wanted him to use. In every case, you could clearly see why John used what he did. Most of the other drivers had ringing (particularly some of the exotic material drivers), high levels distortion, etc. He claimed that if he were to find a better drive, he would use it.

The downside of his speakers were/are: (1) Not particularly attractive (2) BIG (3) hard to tame the bass in most rooms. This, I believe, was due to the woofer placement with one near the ceiling and one near the floor. But if you could deal with that (by room placement and/or digital room correction), you had, in my opinion, all you would ever need in a high end speaker. (4) Some of the drivers that might be needed for replacement are no longer available

I can honestly say that (with the possibility of a couple of notable exceptions) I have yet to hear any speaker at any price that does as many things as well: The big Wilson have better mid-bass slam; the midrange of a Maggie is better; the imaging of the Avalons is better; etc. A possible notable exception that I have heard were the large Rockports at a CES.

Any other current or previous Dunlavy owners out there?
 

Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Chuck

Thanks for starting this thread.

There are many who believe that Dunlavy speakers were amongst the best of the very best. Can you expound as to the differences between the SC-Vl's and SC-V's as well as their MSRP
 

audioguy

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SC-VI's versus SC-V's

John Dunlavy believed that the V was his best speaker. I did not agree. I thought that in the right room the VI was better. At the end, the V's retailed for about $15,000 and the VI's for $25,000...but could go higher depending on finish.

Both were 4 way speakers, first order crossover (as were ALL his speakers), sealed box design. The V's used 12 inch woofers and the VI's used 15 inch woofers. The VI's also had a large mid bass driver and mid-range.

The VI had that extra bit of "oomph" in the lower registers that to me (and others) was more life like. Both had the same efficiency (91db) but the VI may have had higher power capacity. The VI was specked to be able to go a bit lower as well but usually room gain over road any difference. The VI weighed 550 pounds (each) and the V was a light weight at 330 pounds.

What was amazing about the IV, V and VI is that on most material at normal listening levels, they sounded identical. In fact, at most CES's, you had to walk up to the speaker to tell which was playing.

There is an interview with John by Stereophile done in the late 90's that will tell you all you need to know about his design philosophy. See http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/163/index.html.
 

Bruce B

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Apr 25, 2010
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I know a lot of mastering engineers that still use the Dunlavys.


Regards,
 

mep

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Why did Dunlavy go out of business?

Mark
 

audioguy

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I don't know all of the reason they went out of business but the primary one was, in my opinion. lack of marketing and marketing expertise. They were at the opposite pole of Apple Computer. Even in Apple's very early days of the Apple II, they recognized the need for good marketing and had a great marketing team and program .... and still do.

The marketing guy that worked for John when I was around was a guy named Andrew Rigby. He was handcuffed in his abilities, almost never spent much time with the dealers so could not do product training, sales training, etc. In fact, until the very end, John NEVER did any advertising. A year or two before they went toes up, he did place a few ads in Stereophile. There were also ads in Widescreen Review but that was a deal struck between John and the Editor of WSR "donating" 5 SC-V's, two Tower Subs and one other speaker in exchange for advertising space.

I also don't think John and Joan understood some of the basics of cost accounting. For example, the pair of SC-VI's that I purchased for personal use spent about THIRTY HOURS in the anechoic chamber. Every single pair of speakers he built went into the chamber, one speaker at a time and unlike most other speaker companies, each crossover was hand built for that specific speaker and set of drivers and unless John personally examined the chamber results, the speaker would not ship. That's all represents a huge expense and that was not taken into consideration in his pricing model.

As good as his speakers were, they still needed to be marketed and were not. At the opposite end of that spectrum in the speaker business, one only need to look at Dave Wilson. While he certainly makes a fine product, without great marketing, he would not be doing well either.

The finishing touch was John's health. He developed dementia or Alzheimers and just wasn't able to run the ship, but lack of marketing was still what put them out of business.

Because we had a good relationship, Joan and John invited me up to Colorado Springs to look at buying his company. The problem was John's company without John was no company at all, so I chose not to move in that direction.
 

mep

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Chuck-Thanks for all of the insider knowledge. That is a shame on numerous levels. Dunlavy apparently built a great speaker but didn't factor in all of his costs for labor hours from what you said. Add to that the lack of marketing and you have a recipe for disaster. I have no idea what his overhead costs were, but 30 hours of a speaker being in the chamber taking measurements would be very expensive. Let's be conservative and say his overhead rate was only $75 per hour. That would add $2250 to the cost of each pair of speakers. You can't eat that kind of cost very long unless you have deep pockets and then it turns into a hobby and not a business. Bummer.

Mark
 

audioguy

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There have been and will continue to be other "John Dunlavy's" around. While John's IQ may have been off the charts (he held NUMEROUS patents in antenna design), he was at heart, a good/great engineer but lacked the necessary skills to run (long term) a company.

I have seen that in all aspects of my work life. Companies take great salesmen and put them into sales management positions and they are horrible. Or great Doctors who are outstanding had practicing medicine but can't manage an office.

A more recent example is the case of another good engineer. I recently purchased (after a very long struggle with the designer) an excellent and inexpensive automated masking system for my 2.35 screen. When I finally received it and got it installed, I realized how well engineered and clever it was but the documentation sucked. And in the numerous phone calls I had with the designer, I realized that he, too, did not understand business very well. As an example, he spent nearly two years working on the design of his product and those costs are NOT included in his pricing. I could go on but I'm sure any of you can think of similar examples, even in audio.

John and Joan had one other fault. They were very trusting. Without going into any detail, there was an individual (who is still around in high end audio) who took incredible advantage of them financially and that turned out to be the final blow.

Great products; great people but not great business people !!!
 

tdh888

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Nov 4, 2010
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Any other current or previous Dunlavy owners out there?[/QUOTE]
 

tdh888

Well-Known Member
Nov 4, 2010
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Philippines
Any other current or previous Dunlavy owners out there?
[/QUOTE]

Hi audioguy,

Im not a current owner of a Dunlavy but I currently own a Duntech C5000 w/c I believe was designed by John Dunlavy. John I think(correct me if Im wrong) started Duntech in Australia. Duntech is still manufacturing speakers in Australia and they're still making the Sovereign's and the Princess as special order items.They have a new monitor speakers w/c they say still adheres to John's principles Did you have the chance to compare the Dunlavy's from their Australian counterparts?

tdh888
 

Pryso

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Mar 21, 2011
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As a previous owner of Duntech speakers I came to know something of both Duntech and DAL. Hopefully I can fill in a few blanks here.

John Dunlavy's first Duntech speakers were built in Texas in the 1970s. I believe they were designated PCL-15. That model was reviewed by Burt White in Audio magazine and he adopted it as his reference. Such publicity got Duntech rolling.

In the '80s John moved to Australia and continued building Duntech speakers there with an expanded number of models. I owned one of those new models, the Duntech PCL-1100s, also known as the Princess, for 19 years. They were 3-way, five driver speakers in a 6' tall cabinet. The Princess model was the older sibling to the DAL SC-IV and SC-IVa. I reluctantly sold them in 2009 due to a need to downsize.

Then in the '90s John moved back to the US and opened Dunlavy Audio Labs (DAL) which offered similar models to the Duntechs but expanded the line with SC-I to SC-VI models, and eventually a few others. Due to age and health issues John sold DAL to another company in Colorado Springs which distributed (I believe) stage lighting. It is possible the new owner got in over his head and DAL did not survive a year beyond John's leadership.

However, Duntech continues on in Australia with revisions to some original models as well as new products.
 
Last edited:

puroagave

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I never owned duntech's but i have spent considerabl time with their flagship the sovereign, back when they were a current product. duntechs were the first high end speakr co. - to my knowledge - to employ the d'apolito driver arrangement and used 1st order networks (as do Theil and Vandersteen). That pretty much tied them to dynaudio drivers because of their low out of band distortion necessary with the broad overlap present with low order filters. dynaudio's raw drivers were never cheap but had their detractors they werent the most transparent and had a 'soft' character.

I recall the sound being highly dynamic with an even amplitude response. dunlavy was an engineers engineer and his speakers measured well by the numbers. I would love to hear a set of sovereigns again but id venture to guess they've been surpased by the vast improvements in moving coil drivers, for one.
 

DaveyF

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Jul 31, 2010
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I remember the first time I heard the Duntech Sovereign's, WOW was I impressed!:eek: Perhaps the first time that any speaker that I had listened to was able to portray the BIG swings of an orchestra at anything like full tilt. After an extensive listening session, I did notice some of the shortcomings, such as the images tending to stick a little to the speakers and a lack of top end air; BUT If it wasn't for the size of the speakers, I would have bought them that day. The other speakers that i heard that also greatly impressed me a few years later were the Dunlavy V's with BAT gear. Once again, these were so impressive that I was seriously thinking of buying them. The V's were spectacular in their ability to portray dynamics,so much so that to this day, i can think of few other speakers that I have heard that can compete with them in that area.
Oddly, when I heard the V's, I was struck by the similarity of presentation to my Hales speakers that I owned at the time. Shame that both of these manufacturer's went belly up:(, I suspect that if that hadn't happened, today we could really be seeing some amazing speakers from these guys. :cool:
 

Pryso

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Mar 21, 2011
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The Duntech Princess had Dynaudio woofers and tweeter and Scanspeak mids. I believe all of John Dunlavy's designs utilized 1st order crossovers because of his belief in time and phase coherency. They also had a wmtmw driver array to simulate a point source but they were not D'Apolito design since that had different driver spacing and crossover slope requirements.

So far as I know, none of the DAL models had Dynaudio drivers. Regardless of the Duntech and DAL rated efficiencies, I believe the DALs were compatible with lower powered amps than any of the Dynaudio equipped Duntech models. My experience with the Princess suggested at least 200 wpc was needed, and more was better. I've read reports from owners of the similar SC-IV and SC-IVa being happy with less than 100 wpc.

While I appreciated several attributes of my Duntechs, two characteristics were somewhat rare. As suggested they could present a very large sound stage (assuming they were placed in an adequate sized room), partly because they could be spaced further apart without leaving a "hole in the middle" like so many other speakers. Also they had a unique ability to more properly scale the music, from a solo guitar to a full symphony.

Like so many other speakers, matching the model to the room was important. Because my room was not overly large (20 x 17 x 11) I would not have traded my Princesses for the larger Sovereigns even up. I would suspect the same holds true for the DAL model range.
 

A.wayne

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I don't know all of the reason they went out of business but the primary one was, in my opinion. lack of marketing and marketing expertise. They were at the opposite pole of Apple Computer. Even in Apple's very early days of the Apple II, they recognized the need for good marketing and had a great marketing team and program .... and still do.

The marketing guy that worked for John when I was around was a guy named Andrew Rigby. He was handcuffed in his abilities, almost never spent much time with the dealers so could not do product training, sales training, etc. In fact, until the very end, John NEVER did any advertising. A year or two before they went toes up, he did place a few ads in Stereophile. There were also ads in Widescreen Review but that was a deal struck between John and the Editor of WSR "donating" 5 SC-V's, two Tower Subs and one other speaker in exchange for advertising space.

I also don't think John and Joan understood some of the basics of cost accounting. For example, the pair of SC-VI's that I purchased for personal use spent about THIRTY HOURS in the anechoic chamber. Every single pair of speakers he built went into the chamber, one speaker at a time and unlike most other speaker companies, each crossover was hand built for that specific speaker and set of drivers and unless John personally examined the chamber results, the speaker would not ship. That's all represents a huge expense and that was not taken into consideration in his pricing model.

As good as his speakers were, they still needed to be marketed and were not. At the opposite end of that spectrum in the speaker business, one only need to look at Dave Wilson. While he certainly makes a fine product, without great marketing, he would not be doing well either.

The finishing touch was John's health. He developed dementia or Alzheimers and just wasn't able to run the ship, but lack of marketing was still what put them out of business.

Because we had a good relationship, Joan and John invited me up to Colorado Springs to look at buying his company. The problem was John's company without John was no company at all, so I chose not to move in that direction.

I have met John D , i will be polite and say he was a bit thorny :) Dave Wilson is a much, much different person ...
 

audioguy

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Near Atlanta, GA but not too near!
I have met John D , i will be polite and say he was a bit thorny :) Dave Wilson is a much, much different person ...

He was incredibly dogmatic, 150% objectivist (not popular at all in places like WBF), brilliant, and his personality was anything but bubbly or "marketing" oriented. So maybe that's "thorny". I liked him a lot!
 

A.wayne

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Well when someone walks into your room and introduces himself by asking who the phock are you , its kinda hard not to want to bounce him out..... :)


Hell of an engineer ..yes , thorny basturd ....yes .....:)
 

mep

Member Sponsor & WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Well when someone walks into your room and introduces himself by asking who the phock are you , its kinda hard not to want to bounce him out..... :)


Hell of an engineer ..yes , thorny basturd ....yes .....:)


And what room would that be? Have you disclosed any industry affiliations?
 

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