Ocean Way Audio HRA Loudspeakers

[ddk]

Eeesh! Even big woofers aside, the basic horn cabinet requires big solid-state amplification?

If so, why I wonder why their big radial horn system is so insensitive?

I have no idea Ron, they might be sensitive but they prefer to drive the speaker with the same or same type of electronics for coherency.

david

 

[Folsom]

I have no idea Ron, they might be sensitive but they prefer to drive the speaker with the same or same type of electronics for coherency.

david

Even a sensitive horn may need way more power than just 20w for a theater sized room. But if they pad it down from there to more easily match, it would really go up.

A reason to pad down might be to stop gain from introducing extra noise.



I’d like to compare the O/9X to Dyanco A25 it originates from, as the A25 can sound pretty amazing. .

 

[Alrainbow]

Most likely to control the woofers not the horn ..

 

[christoph]

View attachment 67260






View attachment 67261 View attachment 67262

Holy crap, those are huge
I didn't get that impression from Kodomos picture above

 

[Duke LeJeune]

Ocean Way Audio has announced a new horn-based loudspeaker, the HRA. This looks like a very large, heavy and ambitious offering, using a 1" compression driver...

Beautiful speaker! I was very favorably impressed with the smaller Ocean Way speakers I heard at T.H.E. show last summer. ("Last summer"?? Sure seems like longer ago than that... a lot has happened in the world since "last summer".)

I don't have any insights into the compression driver, but presume that it's a really good one. There is way too much effort put into that speaker by a very competent designer for him to skimp on the compression driver.

Interesting horns! In my opinion the design of the horn matters more than the specifics of the compression driver. Not that I don't find pure Beryllium as sexy as the next guy, but based on blind listening tests I'm familiar with, the horn is the more decisive component.

That looks to me like a Radial horn, but without the vanes we often see. The vanes help with horizontal dispersion AND fine-tune the total cross-sectional area of the horn in order to achieve the target curve shape (exponential, hyperbolic, whatever.) Generally Radial horns have very uniform dispersion in the horizontal plane (where it matters the most) but not so much in the vertical plane (where it matters less). Typical for radial horns is a vertical pattern which generally narrows with increasing frequency. For studio monitors where speaker positioning can be optimized for an ear height which is known in advance to within a couple of inches, vertical off-axis anomalies are arguably relatively unimportant. Anyway I'm guessing that's a somewhat evolved version of the Radial concept, as it looks a little bit different to me from other radials I've looked at closely. The literature says "constant directivity" and if true in the vertical as well as the horizontal planes, imo that's new territory for that type of horn.

In my experience the MHM (horn in the middle) format is generally more precise but less forgiving than HMM (horn on top). The lobing error is more severe if your ears are at the wrong height for MHM. With HMM the design is optimized for being a little bit off anyway, and beyond that is geometrically more forgiving of ears being at the wrong height.

When tasked with building custom studio monitors, I have chosen MHM over HMM, and aimed the horns right smack at the recording engineer's ears. For home audio I have used both formats, depending on the specifics.

In my opinion crossover frequency and slope come into play. The higher the crossover frequency and/or shallower the slope, the more I'd be inclined to use MHM for home audio. But as the crossover frequency gets into the 1 kHz region or lower, the ear loses resolution in the vertical plane and HMM becomes competitive. And sometimes what looks like HMM is actually a 2.5 way, with only the upper midwoofer active all the way up to meet the horn.

My guess is that designer Allen Sides saw opportunities for improvement to what is a classic big studio monitor format, perhaps optimized for home audio. I hope he finds more commercial success than Usher apparently did!

 

[ddk]

Beautiful speaker! I was very favorably impressed with the smaller Ocean Way speakers I heard at T.H.E. show last summer. ("Last summer"?? Sure seems like longer ago than that... a lot has happened in the world since "last summer".)

I don't have any insights into the compression driver, but presume that it's a really good one. There is way too much effort put into that speaker by a very competent designer for him to skimp on the compression driver.

Interesting horns! In my opinion the design of the horn matters more than the specifics of the compression driver. Not that I don't find pure Beryllium as sexy as the next guy, but based on blind listening tests I'm familiar with, the horn is the more decisive component.

That looks to me like a Radial horn, but without the vanes we often see. The vanes help with horizontal dispersion AND fine-tune the total cross-sectional area of the horn in order to achieve the target curve shape (exponential, hyperbolic, whatever.) Generally Radial horns have very uniform dispersion in the horizontal plane (where it matters the most) but not so much in the vertical plane (where it matters less). Typical for radial horns is a vertical pattern which generally narrows with increasing frequency. For studio monitors where speaker positioning can be optimized for an ear height which is known in advance to within a couple of inches, vertical off-axis anomalies are arguably relatively unimportant. Anyway I'm guessing that's a somewhat evolved version of the Radial concept, as it looks a little bit different to me from other radials I've looked at closely. The literature says "constant directivity" and if true in the vertical as well as the horizontal planes, imo that's new territory for that type of horn.

In my experience the MHM (horn in the middle) format is generally more precise but less forgiving than HMM (horn on top). The lobing error is more severe if your ears are at the wrong height for MHM. With HMM the design is optimized for being a little bit off anyway, and beyond that is geometrically more forgiving of ears being at the wrong height.

When tasked with building custom studio monitors, I have chosen MHM over HMM, and aimed the horns right smack at the recording engineer's ears. For home audio I have used both formats, depending on the specifics.

In my opinion crossover frequency and slope come into play. The higher the crossover frequency and/or shallower the slope, the more I'd be inclined to use MHM for home audio. But as the crossover frequency gets into the 1 kHz region or lower, the ear loses resolution in the vertical plane and HMM becomes competitive. And sometimes what looks like HMM is actually a 2.5 way, with only the upper midwoofer active all the way up to meet the horn.

My guess is that designer Allen Sides saw opportunities for improvement to what is a classic big studio monitor format, perhaps optimized for home audio. I hope he finds more commercial success than Usher apparently did!

I agree, the horn defines the sonic ability and the design of the speaker but I find the compression driver contributing a lot to the overall character of the sound. Personally I prefer good old aluminum diaphragms to beryllium or Ti ones.

david

 

[jdza]

I agree, the horn defines the sonic ability and the design of the speaker but I find the compression driver contributing a lot to the overall character of the sound. Personally I prefer good old aluminum diaphragms to beryllium or Ti ones.

david

Aluminium does have such a lovely tone. I have had a long term love affair with an old motor with modern Aquaplassed Ti dia- I normally absolutely detest Ti. Strangely enough an aquaplassed Be dia I sort of enjoyed but not as much as expected.

But then as Duke said ,OK-ish driver in a great horn is great. Great driver in OK-ish horn-not so much. Great driver,great horn ,poor coupling-disaster. Remember the now mainly forgotten TAD 4002? Good driver, bad throat adaptor.

 

[Bjorn]

I agree with Duke that the horn is far more important than the driver. Especially with an active crossover and using EQ, the difference between beryllium and aluminium isn't big. That being said, I think beryllium sounds overall a tad smoother and can cause less listening fatigue over time with especially higher volumes. And obviously the driver needs to be of overall good quality.

Below is a proto of a commerical horn system (which will also include a separate horn subwoofer) that I'm working on. I hope to present it to the community here in the fall. It's a big horn system with constant directivity over a wide frequency area and low crossover. Presently it uses the Radian 951BePB compression driver.

Sorry for the foggy poor picture quality.

 

[bonzo75]

Bjorn, what woofer are you using, and approx what crossover? Is that active?

 

[ddk]

Aluminium does have such a lovely tone. I have had a long term love affair with an old motor with modern Aquaplassed Ti dia- I normally absolutely detest Ti. Strangely enough an aquaplassed Be dia I sort of enjoyed but not as much as expected.

But then as Duke said ,OK-ish driver in a great horn is great. Great driver in OK-ish horn-not so much. Great driver,great horn ,poor coupling-disaster. Remember the now mainly forgotten TAD 4002? Good driver, bad throat adaptor.

I'm trying to figure out what Aquaplass is, I have it on some of my JBL speakers and know what it does on Be diaphragms, but what is it?

david

 

[Bjorn]

Bjorn, what woofer are you using, and approx what crossover? Is that active?

Presently we're using Oberton 15NMB600. It's best driver we've tested but the horn works very well with many drivers.
http://oberton.com/en/?option=com_c...=122:15nmb600&catid=48:neodymium-loudspeakers

Take note that a horn on the floor is midbass horn. It doesn't go low and need to be crossed at approximately 90 Hz or higher in order to remain the sensitivity. Crossover between midrange horn and midbass horn is in the 500-600 Hz area.

This is an active horn system. It needs to be IMO in order to be of the best quality. Separate crossover and amplification.

 

[bonzo75]

I'm trying to figure out what Aquaplass is, I have it on some of my JBL speakers and know what it does on Be diaphragms, but what is it?

david

It is used only by JBL, so is paste of silica and clay that is applied over compression drivers and woofers to reduce resonances. How JBL exactly does it is known only to them. Do you know if your JBL have Be diaphragms, which JBL drivers. I don't think Aquaplas is used on Be diaphragms, it is one or the other

 

[Bjorn]

Aquaplass works well to reduce resonances but you add more mass and loose sensitivity. Beryllium is the best IMO but Aquaplass can certainly improve a driver. But again, the driver in an active system doesn't make huge differences as long as it's of good quality. The horn on the hand really does and differences between horns can be tremendous. Personally I only like horns when they are big. That solves a lot of issues alone.

 

[bonzo75]

Aquaplass works well to reduce resonances but you add more mass and loose sensitivity. Beryllium is the best IMO but Aquaplass can certainly improve a driver. But again, the driver in an active system doesn't make huge differences as long as it's of good quality. The horn on the hand really does and differences between horns can be tremendous. Personally I only like horns when they are big. That solves a lot of issues alone.

I agree with big horns. I also like Beryllium and TAD and Radian 950 are among my favorite drivers. I love the 950 in the hORNS Universum. though I also like paper and variants. I think the horn speaker design is more important. For example, if I prefer TAD or Radian midrange driver to Altec, I would not like a TAD monitor more than an Altec 817. But replace Altec in 817 with a TAD and that's different.

Are you making your own horns or are you buying SEOS or something.

 

[Bjorn]

Are you making your own horns or are you buying SEOS or something.

We're designing our own horns. Working with Don Keele. We have several large horn designs developed.

 

[ddk]

It is used only by JBL, so is paste of silica and clay that is applied over compression drivers and woofers to reduce resonances. How JBL exactly does it is known only to them. Do you know if your JBL have Be diaphragms, which JBL drivers. I don't think Aquaplas is used on Be diaphragms, it is one or the other

I understand what Aquaplas is and what it does just don't know if it's a JBL invention or someone else's product they renamed. I sent my speakers to Greg Timbers to look over when I first bought them, it's all new re-cones and he applied Aquaplas to the Be diaphragms because I found them a little too hot for my taste. I don't like Aquaplas on paper cones so none on the woofers. From what I understood from GT, the put that stuff Be too.

david

 

[bonzo75]

I understand what Aquaplas is and what it does just don't know if it's a JBL invention or someone else's product they renamed. I sent my speakers to Greg Timbers to look over when I first bought them, it's all new re-cones and he applied Aquaplas to the Be diaphragms because I found them a little too hot for my taste. I don't like Aquaplas on paper cones so none on the woofers. From what I understood from GT, the put that stuff Be too.

david

JBL had their own beryllium, mainly used on 476, 435, etc. Do you have 476?

TAD have their own, and others use Truextent beryllium, including with many JBL drivers. Beryllium can get hot but it is a bit like an electrostat. Very see through and transparent, and upstream can affect it a lot. I like it because of the transparency (both see through and to upstream gear and recordings), ease, and their resolution is highest for large scale orchestra is the highest. The music is just there. With paper, despite the lovely tone, it is the tone of the driver, and large scale congests. Though I am not comparing the same driver with diaphragm swapped, but essentially the beryllium drivers of TAD and Radian to other non beryllium, so there might be other things. Nuance is also very high

 

[Zero000]

Well they could use any compression driver that crosses between 550 and 700ish like the TAD would, but if they wanted beryllium to replicate the sound there wouldn't be much choice apart from Radian and TAD 4001. Or they might be using non-Be.

The radial horn is the most WAF horn among multicell, JMLC, etc. The GIP/Silbatone uses it on their 200k horn below. However those who have compared radials with JMLC, like Leif, prefer the JMLC for sonics. I heard the radial with the TAD 2404 but never compared.

TAD woofers are excellent on closed/ported boxes like the above, but I always find these boxes a compromise in sonics compared to SOTA

View attachment 67223

Have you ever gotten to hear these?

Massive dispersion in a huge room. You'd want something really wide and long. A great speaker for a 50 by 50 room I think.

Anything too narrow would be trouble.

 

[bonzo75]

Have you ever gotten to hear these?

Massive dispersion in a huge room. You'd want something really wide and long. A great speaker for a 50 by 50 room I think.

Anything too narrow would be trouble.

The wide dispersion is due to the Radial. I have only heard them or their variant in the Munich WE room. But that is a similar dual FLH I am telling you to build. It will just not have GIP drivers, and the mid range horn can vary. You can have a Radial, circular (JMLC), whatever. You can even rotate them like valves. you can also put your valve collection to use in amplifiers then

 

[Zero000]

They won't work in 35 by 14 IMHO. Well they will, but they need way wider to be at their best.