Posted by Duke [ 63.87.108.184 ] on January 27, 2007 at 15:22:30:

In Reply to: Re: Kits? posted by LAL on January 27, 2007 at 14:34:16:

Hi Larry,

Thanks for replying!

Yup, I wait months for waveguides. At just about any given time I have some on order - I just keep 'em almost perpetually on order because it can be a very long time between deliveries. And not all the ones I get are good enough cosmetically.

I started out planning to use custom 16-ohm Eminence woofers in the Stormbringers. I tried several different custom-made prototypes, and none of them quite worked in my application. So I went back to off-the-shelf 8-ohm woofers, and tried several before arriving at the Ciare. The ideal would be a 10" woofer, as that's a better match for the waveguide, but I couldn't find any inexpensive 10" woofers that had the other characteristics I was looking for. The 12" Ciare comes closer than anything else I've found near its price.

I've been quite impressed with the woofers I've tried from B&C and Ciare. Their published specs and graphs are reliable, and that alone is a great benefit. The Ciare isn't as smooth as I'd like between 1 and 2 kHz, which can be dealt with but the result is a more complicated crossover design. It's still better than most in that region (but not as good as the megabucks TAD). What really tipped the scales in favor of the Ciare was its bottom end - something most prosound 12" woofers don't have because they're optimized for higher efficiency.

Duke

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