Point source horn flat pack kit

Update (June 2017):
This post initially announced our intention to create a point source horn kit. It generated much more interest than we anticipated, resulting in a more refined concept, PSE-144. We are now revisiting this original idea and introducing a new kit which is more budget friendly. The details of the new kit will be different.

I will be offering a kit in Australia for a limited time. This is a one-off run. You will need to jump on board right now, because this is not a commercial ongoing venture. Instead I will make this available to a small group, with a view to making this accessible to non DIY types and sharing CNC costs around a group.

If you are interested, shoot me a message on my contact form, and I will keep you in the loop.

Some preliminary details ...

Kit will include:

1. CNC cut flat pack panels – over 40 pieces of birch ply and MDF. 

2. Compression driver (optional). 

3. Dedicated mids 4” closed back
4A. Passive version – assembled passive crossover

4B. Active version – including filter details for the crossover  

Prelim specs

• Size: approx 900mm wide x 660mm high x 500mm deep
• Sensitivity: 103 db 1w1m (passive), 107 db 1w1m (mids), 109 db 1W1m (tweeter)
• Impedance: 8 ohms min
• -3db @ 250 Hz (estimated, but could be 220 – 300 Hz)
• Beamwidth: 80 degrees horizontal, maintained down to 350 Hz, pattern widens below
• 60 degrees vertical, maintained down to 640 Hz, pattern widens below

Options

I will be suggesting the addition of foam to the horn to reduce coloration. Considering offering it cut as an option, if I'm able to construct a suitable cutting device soon enough.

What's so good about point source horns, in subjective terms

This point source horn is everything good about horns - dynamics and slam, good match with flea powered amps, unlimited output. It solves all the problems with horns - their need for a large room, their problems with imaging and the tendency of some to artificially distort the acoustic image. It also avoids the harshness and coloration that is a problem with many designs, often leading to the use of certain valve amps to try to tame them.

There is some similarity to the sound of Martin Logan stats, but without the amplifier difficulties and with much higher output.

The imaging and wide sweet spot is similar to waveguide speakers like the Econowave, but there is greater resolution of midrange detail, greater clarity and the clean output goes to another level.

It creates a large sweet spot like omnis and open baffle speakers, but the image is sharper and more pin-point in nature. This means vocals in movies don't appear artificially stretched.

They can work in a small room and can actually work quite well placed close to boundaries, where other speakers become muddied. They also work better in untreated rooms due to their controlled directivity.

They aren't for everyone - if you like small speakers, horns aren't for you! If you only listen to casual, low level, mellow music like acoustic guitars, easy listening jazz and the like, you won't appreciate everything a point source horn can do. You may find you prefer a nicely crafted Sonus Faber in that case. Or if you have a taste for a very airy top end, if you've fallen in love with the delicate shimmer of cymbals on ribbons or other exotic tweeters like Plasma or AMTs, then you may find point source horns or any speaker with compression drivers don't deliver that experience. However, my experience has been that the point source horns play nice with a very broad range of music. They don't draw as much attention to their air and shimmer, but overall I find them more natural.