[Duke]

Four 7" woofers and a catchy name that makes good use of my company's initials:



Seen here atop its dedicated LCS stand.  More information coming soon.

[Russell Dawkins]

Love to hear those! Very cool stands.

[jimlevitt]

Will this speaker perform well when placed as close to the wall as shown in the photograph? I'd very much like a speaker that would.

How tall are these, on the LCS stand?

[FullRangeMan]

Seems a two way Bose 901

[JLM]

Not simply stands.  The up facing surface on the floor contains more woofers/tweeters.  Check out the related "Zephrin 46" thread.  The design goal, to quote from that thread, "... based on Jim Romeyn's Late Ceiling Splash (LCS) configuration, which is used here with his permission, the idea is to get a lot of spectrally-correct, relatively late-arriving reverberant energy into the room without the room-placement requirements of dipole, bipole, or omni speakers.   The extra reverberant energy is fired from the floor up towards the ceiling, which gives us a nice long path-length-induced time delay.   This improves timbre, spaciousness, and the sense of envelopment.  The long delay preserves the imaging cues from the front-firing array, and then the ambience cues that are on the recording come from more realistic directions instead of primarily from the direction of the speakers (which is probably the worst possible direction).  So we get imaging and envelopment.  Additional benefits include eliminating the baffle-step and mitigating the floor-bounce notch."

The original name was derived from the cabinet shape and the number of woofers/tweeters.

[poseidonsvoice]

Not simply stands.  The up facing surface on the floor contains more woofers/tweeters.  Check out the related "Zephrin 46" thread.  The design goal, to quote from that thread, "... based on Jim Romeyn's Late Ceiling Splash (LCS) configuration, which is used here with his permission, the idea is to get a lot of spectrally-correct, relatively late-arriving reverberant energy into the room without the room-placement requirements of dipole, bipole, or omni speakers.   The extra reverberant energy is fired from the floor up towards the ceiling, which gives us a nice long path-length-induced time delay.   This improves timbre, spaciousness, and the sense of envelopment.  The long delay preserves the imaging cues from the front-firing array, and then the ambience cues that are on the recording come from more realistic directions instead of primarily from the direction of the speakers (which is probably the worst possible direction).  So we get imaging and envelopment.  Additional benefits include eliminating the baffle-step and mitigating the floor-bounce notch."

The original name was derived from the cabinet shape and the number of woofers/tweeters.

You're right. If you expand on the original photo above, you can see the rim of the bottom woofer(s). Very cool CD design. The array arrangement of the 4 woofers+tweeter is a great working concept.

Cheers Duke! Can't wait for more info.

Best,
Anand.

[matt.w]

Oh, that looks cool. Very much looking forward to hearing more.

My Planetarium Alphas feel downright boring and conventional now

[Folsom]

I can't do the Z. The 4 looks good, old school and odd. And... I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark and believe it sounds better than 901's...

Does the 4 box have any resonation treatment, that we can't see in the port/guide/things? 

[Doublej]

Is it just the picture or are the four drivers pointed inward towards each other. If yes why doesn't that mess up the sound?

[Folsom]

Is it just the picture or are the four drivers pointed inward towards each other. If yes why doesn't that mess up the sound?

Perhaps gain from their angle is to compensate for gain from the port/horn/thing. Their frequency range is probably low enough not to get phase issues.

[JoshK]

I can't help but wonder if this speaker was inspired somehow by Tom Danley's Synergy.  Obviously there isn't really the one horn concept, thus not the passband mechanical filter on the mids, but the angled in mids still seems like it would have some benefits in directivity and phase tracking. 

[raov1]

I think its a hybrid of the manipulated vortex technology and LCS
nice!!

[Duke]

I think its a hybrid of the manipulated vortex technology and LCS
nice!!

Yup, that's it!

Sorry I haven't been back on this thread sooner, but I was working to get the AK-47s ready for the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest.  Well, it didn't happen.  Leaving in a few hours for RMAF, and we'll be demo-ing the Zephrins and will have the new LCS add-on speakers there as well, but they won't be paired with anything.  They'll probably just be on static display. 

Dangit, I really wanted to show the AK-47s there, but I guess they'll be making their debut another day.

[jtwrace]

Yup, that's it!

Sorry I haven't been back on this thread sooner, but I was working to get the AK-47s ready for the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest.  Well, it didn't happen.  Leaving in a few hours for RMAF, and we'll be demo-ing the Zephrins and will have the new LCS add-on speakers there as well, but they won't be paired with anything.  They'll probably just be on static display. 

Dangit, I really wanted to show the AK-47s there, but I guess they'll be making their debut another day.

Nooooo. Get them done!

[Rclark]

I wonder how tempted people might be to set them vertically on the floor,  with no stand.

[Larkston Zinaspic]

The Zephrin Vortex!

Very interesting....

[Brian Walsh]

Dangit, I really wanted to show the AK-47s there, but I guess they'll be making their debut another day.

Given the product name, maybe the first word in that sentence should have been Shoot.

I'll be here all week, folks! Try the veal!

[Duke]

We're working on some refinements to the AK-47.  The original woofer did some things well, but I think we can do better, so I'm having some custom sample woofers made.  This project combines the MVW technology with an upfiring Jim Romeyn LCS array in each stand so it has pretty outstanding potential, and I want to take the time to really get it right. 

[Carl V]

great news
I am slow on the uptake & lazy,
what is MVW?

[Duke]

what is MVW?

Sorry about that!

The initials stand for Manipulated Vortex Waveguide.  It's a new type of loudspeaker enclosure invented by Steve Regier and Tom Ewers which draws on principles not normally associated with acoustics, such as vortex theory and fluid dynamics. 

Basically it runs the backwave through a path that's neither horn nor transmission line nor reflex box.  It's almost more like a carburetor.  The inventors have described it as a "frequency-independent virtual labyrinth", and that's probably a good description, but the exact equations they use are proprietary.  I was fortunate enough to be invited onboard because of my background in high-end home audio and crossover design. 

Over in the bass guitar cab world I compete against a builder who is licensed in that market (I'm licensed for high-end home audio only), and his cabs can do things that I can't do with conventional technology.  I'm hoping to do the same thing to the high-end home audio world that he's doing over there. 

Briefly the advantages include better dynamics and impact, and a feel more like you're in the presence of a live band.   I know that second phrase is pretty nebulous and marketing-speak-ish, sorry about that, I'll try to come up with something more quantifiable.  But the leading edges of the notes seem to have more POP, and the trailing edges have insignificant overhang because the box doesn't really use a resonance to extend the low end.  It's like combining the definition of a good low-Q sealed box with the weight of a good reflex box, and better dynamics than either. 

Here's Steve and Tom's website:  http://www.bigeloudspeakers.com/index.htm