I would like to introduce project that started ~1year ago, and was finished this weekend. Overall this project was very successful and I learned a lot of new.
In the first phase we measured original state to assess what aspects could be addressed and improved in new crossover.
Fortunately original crossover are easily accessible from the bottom as they are in the plinth.
Full measurements and story is here:
B&W 802 measurement
In the first phase we measured original state to assess what aspects could be addressed and improved in new crossover.
Fortunately original crossover are easily accessible from the bottom as they are in the plinth.
Full measurements and story is here:
B&W 802 measurement
Attachments
Those crossover assemblies are very nicely detailed, it's almost a shame to hide them in the plinth.
Nice job and nicely documented! Do you have any thoughts about the 'hump' in the midrange response at about 500Hz upwards? B&W might have put it there for a reason. I suspect it could be a correction for a floor bounce cancellation. Did you do measurements with floor bounce taken into account?
I've listened to a number of the 800-series speakers over the years, and I always felt like the midrange was a bit too prominent, which I see evident in the original response. It gave them a very bold sound, but was unnatural. The only 800 series speakers that I felt had a more neutral sound were the 805 bookshelves. I wish I could hear these. The 800 series were some of my favorite speakers, and they did so many things well, but that midrange bump always bugged me, but I always felt that the speakers were otherwise incredible.
Measurement wise, original crossover looks quite......not right, and one would expect the sound to be dissaster. The owner has ~40m2 dedicated listening room, with acoustics treatment, so I think this mitigated the wrong sound balance from the original crossover. I did REW measurement from listening position, and one side has pronounced 500Hz area a bit.
The sound with original crossover was somehow split, it did not sound as one loudspeakers, and this was clear with some songs. Sometimes the singers were too much in your face.
As you can see from final version, we left ~500Hz area lifted. All of this was carefully adjusted by hours and hours of listening, and 0.5dB change in that area had large impact on overall sound balance.
The sound with original crossover was somehow split, it did not sound as one loudspeakers, and this was clear with some songs. Sometimes the singers were too much in your face.
As you can see from final version, we left ~500Hz area lifted. All of this was carefully adjusted by hours and hours of listening, and 0.5dB change in that area had large impact on overall sound balance.
Attachments
That was exactly what I heard. I attributed it to an elevated midrange response, but perhaps it was something else as you alluded to. Either way, it was evident in all of the 800 series speakers I listened to except the 805D.
In the final crosover I left that 500Hz area elevated a bit, but less than with original crossover. I find out that sometimes, probably with larger midranges, it is good, the sound seems to be more in front of loudspeakers, and has more energy and open sound, not laid back and dark. But this balance has to be experimented with, a give it a lot of listening hours.
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Hello to everyone!
New in this forum. Writing for the first time.
I wish a pair of informations regarding this post.
1. Is this crossover applicable also to a pair of BW 802N (Nautilus) dated April 2005 ?
2. if "YES" is this project available as a DIY, ie as a KIT ?
3. If "YES" where can I purchase it after evaluating the cost ?
This questions are asked for a simple reason: I have just repaired one of my 802N just few hours ago.
The trouble was the upper left bass woofer (BW LF Type) not more responding to frequencies above the 70/75 Hz measured with an iPhone sound generator. After many controls I realized the problem was a cold soldering in the positive faston pin of that woofer.
I have so cleaned all the contacts of all loudspeakers of both L/R units and re-soldered the bad connection with ViaBlue soldering Silver+tin wire.
Now the "damaged" loudspeaker sounds again great, but I am evaluating the replacement of the crossover that, today, has an age of almost 18 years.
I think all the crossover components have lost their original specifications and by reading this post I think the replacement with a new designed crossover will be a real upgrade.
Beppe
New in this forum. Writing for the first time.
I wish a pair of informations regarding this post.
1. Is this crossover applicable also to a pair of BW 802N (Nautilus) dated April 2005 ?
2. if "YES" is this project available as a DIY, ie as a KIT ?
3. If "YES" where can I purchase it after evaluating the cost ?
This questions are asked for a simple reason: I have just repaired one of my 802N just few hours ago.
The trouble was the upper left bass woofer (BW LF Type) not more responding to frequencies above the 70/75 Hz measured with an iPhone sound generator. After many controls I realized the problem was a cold soldering in the positive faston pin of that woofer.
I have so cleaned all the contacts of all loudspeakers of both L/R units and re-soldered the bad connection with ViaBlue soldering Silver+tin wire.
Now the "damaged" loudspeaker sounds again great, but I am evaluating the replacement of the crossover that, today, has an age of almost 18 years.
I think all the crossover components have lost their original specifications and by reading this post I think the replacement with a new designed crossover will be a real upgrade.
Beppe