What's up with tweeters?

[jeremy c]

Talking 'bout those little horn things in the middle of 4x10 cabinets.

 

The tweeters seem to be very, very directional. The speakers are not. If you stand in front of your cabinet everything sounds really snappy. If you step off-axis, you can't hear the tweeter anymore. But you can hear the speakers everywhere in the room.

 

Does this mean that the tweeter is useless except for the people who are in a direct line in front of your cabinet? And if you are standing in front of the cab, then you are blocking the sound from them? Should we turn off the tweeter and try to get our sound without it? Or is it just there so we can hear ourself on stage and we shouldn't really take it into consideration when tweaking our "room" sound?

 

People want to know the answers to these and many other questions.

[hags2k]

I am not sure if this is EXACTLY related, but when I was reading through a guide to setting up one of my amps, it suggested that in order to get the eq settings right, I should stand off axis by 45 degrees and get the desired levels from that perspective. In that case, I ended up adjusting the tweeter a bit higher than I normally would have, since I am quite often practicing directly in front of my amp. This very well could be recommended because tweeters sound more directionally than lower frequencies from the main speakers.

 

Personally, I think it really does help to do it that way, and I think my bass sounds better when listening form a distance and not right up on the sucker. Of course, it's been my experience that EVERYTHING sounds tonally different when you're right next to the speaker as opposed to being out in the audience. So, now when I practice by myself, i set my amps for the best sound right up close, but when performing, I generally compensate and increase the tweeter and treble levels quite a bit, and standing off axis seems to be a reasonably effective method for judging the sound.

[_Sweet Willie_]

I think I read somewhere that this is why some players prefer the horns that are flared rectangles -- dispersing the high-end better than some other horn choices.

 

This may also be why greenboy used to post about a rig that had the midrange and high-end speakers up in the air on a pole and the woofers below on the floor. (I'm just guessing here, though.)

 

It's an interesting question, though, about how we should deal with it when EQing "for the room."

 

Peace.

[Dave Martin]

I truly dislike using tweeters; The one on my Super Redhead worked for about 2 minutes - long enough for me to figure out how to turn it off.

[pumpcat]

Originally posted by Dave Martin:

I truly dislike using tweeters

Amen.

I realize that it is a personal tone thing that some players like, but I just can't stand that clickity-clackity sound. And don't even try to use OD/distortion with a tweeter, unless you like that swarm of mosquitos sound.

[dcr]

Tweeters & horns are evil. There are far more cost-effective ways to introduce hiss into your sound, if that's what you want.

 

I wish cabinet makers who put in tweeters would also put in an enable/disable switch. (SWR does this on their WM series, I know. Nice.)

[_Sweet Willie_]

Originally posted by jeremyc:

Does this mean that the tweeter is useless except for the people who are in a direct line in front of your cabinet? And if you are standing in front of the cab, then you are blocking the sound from them? Should we turn off the tweeter and try to get our sound without it? Or is it just there so we can hear ourself on stage and we shouldn't really take it into consideration when tweaking our "room" sound?

 

Just wanted to put in a reminder about the original question, with patience and love to the horn-ranters. (I don't think that horns/tweeters are an awful, terrible thing. I do tend to turn the one in my Super Redhead down quite a bit, but not off.)

 

The quality and type of tweeter/horn does seem to matter. I certainly did not feel the need to turn down the two tweeters in the AccuGroove cabs I've played. I was standing in front of the cabs while playing them, though, so I don't know how I would've heard them had I been off-axis.

 

Tweeters and horns are different animals, right? Can anyone discuss the differences and how those differences may or may not relate to the directionality of high freqs?

 

Peace.

[Wally Malone]

Agreeing with Willie, there's a difference with tweeters in the Accugroove and the compression drivers in cabs like Eden and SWR. When using Eden cabs I always turn it down some, when using the Accugrooves I've never had to turn them down as the tone is not as brittle as the others. To answer Jeremy's question, if one biamps it seems that the sound one gets sounds the best to the player that it is standing right next to the amp where someone in the audience would benefit from playing full range. It seems this may be similar and

related to tweeter and horn usage. Maybe Whappo will chime in if he see's this one.

 

Wally

[Dave Martin]

My understanding is that the piezo weeters don't really even need an external crossover, since they simply won't pass signal below a certain frequency. Horns, on the other hand, will try to reproduce whatever they're given, and will blow up under the influence of low frequencies. The crossover keeps those frequencies from getting to the horn.

 

Also, piezo tweeters are short range; depending on the shape of the horn, a horn tweeter is not.

[orphan wells]

Most of the compression tweeters i have used sound like crap, especiall Carvin. I have used mostly compression tweeters like the ones that come one Eden, SWR, and Ampeg. I hear that the soft textile tweeters like Accugroove uses and the co-axil tweeter that Bag End uses are much more pleasing. I really want to get a cab with a great sounding tweeter because in play alot of slap and i want that snap with out sounding brittle. any cab suggestions?

[getz out]

Originally posted by Sweet Willie:

The quality and type of tweeter/horn does seem to matter. I certainly did not feel the need to turn down the two tweeters in the AccuGroove cabs I've played. I was standing in front of the cabs while playing them, though, so I don't know how I would've heard them had I been off-axis.

Agreed; I'm much happier with my Acme's combination of mid-range speaker and soft-dome tweeter than my Ampeg or Peavey's Fostex horn. The horn-type compression tweeters are knife-like. My Acme sounds a lot more natural, like a good home stereo.

[LizzyD]

Originally posted by orphan wells:

Most of the compression tweeters i have used sound like crap, especiall Carvin. I have used mostly compression tweeters like the ones that come one Eden, SWR, and Ampeg. I hear that the soft textile tweeters like Accugroove uses and the co-axil tweeter that Bag End uses are much more pleasing. I really want to get a cab with a great sounding tweeter because in play alot of slap and i want that snap with out sounding brittle. any cab suggestions?

Check out Bergantino cabs . They've even been known to turn some tweeter-haters around.

[PJR]

I like the horns used in the SWR and Eden cabs ( they are very similiar.....I know cus I've attempted to switch them out in my cabs. )

 

In both my cabs ( SWR Goliath sr , and Eden 2-12xlt ) the horn plays an integral part in the total sound that comes out of the cab. For me....the horn helps shape the entire upper frequencies and adds a bit of 'air' to the total sound.

 

I keep the horn setting at about 11am.

 

btw......the horn is very directional.

 

PJR

[...]

Originally posted by LizzyD:

Originally posted by orphan wells:

Most of the compression tweeters i have used sound like crap, especiall Carvin. I have used mostly compression tweeters like the ones that come one Eden, SWR, and Ampeg. I hear that the soft textile tweeters like Accugroove uses and the co-axil tweeter that Bag End uses are much more pleasing. I really want to get a cab with a great sounding tweeter because in play alot of slap and i want that snap with out sounding brittle. any cab suggestions?

Check out Bergantino cabs . They've even been known to turn some tweeter-haters around.

Whoever could you possibly mean?

 

The Bergies have the best sounding horns that I've ever heard in bass cabs. Super tasty.

 

Every other cab that I've played through that has tweeters, well, the tweeters get turned off.

[Tom Capasso]

Originally posted by Bumpcity:

The Bergies have the best sounding horns that I've ever heard in bass cabs. Super tasty.

I've spoken to Jim about this, and he selected his components to avoid that hash sound. We were at Bass Day 2001 and next to the SWR area. You could hear the difference plainly - brash versus well-balanced. And I've seen his tweeters (CMDN - don't say it) - bigger magnets, better quality.

 

I can't say that I've noticed the directional issues in my Berg, but I'm sure that they are more directional than a speaker.

 

Tom

[bspangleyahoo.com]

Back to Jeremy's question:

I believe that a loudspeaker can be approximately thought of as single source of a wave. The (sound) waves would obey the model for refraction from a single source which is

n(wavelength)/width = sin a where "a" is the angle of dispersion and width is the diameter of the speaker opening. What this means in english is that the lower frequencies (longer wavelengths) spread more that the higher frequencies.

[Whappo]

There are those that like compression horns & those that think they are to harsh, brittle & unnatural sounding. Like many, I'm in the second category.

 

Compression horns were designed for PA systems because of their high efficacy & very low cost. They were not designed for bass cabinets, although they are used in most & are highly adequate for the job.

 

In the mid 70s, when no one else even thought about it, I was using horns in cabs, because I was always looking for a solution to poor sound.

 

When I couldnt stand it anymore & designed my own cab a couple of years ago, this was one of the areas that had to be addressed. Our solution was to use two soft dome tweeters.

 

Advantages; a very natural & sweet sounding high end without the harshness. Two tweeters also offer about twice the power handling of one compression horn (140 watts @ 8 Ohms) & a much better dispersion pattern.

 

Disadvantages; Cost! One tweeter is about twice as expensive as your standard compression horn & we use two of them.

 

I'm NOT saying that we are the only ones doing it right. This was simply our solution to the problem, while others have their answers. If you're happy with compression horns, that's cool. We're all individuals with personal preferences, which is one of the reasons being a bass player so great.

[rumpelstiltskin.]

actually, i was always wondering why there were two tweeters in your cabinets. i assumed there was a very well-thought out reason, but it's good to know what the actual reason is.

 

you can count me among those who don't like the sound of horns.

 

robb.

[Tom Capasso]

The heck with tweeters.....I want to put one of these in the box and make some really interesting sounds...

 

http://looneytunes.warnerbros.com/stars_of_the_show/tweety/img/story/tweety_link14_image1.jpg

 

Tom