Nola

You're going to have to raise your woofer/mid crossover point on the AA's, so you'll have to change the midrange cap and the woofer inductor. If you've ever thought of attenuating the midrange a bit by dropping a atp on the autoformer, now would be the time to try it (since you need a new midrange cap anyway).

 Blvdre

Thanx for your post, but I don't understand your advice :(

I am a total novice at this crossover network stuff. I think I know what an inductor is, but wouldn't bet a beer on it. I think many who read these posts are similarly clueless.

There are many very knowledgable people on the forum about these things. However, I am not one of them. At work, I can find folks who can explain a diagragm to me, but I need the concrete information to show them first. Changing caps, ok. Just tell me uF, where, and cost of parts at sonicaps or wherever.

Woofer inductor-where is it, what do I need to change it to, where do I buy it, and how much.

I don't know what, where, nor how one drops a tap on an autoformer, etc. 

Maybe the guys at work could explain this stuff to me, but the parts info would still be needed. (BTW, if you can fix levees......)

Thx from New Orleans

 You don't want me anywhere near a levee ;) So it sounds like you would meed to enlist the help of someone to rework your crossovers, or are you comfortable with a soldering iron? You may already be aware that Bob Crites reworks old crossovers; if you told him what your criteria is, i.e. raise the crossover point from 400Hz to 500Hz for Dave's trachorns, he could modify and update your networks. He could also attenuate your mids a bit, if you were so inclined.

 I can do soldering iron stuff. Thus, with a diagragm and maybe a few instructions I should be able to do this. I can also ask the biomedical engineers at the hospital and equipt fix it guys for help. If addl help is needed, we have a nice, but small, audio club here and the folks are super. Asking someone else to rebuild the xover will add a lot of cost. That stated, has anyone contacted our forum xover teams (Mr Crites, DeanG, Popbumper-I lost the number for the latter and never had DeanG's contact info) for prices and fix it lead time and bench time?

My intent for my Khorns was to buy the ALK univ. kit in a week or so. I can handle the $300 plus cost per set for 1 set. The ES at $1300/pr is too much for me now. He has a couple week backlog on parts now too. But I 1st wanna hear them with the Crites caps-back at orig factory spec. Then I will change out the squaker for the trachorns. As both my Khorns and LSs use AA networks, I can just switch the fixed AAs between spkr sets. 

I am making a big assumption here: if I can hear a diff with the wooden trachorn installed on the KH and if I like the diffs (for the money spent), I am asuming that a similar benefit will ensue for the LSs with the fastrac wooden horn. The trachorn is not a drop in change out on the LS. Mr K already told me that I have to choose the horn (stock or wooden mod) before buying the xover kit due to the xover point 400/500hz, etc. He said that on the alk uni's the parts were sign. different for each xover point.

Also, other "weekend warriors" with limited abilities will greatly benefit from more detailed info as it becomes available. I realize that the "full product development" is not done done yet, due to Qs on the xover tweeks, etc. But our horn-macher has done great so far, along with help from forum buddies and members. As the info becomes available, our horn maker will likely get very busy :)

Nola, going by the Klipsch crossover desin, these are the changes I come up with. However I prefer ALK designs better that take in to account driver inductance.

This is approximately the AA mid and woofer.

Here is the same at 500Hz

1st Order

500 Hertz

Contents of Shopping Cart
Image	Part Number	In Stock	Description	Qty.	Price	Ext. Price	Remove
	266-904	Yes	Erse Super Q 2.0mH 16 AWG 500W Inductor		$17.59	$35.18
	027-244	Yes	Dayton PMPC-10 10uF 250V Precision Audio Capacitor		$7.28	$14.56
Subtotal:						$49.74

This is one of many ways to mod your AA crossovers.

Nola, if you look at your AA's, there's an autoformer (transformer) with numbers by the tabs (taps). You'll see that the positive terminal of your midrange is connected to tap four. In that case, Dave is right, you would want ~10uF cap. If you would like to attenuate your midrange (some feel the LaScala mid is a bit too hot) you can connect your midrange's positive terminal to tap 3. In this case you would want a cap close to 5.4uF to keep the 500Hz crossover point. A Kimber Cap 5.3uF or a Dayton 5.6 uF would work. The woofer coil would remain the same at 2.0 mH, and the tweeter components would just be the stock values.

 Guys, this info is great. I will still might need someone to explain the partial diagrams a bit though, unless I got it correct below. For noobs like me, mod'd complete diagrams may be needed.  I will draw out the before and what I think the mod'd network schematics would be. Will also likely need a brief phone call to the horn meister macher at some point.

Do you folks think that the wooden horn as a squaker will also run "hot" and thus require attenuating by moving the tap and replacing the 13 to 10 to 5.4 uF cap? How does one determine the strength of the midrange? Was it by checking SPLs using test tones of certain frequencies? 

I have been a bit swamped preparing for a talk tomorrow. But in having to prepare the talk I sort of reconnected to my professional roots. You see, there is something I love more than this audio (expletive deleted).

I have the Crites caps and the trachorns now. 1st projects however will be recapping the Heresy Is and IIs, and adding the gasket thingys Mr Crites sells too.

Hopefully, I will get to the LSs and Khorns by Saturday, per caps and Trachorns to follow. For now, I plan to sit the tweeter fully on top of the Khorn cabinet and aim it towards the couch. Likely a Rube Goldberg doing at first.

I will test the trachorns with crites capped AAs from the LSs. (This will leave 1 set of AAs untouched for future sale, as I plan to put in ALK Uni's for the KHs) If I have to re-redo the caps on them for the fastracs, ok.

So for now, I think I know which new caps will remain unchanged - the 2, 2 uFs, so I can solder them in. The caps that will need to be changed out, I can alligator clamp or tape in for a temp cxn. I think that is only the 13 uF cap.

But I really want to hear the diffs the new caps and wooden horn make for the KH 1st.

 Nola, yes, you've got it - those would be the components to change if using Dave's fastrac horn.

I think the issue of the midrange level is a personal preference, not necessarily that the plots indicate a large midrange bump. Your question concerning the trachorn and whether it may smooth out the midrange is a good one. You could always buy both midrange caps, and swap them to see which set-up you prefer. Alligator clip leads would work well for this.

 OK

All of this is for testing ALKs TracHorn ? 400 for my Klipschorn. I am also presuming that any mods for the ALK TH would be the same for the FT horn. If I presume incorrectly pls let me know ASAP. I do not own the fastrac horn. But if the recapped and modded AA network and tachorn sound sweet, an order will follow. I will only test 1 Khorn with the various changes, so the other will be the unrecapped reference.

I cannot find a 2 mHenry inductor in the city of New Orleans. Pls let me know how that will effect the ? woofer. I want to test all of this stuff this weekend, so can't order parts in time without big overnight shipping cost.

During testing, I was advised to set volume very low, then work my way up. Also advised to drop to tap 1, then 2, then tap 3. This method of moving off tap 4 I was told was the safest. Also, I will be listening and switching between SS and PP tube amps during testing.

Because Mr Crites also sent me caps for 2 Heresy I and 2 Heresy II speaker recaps (in addition to the AA recap kit), I have lots of 1.5 and 2 uF caps that I can experiment with. The biomed guy told me NOT to run caps in series nor parallel. He said buy separate 5 and 10 uF caps for testing. An ultrasound fix it guy and a student said running in parallel is ok, as the voltages on the caps are the same or very similar (all are sonicaps). Also, internet searches on caps said ok too. (eg, http://www.play-hookey.com/dc_theory/parallel_capacitors.html). My plan is diagrammed below. For the 10 uF I can run 5 of the 2uF caps in parallel between new wires1 and 2 as labelled below. To test the lower cap levels, I can leave 2 or 3 of the 2uF caps in place (for 4 or 6 uF), or leave 1 of the 2uF and place 2 of the 1.5 uFs in parallel (for true 5 uF).

 What music is suggested to test out the midrange sound?

I would be happy to call whomever as well.

If all goes well we all win :))

THX

Nola, I may not be following you right, but the KHorn you are testing with the Trachorn should be crossed at 400Hz, no crossover changes need be done except replacing the caps with original values. The ALK Trachorn has a 310Hz Fc designed to be crossed at 400Hz.

Maybe I oopsied. I thought both ALK's and your wooden horns had the same xover. So for my current tests, I only need to replace the 13 uFs without toning anything down to 5 or 10 uF and the 2.5 mHenry is ok?

I guess, therefore, what I rediagrammed is just for your wooden LS FT horns?

:))

Yes, the crossover mods are for Lascala only.

 Non Fastrac comment:

I called Mr AL K about 2 weeks ago. He specifically told me that I had to decide which horn to use (stock Klipsch or his trachorn ?400) on the Khorn before buying an ALK Uni network. Apparently on his Uni, he has to build or part the kits out differently. So, by extrapolation, I assumed the same might be true for the AA network. I also posted on the mod board and if I can I will call Al K.  I also incorrectly assumed that "all wooden horns are alike". Oops :(

For us noobs, this stuff requires a chat over a beer or a steak or Jubilees :)