Ohm Walsh Micro Talls: who's actually heard 'em?

Yes, Merry Christmas to all!

Peter, I do find that tweeks to Ohms can be interesting, and many have to chose to tinker and play. But my thoughts are simply once done, they really aren't "Ohms" anymore, but your own take on what you would like them to be. Nothing wrong with that of course, after all, they are yours to do whatever you hear fit for them! I do watch and read with interest, however! 

I also agree a bit on some of the build quality, while it may not necessarily affect the sound quality, the soldering and general shoddy workmanship leaves a bit to be desired, and the sad part is, it takes no more time or expense to actually do a decent job of it. I have probably seen under the cans of too many Ohms, and they all look pretty terrible in general. As you say though, ignorance can be bliss, and indeed, what is inside the mystical can.

More to come later. I haven't followed up much, just little off and on. I am hoping to get a listen to one of my friend's brother's Ohm Walsh 5000 system from Germany, which is their active speaker system. I do think active crossovers can have serious benefits if done right, and I am curious why John Strohbeen maybe hasn't exploited this here in the US as the crew in Germany has. Will post back if this all comes together. 

Frazeur1....

Thank you for chiming in regarding a few of my findings.
The thing that really got me when I first got my Ohm's
was why does the speaker have to go through so many 
"filters" before hitting my ears, let me explain a little further.
The tweeter and the Ohm Walsh driver has to pass (4) four layers 
of a passive filter media before reaching your ears...!!

A foam layer, a perforated steel can layer, and a fabric grill layer, you might be saying, Peter that's three layers....yes, but after they build the cans, and close them up they spray the cans black, so what happens is that the open cell foam becomes clogged with paint and blocks even more high frequency energy from escaping the Cans.

I always listen to all my speakers naked, with the exception for the
maggies. All of them sound better without the grilles period.

I will have more time this week to play with my rear tweeters
and it's amazing how the sound field collapses when turned of.

Peace out...🇸🇪

Happy New Years everyone....

Tuesday will be the day my babies will come apart, I will add dampening to the cabinet, color change, and a full re-wiring,
some new caps and what ever else I can think of....

Stay safe...🇸🇪🎉

Day One....

Surgery starts, and a few thoughts.

Any time I take something apart I have this feeling of doom and a sense of what the f.... am I doing.
But the feeling always get shrugged of' and a calm I can fix anything (or effit up) comes over me.....

A double Espresso gives me a shot of needed "Kick in the ass" and off I go.

To separate the "can" from the main cabinet is child's play, Four wing nuts and the innards reveal them selfs in all its.......?

OK so I know I had some resentment brewing as All I had seen previously was a black spray painted 2x4 brace and that was it                  *****(this is were I apologize for flying of the hook without looking closer)****

Normally you would see X amount of acoustic dampening  occupy the speaker cavity, but here you have a three inch thick layer of fairly dense what looks like compressed recycled denim insulation.
On top there's a few inches of polyester/Dacron fill capped with a 
fabric mesh. Clean and simple and helping the filler from caving in to the speaker cavity is the port tube and some cross members.

The port tube is four inches in diameter, but steps down to what look like three inches towards the end of the cabinet. The outer and inner tube construction resembles something called an anti reversion step in an exhaust manifold, a very smart way to prevent reversion allowing for a smoother and less turbulent air flow...cool.

Back to the bracing of the cabinet, as the rest of the speaker cabinet is pretty much beautifully built, they did take time to do some cross bracing through out the cabinet. A mix of soft pine and birch plywood braces from top to bottom is making sure the cabinet is stiff in all directions. I also know that the truncated pyramid/sloped cabinets do prevent a lot of standing wave issues. 

I will most likely remove all the filler and line some sound deadening material throug out inside cabinet walls, and the bottom
will get a layer off elastomer and foam to stiffen the bottom of the cabinet.

I finally got my listening panel together (my kids) to see if they preferred the speaker with or without the rear tweeters in action.
And......yes the loved it with the tweeter playing, alive, fun, and the best they sounded so far.

So the rear  tweeters are staying, and will be installed flush with the cabinet in conjunction with the Volume control. All this should look
primo and very integrated.

Back to the "CAN" staring at it I could come up with tons of cool ways to make it look high tech, stem punk, Star Wars, or what ever
super cool solution, but JS decided on Death Star black with no personality, oh well.

On the bottom of the Ohm driver is a perforated steel sheet cover.
why did he do this? The pice is ringing like a son of a bitch when you tap it, that can't be good in my book so I will remove it and hopefully improve the sound. 

The plate holding the driver is a 3/4" sheet of plywood and the "can"
is installed with what looks like sheet metal screws in to the plywood. It works but mechanically it kind of sucks. The idea is to
do a 3/4" plywood/ 1/4" thick steel plate sandwich with laser cut holes around the opening. Threaded holes will allow for much better mechanical coupling and adjustability.

The outside bottom of the cabinet, has enough depth that I can
add a flared port and some extra material to deaden the bottom a little more......

Any way, got to go and work on these babies for a bit......🇸🇪

Back for a little update....

Got the cabinets all cleared out, vacuumed and prepped for sound deadening materials.
The "Cans" are taken apart and I finally figured out how he dampens and in the same time allows the cone to vibrate through the full frequency range, pretty cool indeed.

The more I'm considering a new design concept the more exiting it gets.
The thought is to move the switches and crossover down in to the cabinet, away from
magnets/drivers, and with that I can give the driver housing a new form factor. I will retain some perforated metal but I will use aluminum as is much deader, doesn't ring and it's also easier to form and anneal.
There will be no "Can" but a fresh new take on how I think it should look.
It could be Carbon Fiber, or Maple or both with my new matte blood red color scheme.
my bud the metal guy was here for Christmas and we will build the horizontal brace
from SS fully polished, vertical stand offs are also SS fully polished. I'm also considering a belt line right under the grille wrapping around the speaker also in SS.

This will be one sexy speaker when I'm done with it, it should look like it come out of a 
big manufacturers work shop all perfect....

Going to bed, more tomorrow I hope, and I told my son if a meteor hits me
go in the garage find the stuffing, the rest you can figure out.....lol 🇸🇪