Volti does it again!

@lucera   Yes, please keep rambling - I'm curious to hear your thoughts on the Jubilee and the reasons for the Klipsch horn design.   Also, how does the throat size compare in the Lucera and the Rival?  

Currently all Volti speakers utilize midrange horns with 2" throats.

I’m fortunate that I found a very nice sounding midrange horn with a 2" throat that I can buy for the Razz and the Lucera. Having a supplier for those midrange horns is a big part of being able to keep the costs down. It is very time-consuming and expensive to build midrange horns out of wood.

One of things you are paying for when you move up to the Rival is the hand-made wooden midrange horns.

I do like wooden midrange horns, but the wood material the horn is made out of has only a little effect, if any on the sound quality. What I gain by building midrange horns from wood, is that I can control the size and shape of the horn to suit the particular speaker design and integration with the other drivers in the speaker.

To date, I have myself, built over 1500 wooden midrange horns. With that experience I’ve learned what makes a great sounding midrange horn.

Ah, here’s that big company/small company thing again. If I want a big company, well no more building wooden horns by hand. I’ll have to find a company to make us the molds to mold our own horns. Very expensive to do here in the U.S. I once visited a company about fifty miles from me in McMinnville, TN that makes these type of metal (steel I think) molds. Intricately machined pieces that bolt together to make removable molds. The guy who showed me around the place was very nice and explained the whole process. The cost estimate was $50K! But then I could make my own designed midrange horns of a high quality plastic. Yes there are different quality levels of plastic. Probably I would not end up doing this (for the big company thing I mean). I would end up going to a Chinese company like Klipsch does, because it’s so much cheaper to have plastic parts molded there. Even custom ones. But as I’ve explained before, I’m too old for such things and I enjoy building my own midrange horns out of wood. I’m building the first twelve for the New Vittora right now. The largest midrange horns I’ve built to date.

Greg

One of the most striking things you demonstrated to me was the difference between an of the shelf or typical horn, with a 1 inch or less throat compared to the two inch used in my Razz, was the lifelike and natural sound. Speaking in a normal voice, about 15 feet away, the difference was massive. Greg spoke through both and hands down there was no mistaking why the Volti mids sound just right. 

@doyle3433 +1.  Greg did that demonstration at the first or second Capitol Audio Fest that he exhibited at.  It's a pretty compelling demo.

I have doubts that something like a 2” throat diameter is the secret sauce to superior horn performance.  Horn behavior has been studied for many decades and a dizzying array of designs have been tried.  
i like the Volti speakers and its compression midrange driver and horn are good compared to most modern varieties, but, I prefer a number of vintage horns and compression driver combinations, none of which employ a 2” throat.  I particularly like WesternElectric horns and drivers, replica Western Electric drivers, and other vintage horn/drivers that followed Western Electric principles.