Moving to Horn speakers


Hi - i am new to the forum - 45, living in UK.

System: Gyrodec/incognito rb300/Ortofon FL25, CAT SL1 reference, Lumley M120 monoblocs, Proac Studio 150s.

Whilst I am content with this system - I recently had the fortune to hear a pair of Lowther equiped horns, on the end of an 8 watt SET - and was very very impressed. The feeling of being there was outstanding.

I have also seen on a web site a design for a Voight horn, which looks fairly simple to do. I would probably put a pair of second hand lowther units in them(PM6C ).

My question is - my monoblocs are 120 watts pentode/ 70 watts triode - and even in triode mode (my preferred option) will they not be too powerful for the horns.

The end goal - if I found I could live with the lowther horns, would be to replace the monoblocs with a high quality,low powered SET (probably DIY).
laurencedwyer
The amps will do fine on the Lowthers. You don't need that much power, and will only turn up the volume slightly to get plenty of sound. You can do better with a low power SET, but you can do that later.

The main concern would be accidentally turning the system on with the volume cranked wide-open, or driving the speakers into compression at loud volumes for a long period and heating up the voice coils. They will do 108db peak, or so, without much compression, so limit the listening levels to that or below, and you'll be fine.
So long as one uses a reasonable amount of caution, too much power in an amp is typically not as much of a problem as not enough power. Having said that, my thoughts are that Lowther's are more fragile than most "hi-fi" type drivers, so treat them with a little more respect than you might normally bestow on a bigger, more rugged beast.

As far as power amps go, so long as speed, bandwidth, linearity, stability and class of operation ( bias level ) remain consistent, the amp with more power will typically sound better and work in a wider variety of situations. When one of the factors that i mentioned differs between comparable models, what you like best is strictly a matter of personal preference.

Twl: When you mention 108 dB peaks, are you talking at 1 meter, at a random listening position X feet away from the pair of speakers, etc... ? Sean
>
Yes, Sean, that is based on the 1 meter testing position, on peak. They start to suffer from compression above that level. They may have some compression below that also, but not real noticeable. Of course, SPL drops off as you get further away.