High Pass Filtering for Full Range Driver? (BD-Design)

by Bert , Tuesday, November 22, 2016, 10:43 (2705 days ago) @ BS

Hi BS,

I am curious if youve tried High pass filtering the full range drivers and if you can see any downside? I assume there may some some phase considerations, but I'm talking about 30hz -3dB point or similar, and I assume the phase would be more dominated by the room and placement, and the amps natural BW would also have limits.

I always use a high pass filter on the full-range driver to protect them from unwanted damaging movements when playing too loud at sub frequencies. Less distortion and more headroom too of course...

This can be done in several ways depending on the set-up (best compromise).

1) passive in front of the full-range driver (12dB @ 100-150Hz)
2) active (changing your input caps to a smaller value and perhaps a second one for a second order slope).

The first is most flexible but all energy given by the amp gets lost in the crossover not helping the dynamic range of the amplifier.

The signal for the bass can be tapped from the output of the EAR or any other amplifier you want to use or try without changing the crossover settings/EQ for the bass.

The second one would be best for dynamic range. Amplifier at first but secondly also the full-range driver as less bass is going there. Remember that this will also give a phase shift similar to a standard high-pass crossover.

The signal for the bass this way can't be taken from the output but only from the input of the EAR (after the volume control) or from a second pre-amplifier output.

Advantage is that the noise coming from the EAR will not be audible in the bass compared to the first option. If the amps produce hum then this will only be amplified by the amp used for the bass section.

Bert

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