DAL picked up where Duntech left off. JD said his DAL speakers were more accurate than the earlier Duntech designs because of things he learned over time, advanced measuring equipment, and his large anechoic chambers. Hard to believe that 20+ years later there still isn't anyone building speakers that measure as accurate as what he built.
Dunlavy resurrection?
I bought the rights etc to Dunlavy when Kenny closed it years ago. After years of design research have come up with an amazing evolution to the line. While I love the thought of bringing it back to market, and think there is a need, I'm not sure I "want a job" and don't really need one. If any one out there with an industry connection that might have interest in discussing moving things forward with my financial backing, send me an email at dunlavyinfo@gmail.com
Jim
Jim
38 responses Add your response
pryso, thanks for that back story. After a little search he was a true innovator with his antenna technology and extra low frequency communication. It appears he had an ardent fan in a recording engineer I worked with. He only used his Koss (green pro?) headphones for microphone placement and level, avoiding the various studio differences. In 1963 he helped me build a dirty and dry two cabinet electric bass rig. Some years later I visited his home and not surprising, were a pair of Sovereigns along with his Ampex R/R's, MFA and Wavestream electronics. The hoods were off everything. Thanks again. |
m-db, I don't know specific years but this is the historical overview as I know it. John Dunlavy started Duntech Audio in the 1970 in Texas. His top model was tested by Bert White for Audio magazine and after a glowing review White chose them as his reference speaker. That helped establish the Duntech name. In the very early '80s John moved to Australia with his company and expanded the line up. However one problem was the resulting cost elsewhere due to the size and weight of shipping most models. So around 1990 John returned to the US and opened a facility in Utah. One model was produced there, the Black Knight, which had mixed success. John encountered manufacturing issues and relocated to Colorado Springs where he opened a new company, Dunlavy Audio Labs (DAL). I believe he separated from Duntech then but don't know the details. He continued designing and producing DAL speakers until health issues forced him to sell. The new owner was not successful and closed within about a year. I owned a pair of Duntech Princess from 1990 to 2009, by far the longest of any speakers I've had. I had the pleasure of chatting with John a few times in Las Vegas during the CES in his DAL room. The two companies produce similar models in their line ups and Duntech continues on to today. |
I'm confused or maybe just history challenged. Weren't Duntech Dunlavy's original design? I'll never forget the stunning playback of our trio's raw taped studio tracks through Sovereign's at mastering studio. After the post production the Sovereign's also revealed the degradation the producer needed for the dialogue background.
avatar: https://www.stringvirtuoso.com/artists/lorraine-campet/
|
vine, while I've heard different DAL models I don't know as much about them as the Duntechs. My impression was that John cut some corners in producing his DAL models to keep prices as competitive as possible. With a casual glance the comparable models between the two companies looked very much alike, but there were important differences. The two best examples were drivers and cabinet design. I believe the DAL utilized Vifa and Scanspeak. Those may be less expensive than the Dynaudio drivers in Duntechs. And the cabinets for DAL had straight side panels, rather than step back sides for the mids and tweeter (even with heavy felt surrounds, less side reflections). I don't know about internal bracing in the DALs but my Duntechs had separate compartments for each driver and all were heavily braced. Each Princess weighed at least 180 pounds. What does the sibling DAL SC-IV/IVa weigh? For all that, while I never heard comparable models side by side, I always thought the DAL models sounded very good. I was just a bit prejudiced that my Duntechs performed a little better. ;^) |
Vinestreet, I built a box with a downfiring Scanspeak 25w8565-00 to set my Dunlavy SM-1’s on. I am using a simple 14.5mH coil for crossover currently-I am surprised how good it sounds. I am using them as surrounds and Dirac Live mops up what I lack in know how. I have played with a Zobel to flatten impedance a bit but I honestly did t notice much of a difference.... Any tips? |
If you want to know what's special about Dunlavy speakers, click on the link and goto the bottom of the page to the "waterfall" plot. This is the cleanest I've seen (a late-gen Wilson Watt had a similarly clean graph albiet with a lower amplitude). Another element of this speaker's sound is the tight (hand adjusted) matching of driver/crossover components. From Stereophile: "Pair matching: better than ±0.5dB up to 15kHz." Comparing the response of both test speakers. Amazing. Dunlavy Audio Laboratories SC-IV loudspeaker Measurements | Stereophile.com |
Evolution in design entails not using incredibly cheap cabinets, 39 dollar tweeters, entry level capacitors and ceramic resistors. I helped in the design of the SC3a. That was my inroad to buying the company. I have a background in electrical engineering. I'm quite aware of John and his accomplishments. I knew him for over 10 years. |
vine, I owned and enjoyed a pair of Duntech Princess (older sibling to the SC-IV/a) for 19 years. No problem with the Dynaudio tweeter in all that time. After John moved back to the US and opened DAL I spoke with him a few times at the Vegas CES. He was an old school engineer and did not believe in "exotic" components. Seeing how complex the crossover was in my Princesses (visual look, I'm not an engineer) I always wondered if better parts might have offered improvements to an already wonderful speaker. Regarding resurrecting DAL, I can foresee two problems. The obvious one being the size and weight of most of his models. It seems that trends are demanding smaller speakers. Whatever market that still exists for such large speakers may already be filled by current companies. Also there is how much shipping costs have increased. JD initially moved back to the US from OZ to build a new Duntech model in the US to save shipping costs so it could be priced more competitively. When that failed he separated from Duntech and opened DAL. I offer that only as an example of impacts of distribution costs. The other problem is potentially what "evolution" in design have you developed? Have you retained John's basic critical time/phase principles? If not then you really wouldn't have a new Dunlavy speaker. |
Visually and audibly wicked speakers. If this comes to a start, please take care of the customers. the customers are why a company is in business. Offer a good solid warranty and make service priority, then the customers will be lined up to purchase. treat hard working customers like the old company, and it will end up the same way as the first. A friend of a friend owned a pair, they were impressive to say the least. Hope everything works out for you! such a cool business to get into. |
Looks like the question is: How much maintenance are you willing to do for great sound? We know the requirements of tube amps, i.e., tubes wear out and need replacing. Is great sound worth swapping out tweeters every year or so? I still remember my audition of SC-IVa's many years ago as one of the most impressive moments of my listening journey. Everything was simply "Right" (Listening to Sade's "Stronger Than Pride"). |
Hi @sedgewick , Unfortunately Dunlavy is not the only speaker maker who used 1st order filters and suffered reliability issues as a result. Some more than others. The issue isn't merely the filter order (1st, 2nd, etc) but also the cutoff frequency. The lower the f the more power / displacement the tweeter will be subjected to. I think this probably has a lot to do with Gryphon and their choice of using AMT's. The good one's have remarkable power handling and are nearly indestructible. I'm not sure what their filter topology is though, last I read they were using something Duelund had come up with . Best, E |
If you do resurrect, please please please put a tweeter in them that was actually designed to be used with a first order crossover. I had a pair of scvVI’s , huge monsters that weighed around 500lb each, that blew tweeters like there was no tomorrow. When old John was around, he actually sent me 5 matched pairs. These tweeters were meant to be used with 2nd order crossovers or above, certainly not 1st. They just received far too much upper mid to play at higher levels. Their sound was awesome though, I’d still have them today if their power handling was realistic for their size. I had the same trouble with their centre channel (ccv?), and also scvII’s used as surrounds in a 5.1 av system. Once you cut into all that thick felt covering the tweeter surrounds, I became an expert at tweeter installation, even though the centre channel was 8’ off the ground! |
I'm probably one of the biggest fans ever of the Dunlavy speaker line up. I own almost every model that was produced. I've had to do some maintenance on some of the units, but for the most part they have given me years of nothing but listening pleasure. Best wishes on getting them back on the market. Would be great to see them back into the high end mainstream. |
Why not talk to http://www.tyleracoustics.com/. Mr. Tyler already makes some fine speakers and, obviously, has the infrastructure in place. Seems like a natural fit. Good luck! |
| Post removed |