Open baffle speakers

@Coltrane1 our experiences seem very similar. The bass is sublime. Way more textured and detailed than any box speaker I’ve heard.

I honestly don’t know why a certain segment of the audiophile community has made it their mission to denigrate a particular speaker design. Variety is the spice of life and all that. I wish there were more commercially available open baffles (excluding ribbons and quasi ribbon dipoles). As it stands they are quite rare. I guess that’s the reason you and I have gone the custom route.

Maybe the bass is "way more textured" because open baffle speakers tend to use an accordion rather than foam surround?

I use JBL 2241H (18")  and 2251J (~10") woofers in ported cabinets and these have accordion and double roll, respectively, rather than foam surrounds and are extremely textured in the bass. I am not a fan of foam surrounds even if they go a bit lower. I have JBL AlNiCo 2235s (foam edge 15") in my L200/300 cabinets and the texture of the bass, especially things like stand-up string bass, can’t compare.

Who knows. Here’s the 15” woofer my new build gets. 
 

https://www.sbaudience.com/index.php/products/open-baffle-drivers/bianco-15ob350/

It does seem to have the same surround as the JBLs.

No not quite, though it appears to be a "double roll" rather than a simple foam. It would appear that your selected surround is "applied" to the cone whereas the JBLs are a "part" of the cone and of different material.

Of course the JBLs also have bigger voice coils, more tesla, higher BL, etc., but I don't think they are suited to open baffle mounts.

Another qualifier when I put these together was that there would be no foams to rot and replace, again at the expense of deeper bass.

@toddalin That’s very interesting because a lot of classic jazz guitar amplifiers also use Alnico speakers. They’re some of the finest tones to be had from a jazz guitar amp, of course powered by tube amplification.