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Radical toe in once more

Hi all. I have bi-directional floorstanders, two way speakers with identical treble and woofer on the front and the back. Half of the sound goes to the front drivers, half to the back.

The toe-in of this type of speaker is very influenced by how the back sound wave and the reverberant sound behaves. These speakers often sound good with radical toe-in due to better room acoustics with a longer back wave towards the corners.

This is a huge topic, and my question is more restricted: what happens with the front firing sound?

Is there an "inherent" problem with radical toe in, when the main sound from the front drivers cross in front of the listener, instead of the more conventional setup where the crossing point is behind the listener - and if so, what?

Is this (potential) minus factor in fact low, if the listener is just a foot or so back of the crossing point?

 

Ag insider logo xs@2xo_holter
erik_squires
15,824 posts
 

I am just in two minds, regarding the front wave.

 

If you had never heard of radical toe-in you'd be happy?  Then pretend you don't know what it is and keep things conventional.

ozzy's avatar
ozzy
7,230 posts
 

Interesting topic. I will (hopefully) have new speakers next week. They are of the Planar/ribbon design. I have been told that they should be placed with no toe in, no absorptive materials behind them or at 1st reflection points and place them about 4-5 feet from the wall that is behind the speakers.

Very new concept for me, so, I shall see what this leads to.

ozzy

stringreen's avatar
stringreen
6,372 posts
 

disconnect the back firing speaker

asvjerry's avatar
asvjerry
4,327 posts
 

Dipoles and omnis have their own set of 'feeding habits', esp. in the spaces one makes the habitat....but half the fun (or in some cases, frustration) is like the real estate mantra:

"Location, location, location."

Omnis don't 'toe anything', whereas dipoles in irregular spaces are the polar opposite....pun intended...

...and crippling a speaker on purpose?  Voids warranties on contact, so keep that to older or 'vintage'...

I disconnected the tweets, mids, and xover in a pair of 3ways, but only wanted the woofers (which explains them being upside down....). 😏😉

salc
32 posts
 

Regarding planar/ribbon speakers.  I have the Magnepan 20s that are located 5 ff from the back wall with diffusers (also highly recommended).  With regard to toe-in Magnepan recommends  in its operating manual that the tweeter should not be closer to the listening postion than the base section whether the tweeter is on the inside or the outside.  I have played with the tweeter on the inside and the outside.  On the inside the toe-in is more dramatic.  The sound becomes a preference either larger sweet spot sound stage with the tweeters on the outside vs imaging with them on the inside.  Frustrating and fun process

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