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[Sam Jayaraj]

Has anyone here built Wayne Parham's 12pi bass horn?  It is similar to the LabSub except that it incorporates heatpipes etc.,

I am already very impressed with the performance of the Tuba24s, 4 of which we use together; they far outperform 8 x 18" Bass Horns.

So we are considering between the Tuba36(slim version downsized to a width of 27") versus the 12pi.  Any inputs on the sound quality of each?

Thanks,

[Joe Jones]

Haven't heard the Pi, but I've seen the posted charts from the shootout. It looks pretty good, but not much better than the T36, and it's a lot bigger and much more complicated to build. I've got a T24 I use for my bass and four T36s on my PA, and if you think the T24 is good you ain't heard nothing yet, four T36s are astounding.  

[Sam Jayaraj]

Joe, your report on the Tuba36 is superlative, the same that I have seen on Bill's forum as well.  Question is, what is the width of your cabs, the full 36" or less and what driver have you used?

Thanks for the input.

Anyone on the 12pi horns?

[Joe Jones]

I've got two 20" wide, which are plenty for mosts gigs, up to 500 seats maybe, and two 30" wide that I use for up to maybe 800 seats, I use all four only for the really big gigs. I've got Magnum 15LFs in all of them. The 36" wide version would be for two fifteens, too much for even two guys to move around. There's a guy who has a pair of 36" dual 15s in his autobody shop, in California I think, he says that they can be heard a mile away at another shop owned by a friend of his. He's seriously nuts, plans on building two more.

[Wayne Parham]

The size of the 12Pi basshorn subwoofer is 45" x 45" x 28".  If you don't use heat exchangers, it is no more complicated than any other hornsub, Tuba, LABhorn, whatever.  And really, the heat exchanger isn't all that complicated - It's a very simple device and easy to implement.  You can insert fill pieces to make the front chamber smaller (as I did) but you don't have to.  Response is made better with the fill inserted, but even without it, response is still smoother than the LABhorn or the Tuba 36.  That and you have push-pull configuration of drivers.  Since there are two drivers, it makes sense to me to take advantage of that to counteract harmonic distortion.

I am very pleased with the 12Pi basshorn subwoofer.  I wanted to address the cancellation of harmonics with the push-pull arrangement and I wanted to change the configuration of the horn and chamber sizes to make response flatter.  While doing it, I included a mechanism to reduce heat.  It all turned out extremely well.  And like I said, it isn't any more difficult to build than any other basshorn subwoofer.  If you're interested I'll send you the plans and you can build it and see.

• 12Pi basshorn subwoofer

[Sam Jayaraj]

Joe, thanks for that short detailed report.  Its helped me kind of appreciate the Tuba36 better, especially the various slim versions.  I am sure this would also help other prospective constructors.

Wayne, thanks for responding with some insights into the sound quality of 12pi.

I have made up my mind to construct the the 12pi Bass Horn.  Wayne I have already got your mail with construction details of your great design.  There are some parts that are not decipherable.  This happened to be a scan of your prototype drawings.  In case, you have some fresh drawings, I'd definitely like to have them.  Work should start in about a fortnight from now.

As an aside, I can quite guess the sound of the Tuba36s.  Bill's work is fantastic.  I can say this after hearing his DR300 which we built and heard today in a real rig.  Wow!!

[jeffhtg (Jeff Kenney)]

do you have horizontal or vertical baffle tuba 36 - 20"ers?

Also have you tried any less expensive drivers?? that magnum is pricey at 300$ish!

[Duane Massey]

I doubt that you'll find many quality high-powered drivers cheap. If you shop around you can probably find the magnum for less than $300, but it's still less than most other speakers in that class.

[jeffhtg (Jeff Kenney)]

not as much as a lab

[Russell Hartman]

Jeff,
I am the owner of the double wide 36x36x36 tubas, both are loaded with the new new peavey lo-rider 15s, I was skeptical of the brand myself, however these drivers are pure brutes. Driven with a Crown mt 1200 they are simply monsters, and yes they can be heard  a mile away at our friends shop, so at $145 per driver we are very pleased with the performance, we run them in our diesel shop in atl. Two more Tubas are in production at the moment...
Russ