Klipschorn

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The Klipschorn, or Khorn, loudspeaker is the flagship product of Klipsch Audio Technologies. It was patented by founder Paul W Klipsch in 1946, and has been in continuous production in the plant in Hope, Arkansas since then.

It is important to note that there have been many improvements in the Klipschorn over the years, including a recent redesign and "revoicing" of the crossover network that results in a slightly "sweeter" sound, and smoother bass than in the past. The more than four-foot (1.23m) tall, three-foot (0.92 m) wide home speaker is a three-way design: separate speaker drivers handle the bass, midrange and high (treble) portions of the audible spectrum. These drivers are the woofer, the squawker and the tweeter.

Two rectangular horn lenses coupled to compression drivers handle the midrange and treble. In addition to the two horns above, a 15” cone woofer rests in a folded bass bin compartment below. The folds open at the rear of the horn cabinet structure, utilizing the room walls and floor as continuations of horn structure, thereby increasing the effective length and size of the horn, resulting in extending the low bass response of the woofer.

The body of the speaker cabinet forms a horn, an acoustic transformer/amplifier. The “Khorn” shape is like a baseball diamond: the pointy rear is open and exposed, the flat front covered with a wood panel and the top enclosed in cloth. The speaker sits in the corner of two adjoining walls, using the walls and floor boundaries as extensions of the horn to extend the lowest bass notes. Technically speaking, the Khorn's folded bass "corner horn" can be described as a bifurcated trihedral (floor and two walls to form the trihedral corner) exponential wave transmission line.

This design results in extremely high efficiency. One watt RMS produces a 104 decibel per meter sound pressure level (SPL) on the Khorn, which is approximately 14-20 decibels higher than conventional speakers. Such efficiency requires unusually low watts of power. Concert level volumes require only a few watts. Normal volume SPLs require milliwatts. The Khorn encourages the use of low powered valve (vacuum tube) amplifiers, or high quality solid state amplifiers, where the first milliwatts have low THD, IMD, TIM and crossover or "notch" distortion typical of Class A and valve amplifiers, but which is more prevalent in common transistor or other Classes (ie: AB or AB+B) of amplifiers.

The longest run in speaker production history, an upgraded version of the classic “Khorn” is still produced today. One smaller model, the LaScala, uses the same two mid and high range horns and drivers as well as the same bass driver. The bass bin is also a bifurcated folded horn design but is free standing and does not utilize the room walls and floor as extensions of the folded horn of the bass bin, resulting in a more compact size with the same efficiency and low distortion, albeit, with slightly less extended bass.

Two noteworthy aspects of the Klipschorn: Utilizing the room walls and floor boundaries as extensions of the bass horn helps extend the speaker's frequency response down into the 30 Hz range. Because of the folded horn, the woofer only needs to move a few millimeters, FMD, or Frequency Modulation Distortion, also known as Doppler Distortion, is dramatically reduced. Additionally, the sound the Klipschorn produces is fast, with wide dynamic range and extremely low THD compared to conventional designs. It has an immediate "impact" to it. Aficionados feel that the sound is closer to live music than other designs. Khorns require a larger room than other speakers and strict corner placement.

As the only speaker in the world to be in continuous production for nearly 60 years, the Klipschorn has remained relatively unchanged since its inception. The midrange horn was changed from metal to braced fiberglass, and the tweeter was front mounted in the 1980s. Both of these changes reduced the already low distortion. In 2005, the company made some minor cosmetic and functional revisions to this legendary speaker, including the elimination of the inset collar, or spacer, between the upper and lower cabinets for a cleaner aesthetic appearance. A horizontal wall seal was added to improve the low frequency horn's connection to the wall. The crossover, which includes some EQ, had been revoiced in the early 2000s.