Dayton Designer Series: DS175-8 build quality review.

[johnnyrichards]

First of all, this drivers origin in the DVC series is very obvious. Five hole mounting pattern, the dimpled cone, the rubber surround and the frame style are all identical to the DVC series, if there were a DVC 6.5" driver.

This driver has some damping material applied around the area where the cone meets the surround. Kind of shiny, but somewhat sloppily applied. It's presence is encouraging nevertheless.

If you are familiar with the DVC series, you know how flimsy the stamped steel frames are and this driver is no exception. Purists may want to apply whatever homeopathic remedy to the frame to put their minds at ease. One superb addition to this driver over the DVC series is a cardboard "gap filling" gasket. The stamping process on "cosmetic" frames generally leaves a gap around the outer edge of the frame, which crushes easily if you get even a teeny bit torque happy. This is one of those driver features that everyone will love - yet is never called out in the literature.

Turning the driver over to look at the externals of the motor, the magnet is huge. The top and bottom plate are pretty typical however, and there is no back plate bumping. The vent is a simple hole somewhat larger than 1/2" in diameter. Understanding that cost is an issue with this series, it still would have been nice to see a little thicker top and bottom plates, bumping on the back plate, and a round-over on the vent. There is no other VC venting present, so this may not hit rated Xmax as quietly as some woofers in this price class. On the other hand, it might. I will try to run some tests this weekend on it.

It employs typical 0.205 terminals, and un-insulated tinsel leads. If the driver really will do 5+mm, lead slap may be a concern, but of more concern is the ease with which I was able to short the two leads together. I have had that happen before, and it took awhile for me to figure out why my AVR was going into protect mode. Some judicious application of tape or hot glue may be enough to prevent problems.

In all, the driver appears to have the money put into the right spots (I would rather pay an engineer to work on the motor than worry about tinsel leads shorting out, that doesn't cost me anything to address) and if the specs are backed up by the performance I think this should prove to be a fairly popular budget woofer.

[50 watt head]

Dude, you totally hopped in the car after work and drove all the way to Springboro, didn't you?!?

Awesome report -- can't wait for more!

[ryanbouma]

Thanks! Look forward to frequency response.

[Whitneyville1]

Johnny, I simmed the DS175-8 and was a little surprised. It liked a smallish enclosure of 6-7 liters ported, tuned to the mid 50's, and could turn on you if you wanted a larger box. Deep bass isn't these mid-woofers forte. Doubled up in a single enclosure, they should control distortion nicely up to nose bleed loudness levels, but there are humps and dips in the meaty part of the passband we'll wish wern't there. The 175 and 225 display a wicked peak around 150-175 Hz that will take a trap, it looks to me. The 175 has two fairly deep suck-outs @ ~900Hz and 1900Hz (5dB-ish). This may all be moot on a baffle. Frankly, I was wishing for a paper-coned Reference Series from the DS175 for $38 (even a GOOD poly cone), but until we get some mic tests????

[johnnyrichards]

Johnny, I simmed the DS175-8 and was a little surprised. It liked a smallish enclosure of 6-7 liters ported, tuned to the mid 50's, and could turn on you if you wanted a larger box. Deep bass isn't these mid-woofers forte. Doubled up in a single enclosure, they should control distortion nicely up to nose bleed loudness levels, but there are humps and dips in the meaty part of the passband we'll wish wern't there. The 175 and 225 display a wicked peak around 150-175 Hz that will take a trap, it looks to me. The 175 has two fairly deep suck-outs @ ~900Hz and 1900Hz (5dB-ish). This may all be moot on a baffle. Frankly, I was wishing for a paper-coned Reference Series from the DS175 for $38 (even a GOOD poly cone), but until we get some mic tests????

In that other thread, I mentioned I have my doubts about the provided measurements. The peaking at ~175 shows up on most, if not all, of the Designer measurements which leads me to believe it is an artifact, and not real. The pass band looks reasonably smooth to me.

[r-carpenter]

ARTA it Johnny!

[johnnyrichards]

ARTA it Johnny!

On the way Have to drag my 6.5" mule out of the garage first.

[mzisserson]

Looks of acceptable quality.

Simming some of these drivers they certinly will move enough air to create very respectable bass. of the 175's in an MTM, or TMM 2.5 way tower. The Motor according to Dayton's T/S specs also looks respectable enough to control their x-max enough to make them of reasonable fidelity/lowish distortion in the lower octaves too. If the sourround is any implication of their X-lim, they will likely be polite when pushed a little harder than they should be.

I just hope all of the above does not come at the sacrifice of increase 3rd order distortion from 1K+ since the sensitivity is only so-so. Kippel? My last speculation will be around how these behave at volume vs. small signal.... I am sure Jonhhy will have this cleared up real soon! Bring on the measurements!

[fjhuerta]

I can't wait to see 3rd order distortion on it.

OTOH, PE should really do a paper / poly RS series... IMHO.

[johnnyrichards]

I can't wait to see 3rd order distortion on it.

OTOH, PE should really do a paper / poly RS series... IMHO.

+1

While this series is a nice "niche" driver (it hits a price point that had either been unpopulated or taken by drivers nobody seems to want to use), what many many people have asked for is a non-metal Reference Series driver.

Imagine, the low distortion motors on the Reference coupled with a well damped paper cone ala Scan Speak... Mmmm...

[johnnyrichards]

Looks of acceptable quality.

Simming some of these drivers they certinly will move enough air to create very respectable bass. of the 175's in an MTM, or TMM 2.5 way tower. The Motor according to Dayton's T/S specs also looks respectable enough to control their x-max enough to make them of reasonable fidelity/lowish distortion in the lower octaves too. If the sourround is any implication of their X-lim, they will likely be polite when pushed a little harder than they should be.

I just hope all of the above does not come at the sacrifice of increase 3rd order distortion from 1K+ since the sensitivity is only so-so. Kippel? My last speculation will be around how these behave at volume vs. small signal.... I am sure Jonhhy will have this cleared up real soon! Bring on the measurements!

I don't know about the Xlim, that may be wishful thinking Mike. The back plate is pretty thin and there is no bumping. IMHO and experience, drivers with thicker back plates and bumping are more forgiving when leaving the gap. Plus, with the lack of any kind of venting on the VC other than the smallish back plate vent, it may start generating mechanical noise before electrical noise. At least, most of the drivers I have used that have similar construction have done so. Again, this may be better engineered than it appears, since I am not going to take it apart and look at the internals.

Otherwise, it does look like it will "put out" across the passband. I am a little worried given the drivers heritage rooted in the DVC series about high 3rd order distortion above of the midbass band, but we will see. Hopefully they addressed some of that.

[mzisserson]

[QUOTE=johnnyrichards;1820371
. I am a little worried given the drivers heritage rooted in the DVC series about high 3rd order distortion above of the midbass band, but we will see. Hopefully they addressed some of that.[/QUOTE]

Heh heh... I put a little goop in my cabinets to dampen resonance, why not around the VC/Spider?

You are teasing everyone here you know... Many are waiting with baited breath!

[johnnyrichards]

Heh heh... I put a little goop in my cabinets to dampen resonance, why not around the VC/Spider?

You are teasing everyone here you know... Many are waiting with baited breath!

Got the test mule almost finished up. Need to cut the ports, and glue the fiberglass into it. After that, it is a little while with some sine waves, mount the drivers and get the mic set up.

[Wolf]

The thing is- that's not the definition of the 'reference series' line:

"Low-distortion high-excursion motor system with 2 short circuit paths."

"Compliant suspension and rigid black anodized aluminum cone for strong bass performance."

"Heavy-duty 6-hole cast frame, low-loss rubber surround, and solid aluminum phase plug."

These are the design mantra behind the RS drivers.

Now if they wanted to make a paperref or polyref line, then it would not be called 'reference series', nor would it be included in that line. They'd have to call it something else.

Later,
Wolf

[Mark65]

But we had this discussion, and the RS28F is a silk dome. If they can make that concession, then a paper or poly cone for the RS motor and frame is not that big of a stretch.

Oh, and cheaper, I'd wager...


I'm firmly in the "I want a paper/poly cone RS woofer" camp. And, as you already know, I'd like it to be available sans phase plug.


Wishful thinking, I know, but a man can dream....



Mark

[johnnyrichards]

Nomenclature aside, a non-metal driver sharing many characteristics of the Reference series seems to be something a lot of people want.

Listening to the DS175 full range in the test mule right now. Hmmm... Not terrible running full range. Not terrible at all. Just running her in before I grab measurements.

[Taterworks]

I agree that I'd like to see a non-metallic cone driver added to the Dayton Reference series, and as long as the same style frames and motors are used I don't think a non-metallic cone would be outside the product definition of the Reference Series. I think the ideal cone material would be a mix of paper and carbon fibers, randomly oriented (like a typical paper emulsion), with graphite powder added to the pulp to crank up the modulus of elasticity of the paper and provide more damping. The purpose of this driver would be as a midrange or midbass for use with a pair of aluminum-cone woofers (since there's no better material for low-distortion bass than aluminum, unless you go for an expensive Rohacell/fabric sandwich) so the resulting drivers would have to be fairly efficient (rather than a high-damping, low Fs design like we currently have). These hypothetical carbon-paper-cone midrange drivers would only really be needed in the 4", 5.25", and 6.5" size classes. For a project I'm developing, I'm having to go to the Scan Speak Discovery line for a suitable 5.25" cone midrange driver (which isn't a problem, since they have exactly what I need).

I think I'd feel let down if a 'paper' Reference series midbass driver had 'just' a paper cone, or 'just' a poly cone -- there are manufacturers out there who are pushing the materials engineering of paper-composite cones even further, like Venture Audio which uses an abaca fiber pulp and graphite-powder composite, and SB Acoustics who use a reed-paper emulsion. With the industry clout that Parts Express has, they should be able to obtain samples of more exotic materials from their suppliers and put that sort of materials science to work for us.

[Wolf]

Something tells me that this avenue has already been explored a bit too.
I have some Dayton prototypes that have woven fiber cones, and also a set of honeycomb sandwich types. They have the same frames and motors as the RS series, so it may have been an option at one time in the development process. Shawn has a set of aluminum RS-proto drivers that are unanodized, and have a metal convex dustcap.

The thing is- we were also told we would be getting RSS PR's, and I've not seen them.

I have it on good authority, that the RS28F took a *LOT* of nudging to happen, and the idea was rejected more than once. The DIY masses were lucky it even came out at all, and it was due to the mantra I stated above as being their reasoning for not doing it initially. It just didn't fit the design/line criteria. Being that fact, it'll be harder to get that point across for more drivers, unless there are more than 4-5 people wanting them anyway.

I'm not saying the premise is not viable, but I am saying that the forthcoming release of such a product better not have you inhaling without exhaling in hopes for it.

I also suspect that Dayton may try a higher-end (higher than RS) product down the road, since they're Klippeling everything now. It wouldn't surprise me.

Later,
Wolf

[donradick]

+1

While This Series Is A Nice "niche" Driver (it Hits A Price Point That Had Either Been Unpopulated Or Taken By Drivers Nobody Seems To Want To Use), What Many Many People Have Asked For Is A Non-metal Reference Series Driver.

Imagine, The Low Distortion Motors On The Reference Coupled With A Well Damped Paper Cone Ala Scan Speak... Mmmm...

+10 Yes!

[Paul Carmody]

I believe one thing that makes possible such high-quality, inexpensive drivers like the Dayton RS, the Zaph ZA14, and the Fountek FW series is that the aluminum cones are very inexpensive. Think about it; you take a stock roll of sheet aluminum, and stamp it. Done. Other cones require specialized materials and molds and curing processes, not to mention damping compounds.

I could be wrong, but I have a strong hunch that, once you change the cone material to something more expensive to produce, the price goes up dramatically.