sundownz

Barely -- have to squeeze it with the speaker wires. Sean from Sundownonly.com is borrowing this one for a bit to give it a good listen.

The containers with these should be in the port of Charleston around Dec 20th -- depending on holiday delays to get from there to us they may arrive before end of December so pre-order NOW if you want some at this price

The containers with these should be in the port of Charleston around Dec 20th -- depending on holiday delays to get from there to us they may arrive before end of December so pre-order NOW if you want some at this price

As with the SA series we will be able to make custom drop-ins later but will not be doing much if any custom building of these from raw parts ; that typically starts around the Z line.

Then a few days later we got to an actual studio test with proper boxes built the boxes are just a bit over 1cf net and in this test power came from and old-school DLS amp break-in time needed was 2hours with the overall testing lasting over 5 hours, this time we had one of the Head Judges from EMMA with us.... he confirmed our initiall amazement and in short gave the following summary Sundown Audio manged to produce something near a miracle - a very strong, tactile mid-bass, amazingly detailed and firm punch coupled with a very pleasing mid-range the highs have alot of air to them and are very detailed so a perfect set for a wide range of music for someone who trully enjoys a refined, quality sound that can also be loud (when needed) couple of vids

Originally posted by Greg Kashin : http://www.caraudioc...ponent-set.html ---------- Ok, we got our comps in a few weeks ago, and were immidietly super impressed with the build quality and finish on these things - really a great set! So the initial listening impression was from an SQL-type install in a Toyota Landcruiser two sets on a Sundown SAX125.2 with a couple of SA10's sealed in the back for bass testing material was comprised of some random rock, blues and vairous club track that the owner of the car normally listens to as well as an SQ competition CD from the AMT Russian Challenge format the mid-range capabilities of the set inpressed us - well over 3khz with no distortion or harshnes the highs are equally amazing playing with full detail into 17khz with a beutifull sound....great silk tweeter (we actually had a few people request the tweeters alone for use with really high end SQ components) but the best part we feel is the mid-bass, being able to hit with authority from 62hz (even fresh out of the box with barely any play time) and deliverring terrific, detailed punch. The drum sections have so much detail to them on this set that we feel many hard-core SQ guys will love these So, overall - rock, jazz, blues are not a problem for this set-up..... the defintion and high level on control on any music material clearly indicates that alot of work went into development and testing for these. Also, the cooling and whatever else magic that went into them is really working as we found nearly impossible to overload the speakers with the current power on tap (SAX125.2 @2ohm for 2 sets) and they do get quite loud when asked this was more or less a short test, but I think many of you, who have had a chance to play with the SA-6.5SC can confirm similar experiences :thumbsup:

I am very excited about this line... a truly high excursion line at reasonable prices. I had a very particular vision with this line in mind -- I was not happy with simply making an evolutionary step from the SA line as our previous prototype from a few years back was. I wanted a fully new platform line to delivery truly GREAT performance. I think once the final specs are released and people see / hear these they will be a big hit. Another cool thing about the X series motor is that it can be pretty easily re-coned with many popular 3" coils from custom sources such as FixMySpeaker in case someone tears one up and wants to go that route Many 8-layer flats will fit the gap.

I will release official x-max after Klippel testing. As for custom configs... I do not plan to offer that "stock" on this line as they are "mass production" drivers.

This is what I am coming up with on pricing for these drivers : X-10 : $329 X-12 : $349 X-15 : $389 X-18 : $409 This is MAP from any authorized dealers (which is a shipped price). We will also have pre-order specials as these are launched; they may not launch all at once for reference. The pre-order price is TBA but will follow suit roughly at the same type of % discount as past pre-orders. It is based entirely on their cost to build and I have not figured in a single cent for the money spent on the new tooling or patent fees.

Obviously our tooled frames are MUCH stronger and have superior clearances. As far as the X line there won't be alot of benefit and it would add a good bit of cost; so the X line may retain the 6-spoke to keep costs in check and the larger lines get the new frame.

Our tooled 18" basket is at least a year out -- so we tooled the pictured spider adapter to use the 18" 6-spoke until then.

I don't see them over-taking the SA line at all ; the SA price-point is our most popular level by far. I could see these selling perhaps 1/3 to 1/2 as many as the SA series

Ok then. My fault. You can imagine my dissapointment when I thought that this could be the biggest series. I would like to see also the big guys in their new clothes. We have other threads with the Z v.4 10 / 12 / 15 up from earlier -- the final NS v.3 motor has not been shown yet. This motor is not as small as it looks -- it's about 4.15" tall and 7.5" around. Compared to the new frames it does look proportionally a little small

First video of the X-18 up. I've noticed some confusion about these testing videos; all of the drivers we test exhibit a similar sound at very high travel -- bit of a "whopping" sound is the best way to describe it. It's a combination of BL distortion (as we always push drivers well past linearity) , some mechanical (as drivers are a little noisy at high throw when not in boxes) , and also the camera mic itself doesn't do so well when that close to a driver creating that amplitude of sound.

Just got them in and QC tested them all on the bench; very happy so far. Still need to get them fully charged then run preliminary specs (have to send them out to do so as our magnetizer isn't in yet) -- but we are still stiffening up the surrounds so those will only be ~80% accurate initially. This is also the first look at our tooled 18" spider adapter piece ! On to the photos (video of the 18" is uploading) :

All the measurements on the back.

Check the back of the box they came in

Yes, you do see a little tape handle on the dust cap As for the "arawndark" name it came from a book; which was also made into a Disney Movie (didn't see it... but read the books in Elementary school) : http://prydain.wikia...rawn_Death-Lord

Once I get it in a box I will get some music videos -- our QC test track doesn't really reflect how it will actually sound. We just use it for this type of test as it has many varying frequencies and is pretty hard on any driver.

With that in mind the price won't scale as it usually does; we'll have to see how it all lands.

Our prior unit had extensive supplier issues to the point where we've just had to write off all of that work and tooling. In any event... I decided to re-visit the X-8 idea and base it on our SA-8 v.2 frame tooling. The first challenge was to make a GREAT spider for a 2.5" coil on an 8" woofer... which is difficult and we used extensive software optimization before tooling. Fortunately our basket allows a spider about 10mm wider than pretty much all other 8" frames out there. Since the spider is the main challenger we had that tooled first and then built up a test bed to test with : * Former was too tall / big in diameter for the SA-8 dust cap to work so I had to use an SA-12 dust cap; which came all the way out to glue onto the surround edge. * SA-12 Motor * We had an adapter machined to mount the motor; I decided to have some extras made for some brave DIY folks that may want to make a similar project. * There is the beastly new spider tooling -- this thing worked great ! I was able to test the X-8 spider with an SA-12 motor / coil and SA-8 v.2 cone and surround. The X-8 will have it's own unique motor, cone, and surround for production. Those parts aren't done yet and I wanted to test the spider so we built it like this for now I am very pleased with the spiders excursion capacity and linearity. I will get some Klippel measurements done on it soon as well to verify... my "push the cone Klippel" indicates that the spider has a very linear compliance to it for quite a bit of travel in both directions -- anxious to see the actual plots All of the computer optimization on this spider definitely paid off with the result.

There is no way to keep the price the same. The frames cost about 2.5x more than the old frames, new cones are more, and the motors have an extra slug + extra steel. Either way -- the cost will simply scale directly with the build cost -- there won't be extra cost added "just because" it's a new product.

Glad to hear you are enjoying them

We will rate them 1250 RMS

Just showed up today. Need a bit of tweaking still (they don't have the stiffer surround on them yet, etc) but at least we have the first looks at them and our new terminal blocks too :thumbsup: * Z v.4 12 on the left and X-12 on the right. * Z v.4 12 on the left and X-12 on the right. * New terminal blocks ! * Z style spider -- these will feature one fewer layer than the Z models. Coil is also lighter on these but overall FS should be right at or slightly below the Z counterparts in stock format. * Essentially looks like a "mini-Z" style motor... 190mm magnet vs. 220mm on the Z series / 66mm tall stack vs. 75mm tall stack / thinner steel / less expensive round wire coil vs. flat wire in the Z, etc, etc.