Recently the overlords of the official Klipsch sponsored forum have gone a bit wonky on what they allow. Apparently the idea that things like my tweeters are called upgrades really irritates some Klipsch people and so they have been deleting some tweeter threads and comments along with other threads on different topics that also irritate them. I have no idea what prompted all this but find it somewhat ironic.
Roy Delgado is the chief engineer for Klipsch and he does admirable work. I have nothing but high regard for his technical abilities but his involvement in the forum has not been so productive. Very sensitive to the idea that thirty year old drivers and horns have been improved upon and are far better then those old dog barker tweeters Klipsch used for way to long. He talks about preserving the PWK legacy and vision and sound but has done things like convince PWK to start using Tractrix horns so he himself is guilty of changing PWK’s “vision” for some decades now. The computer generated models he gets for insanely complex crossovers are nothing at all like legacy PWK Klipsch but they just happen to work much better. I understand Roy is loyal to the vision of PWK but somehow he can change things around and it is approved whereas others do the same thing and it is not.
Klipsch and Roy themselves have admitted the old tech drivers were no good when they came out with the new ones for the revamped Cornwall 4 and the Heresy 4 and the new Forte. New drivers, new lenses in places, cabinet modifications and new crossovers. The end result is very good and they are light years ahead of the old style. My jaw dropped the first time I heard the CW4 and Heresy 4 and even though I make aftermarket tweeters I would sure not put them in these. Incredibly improved and also NOT PWK designed so whose vision is it now anyway? I say it is Roy’s vision and all that PWK legacy honoring stuff is just words.
What makes this kind of sad though is the demand that only pure unmodified Klipsch speakers are truly Klipsch speakers. Only JEM capacitors will give you that genuine “Klipsch” sound, whatever that is. Funny thing is that those of us who treasure our modified Klipsch speakers still consider them Klipsch speakers. But just what is a pure true blue Klipsch speaker sound anyway when Klipsch is busy changing the recipe that makes that sound? I figure the good bones a Klipsch speaker comes with allows for aftermarket tinkering, and a La Scala or Chorus for instance can go another 30 years or more and sound much better doing so with minor tinkering. Tinkering with Klipsch speakers goes back for decades on the Klipsch forums but there are now new rules to go by.
I had a thread about the new LMAHL V2 and SMAHL V2 started by another forum member that discussed the new V2 style and went into it in great length. I referred people to it on occasion when they wanted to see curves or why they were better. I figured Claude who was a forum member who graciously tested my ideas for me and other forum members who described what these new tweeters did for their speakers in their own words stated what they were and did better then me. Plus these were honest comments from others and not from the guy tooting his own horn just because he makes them. I am egocentric enough however to tell you patient readers I make the best aftermarket drop in tweeters for Vintage Klipsch speakers but let unsolicited buyer testimonies on EBay and the Klipsch forums do my horn tooting.
Much to my chagrin this thread was deleted. I found out when I referred someone to that thread and they could not find it. Well in looking neither could I because that now offensive “upgrade” thread had been deleted. So I did a search and found a link to the old post that while it did not work did give me a time frame and topic name to enter into the “Wayback Machine” site where I find the complete thread archived in all it’s glory.
If you do not know about the WaybackMachine it is a wonderful research tool you should know about. It saved the tweeter thread in a way Klipsch can’t delete and I have found old Pro Klipsch gear brochures from the 90’s there also that Klipsch had thrown away a long time ago with a past forum “upgrade” that trashed a lot of legacy data.
So, you have MAHL V2 questions there are once again answers.
Machined Audio Horn Lens 
Happy to hear from you Dave. I haven’t visited the forum in a while for similar reasons. The Facebook pages are the same with Trey Cannon chiming in there dogging any mods or upgrades as non Klipsch, no longer Klipsch sound (that’s why I modded!) and such, it gets tiresome. I love my smahls and recommend them when I have the opportunity. Thanks again for your work, love to have you visit again and have a listen. Take care.
They are fighting a losing battle to preserve this mythical Klipsch purity standard. Their refusal to acknowledge some of their past driver and design problems and dismissing what actual klipsch speaker owners have chosen to do by their own preferences is a bit silly. We choose by our own ears to define what the “Klipsch” standard sound is and Trey and Roy can bloviate all they want about the correct sound and that is their opinion only. Many happen to have different opinions and are willing to spend their money and time to find what THEY like and not what Trey and Roy like.
I guess with this post I have kind of crossed a line here and I am seriously contemplating greener pastures then the Klipsch forums have become. Serious tinkering audio hobbyists I once read often on the Klipsch forum are mostly gone and I see those names elsewhere now on other forums. I am in the process of joining those forums too.
I keep intending to get up there again and had planned to this summer until my wife had a stroke. Kind of changes your available time.
Thanks for the reply Dave, I’m sorry to hear about your wife having a stroke. I hope she is doing better, god is good, medicine these days is working wonders, and I pray for her continued recovery.
What forums do you peruse regularly now? Just curious what’s out there, since the Klipsch Community forum is disintegrating, and what a shame.
Take care.
Thanks for the prayers. I really don’t have a favorite or even a frequented forum yet outside of the moribund klipsch forum. I just registered at the Audiokarma forum but have yet to do much or fill out things like my system. I have occasionally gone to the DIY Audio forum but primarily for technical things and not anything klipsch related. Of course the Klipsch forum as it was moderated by Carl will always be my favorite and a cherished memory and I expect nothing will replace it. They ran Carl off and it has been all downhill since though lately the deterioration has been extreme.
I have been told I need to get involved with the fakebook groups which I intend to look into. As I find out where to go I will have another post that will talk about what I have found.
It really is a travesty what is currently happening on the Klipsch forum. Your thoughts above totally encapsulate the issue, even it is their sandbox.
When I first started lurking the forum I was well impressed how many said to upgrade the deficient K77M tweeter to a DE-120 on SMAHL. Sure enough, they were totally right when I finally made the jump.
Time will tell if the Community will survive the new corporate Klipsch rah rah approach, but today I am not so optimistic.
The forum is going no where but the content many of us came there for is leaving. What brought me there some 8 years ago was two sets of La Scalas I had bought and they sounded different. I ended up on the Klipsch forum where I found answers and stayed. It is a bit appalling the number of very popular threads being axed because they talk about modifications and upgrades. Sad thing is that they really were upgrades and I think that is what frosted some rear ends over at Klipsch. For some reason Klipsch hangs onto bad ideas way to long and their K-77 and K-76,79 etc tweeters are prime examples of bad things. It is why the thread talking about my SMAHL and LMAHL V2 versions was deleted because what I make is the best out there and Klipsch with all their money and talent elected to stay with dated inferior stuff.
Thank you, Dave, for totally encapsulating the odd new Klipsch forum attitude towards loyal Klipsch owners trying to better their sound. I find it both sad and ironic that we can no longer discuss Klipsch loudspeakers on the Klipsch forum. Although it appears there is still lively discussion there on all other topics….
I would imagine it is the VOXX people doing this. I can’t think of one company that gets bought out that does not have their practices changed by the new overlords and normally for the worse where consumers and users are concerned. The Solid Edge design software I have used since 2009 has fallen to the same exact problem and the new bosses killed the user community among other things.