Amazing Little Devil indeed - Lii F6

[Subbu68]

It is the original thread on this driver that made me seriously think of getting a pair.

Thanks to @yogibear who brought this driver to my attention and helped with his advices from time to time to give me confidence to tread OB Land from the "boxes".

Got it to Abu Dhabi through Amazon.ae from the US for about INR 7000 including shipping and import duty. They came in a silly looking cardboard. Here's the unboxing.

No specs or anything inside other than on the cap on the magnet. Ferrite magnet but shielded. Looks good. Pretty light.

With no baffle it sounded okay. Quickly adapted the 900mm x 900mm temp baffles I made for my Ahujas to mount these little ones. Driven by Elekit TU8200, SE valve amp, 8Wpc.

Just half the dia of Ahuja but truly exotic sound. No subwoofer, yet digs so deep. On low registers Felt I was listening to my old Jamo E855 with a little bass cut. The voices are lush and highs satisfying for my ears. Not piercing at all.. Superb imaging. Speakers not "seen" by ears.

Hope to soon finalize them on a proper baffle.

 

[rwnano]

why not make the whole cabinet, why only these open baffles ??

 

[Subbu68]

The first samples

Someone from Europe reviewing F8 had written that our desi music is the test for speakers..so let it be for my F6 too

 

[Subbu68]

why not make the whole cabinet, why only these open baffles ??

Smitten by OB... It is intoxicating once tasted

Have a pair of Heresy III you can see at the back.. no more boxes for me.

 

[Subbu68]

The only weak aspect of F6 is it’s fragile SS chassis. If you force mount it or even bend the chassis through hands, the VC will be off.

The driver has quite high Qts at 1.32, so it’s made for OB only. The wider baffle you throw at it, the deeper it digs. It’s one of the unique drivers which excels at both male and female vocals with excellent HF extension. The drivers cone and surrounds are very special and remind me of Coral flat drivers from Japan.

Modify your side wings to unequal widths and you will have more linear midrange response. This is to acoustically off centre the driver.

I have your previous advice in mind to off center the driver. In fact I tried it on Basta after you wrote to me and it showed the magic to smoothen a huge dip around 1kHz in Ahuja design..since then have been modelling with off centered drivers

I am thinking of a hinged arrangement for the wing and only on outer edge. A two panel wing. Main baffle hinged to first wing and another piece hinged to it..or some arrangement to remove the wings as desired.

 

[Subbu68]

I must add this link too that inspired me to get a pair of F6.

DIY OB Project using the Lii Audio F6 Full Range

This thread is to help document the OB project that was started off a while ago as part of a WhatsApp group. Thanks to @yogibear , who is the friend, philosopher and guide of the OB Group, for helping in identifying, sourcing and managing the group buy of this diminutive gem from Lii Audio...

www.hifivision.com

Thanks @CJP for the well documented info on your work.

 

[muralimmreddy]

Just half the dia of Ahuja but truly exotic sound. No subwoofer, yet digs so deep. On low registers Felt I was listening to my old Jamo E855 with a little bass cut. The voices are lush and highs satisfying for my ears. Not piercing at all.. Superb imaging. Speakers not "seen" by ears.

indeed sounds like a little devil such a big sound from small driver.

How does it compare to 12 inch ahuja, just in term of presence, scale (Just wondering how do one consider 6inch or 12 inch or 15inch driver)

 

[Subbu68]

F6 sounds fuller as the LF is deeper compared to Ahuja.. To give an idea I had to dial down the crossover point from 120Hz to 70Hz and gain by about 4 points on my subwoofer when I used F6 with subwoofer. Still seemed not properly crossed over.

I have some recordings though not the same song on Ahuja on that YouTube channel of mine and in another post on Heresy - Ahuja shootout. That could give an idea?

 

[keith_correa]

Still seemed not properly crossed over.

Try ~200Hz.

 

[Subbu68]

Try ~200Hz.

It's the other scenario. F6 goes deeper than Ahuja so have to cut off the sub lower.

Perhaps with room gain even at 80Hz it seemed too much. Now brought it down to near 70Hz. It's a decent boombox level bass but "bigger". Now playing Jaane Do na from Saagar. I can hear the bass guitar clearly.

 

[keith_correa]

It's the other scenario. F6 goes deeper than Ahuja so have to cut off the sub lower.

Perhaps with room gain even at 80Hz it seemed too much. Now brought it down to near 70Hz. It's a decent boombox level bass but "bigger". Now playing Jaane Do na from Saagar. I can hear the bass guitar clearly.

Try ~200Hz with an open mind. You probably will be surprised how much better a FR performs when freed up from asked to repro frequencies that it is not really equipped to repro accurately.

 

[Subbu68]

Try ~200Hz with an open mind. You probably will be surprised how much better a FR performs when freed up from asked to repro frequencies that it is not really equipped to repro accurately.

Wow!! Thanks for the tip. The max on my sub is 140Hz. Still sounds fuller

But both sub and speakers are connected parallel to the o/p of my valve amp - no pre out or DSP. F6 is still going to get the same signal, isn't it?

 

[keith_correa]

F6 is still going to get the same signal, isn't it?

Sadly, yes and it's a limitation of your sub. You're listening to compromised sound this way.

 

[Subbu68]

Sadly, yes and it's a limitation of your sub. You're listening to compromised sound this way.

not loosing hope.

In OB the baffle width can act as a bass cut off? If the baffle is made so that the drop off is at around 150Hz and sub takes over?

Now the baffle is huge at nearly 950mm wide and Basta model gives a good gain even up to 80Hz.

But that bass is pretty sweet though.

 

[Hari Iyer]

Nice. What about driver compliance- are they low or high? My guess - high.

 

[Subbu68]

Nice. What about driver compliance- are they low or high? My guess - high.

I tested as you wrote. It is not as compliant as a woofer but not too hard too. It is an invert surround not the accordion cloth surround. Definitely not as stiff as my Ahuja.

 

[Hari Iyer]

I tested as you wrote. It is not as compliant as a woofer but not too hard too. It is an invert surround not the accordion cloth surround. Definitely not as stiff as my Ahuja.

I read that as medium compliance. It's good that it's not high compliance. Otherwise the cone suspension won't get support when driven low and this may cause non-linear distortion at the surround edge which will be difficult to correct. If possible try to measure the driver impedance mounted on a baffle. This wl indicate any possible resonance at lmid bass and low frequency. This can help you to verify if the driver is suitable for an OB loading.

 

[gnattyman]

The driver has quite high Qts at 1.32, so it’s made for OB only.

Do you know for sure that this is true? Because the Lii Audio site shows specs very different from this and I doubt that they could have so much of a difference. Perhaps they redesigned this driver???

 

[Subbu68]

F6 was made and marketed as an inexpensive car FR. Even specs printed on the basket were wrong. Probably they did not take the driver seriously but I was given a free pair to try and it had an uncanny resemblance to the Coral Flats.

My hunch told me it’s made for OB. I measured the TSP using Dayton Audio DATS V2 and here they are:

F6 TSP: 93dB, Re6.7, Fs 84, Qts 1.32, Qes 1.7, Qms 5.92, Le 0.126, Mms 6.58, Vas 0.633.

Subsequently many measured it around the globe and had similar readings.

I too read in other forums the above measurements are true

 

[rajan-]

Wow!! Thanks for the tip. The max on my sub is 140Hz. Still sounds fuller

But both sub and speakers are connected parallel to the o/p of my valve amp - no pre out or DSP. F6 is still going to get the same signal, isn't it?

Sadly, yes and it's a limitation of your sub. You're listening to compromised sound this way.

A potential solution to this is in-line filters before the power amps (if you can use the pre / power combo you already have)

I know its taking away from the purist approach to the Full Range driver usage. but Since there is already a Sub augmenting the bass in your setup, and also you have separates, this approach is worth trying.

I think you have tried something similar when you were integrating the sub, earlier. if so, you may be having those things lying around already.