Can’t remember if that horn arrangement is older, newer or a different model variation altogether than the ones with the arc-shaped supports. I think I prefer the plain one you’ve posted.
I suspect Jim might find the treble units on the AG setup a downgrade after his experience with the Acapellas.
It was the year I went. I was impressed by that room
There is a volume control on the back of the tweeter, so it can be as loud as required. I wouldn’t call them bright, I would say they are very extended
I have had AG’s, plasma tweeters and several sets of RAAL’s. Whilst it is very difficult to compare these all exactly because of differing set ups- I can say that it took me a much longer time to acclimatize after the Plasma tweeters (Ionafane) than the others.
I think the founders of Goto, Ale and Onken all originally worked at YL. I think Kondo eventually owned YL but by then it was a smaller venture whereas back in the 50s & early 60s it was a much larger company making very high quality pa gear often inspired by WE designs.
There was an interview with Kondo years ago where he explained the history and links…
The nomenclature for the AUDIO NOTE came from MY AUDIO NOTE BOOK wherein I record every dream and idea of audio products. Also the word NOTE means music note and sound. I drew an underline below each word AUDIO and NOTE to stress, and started using the logo when I founded my company Audio Note Co., Ltd., Tokyo in 1976. The American magazine Audio Horizons issued in 1978 introduced our AN-S4.
I merged YL Acoustic Lab with Audio Note Co. in 1981 to succeed to production of historical and reputed horn speakers ever made by YL, which came from Yoshimura Laboratory. Note that the logo of YL is comprised of letters Y and L. to symbolize a horn.
In 1990, Audio Note Co. added a new brandmark to commemorate the completion of silver wire wounded output transformers. This new logo was designed by a professional designer who worked for Taiyo Electric Co. run by Mr. Yasuhiro Oishi, one of the shareholders of Audio Note Co.
Hiroyasu Kondo Dec. 24, 1999
“The YL Acoustic Laboratory is a Japanese horn speaker manufacturer from around 1950 to 1980. This company was a solid old brand in Japan. They were making mainly compression drivers and horns for five-way speaker systems. Those drivers used a huge size of Alnico magnet and light weight (aluminium alloy “super duralumin”) diaphragm (at that period). The sound was dynamic and silent as a horn system. It was also smooth because founder Mr. Yoshimura was a classical music lover. After Mr. Yoshimura passed away, Audio Note Mr. Kondo took over the YL in 1981. We were continually making some of the drivers and did after-support until around 2000. Our Kondo logo uses a horn emblem which came from YL Laboratories. We used to have three to four major horn manufacturers in Japan (unfortunately not now). YL is the mother company of them all.”
Yes, I had the 1800G (and 3500G upper-mid and 5500G lower mid). Those were the ones I used in the speakers I brought to Scalford.
I had the Goto SG-370DX upper and SG570BL lower, never managed to find a matching tweeter at the right price. I tried the SG-370s and they were lovely, very sweet. I never got to try the SG-570 as I couldn’t get a matching horn because the throat is a non-standard size. I was offered the Goto 150Hz horn, but it would have been expensive to ship and I was thinking to use the Azura 160s, that Ritchie is enjoying now, but didn’t have the space (and still don’t lol). All sold now