On Location:

The 600+ acre farm was key to this test, for when testing train horns they need a large open space with nothing to echo off of. this large flat open space made for perfect conditions for the test.

Setting up all of the gear and testing each of the 22 horns at (2) Distances and multiple tests resulted in us spending the better part of 12 hours out in the cold. What we do not do for science! … and if you are curious as to the large tire in the picture, it was holding the dolly with the nitrogen tank from rolling away.

The sound meter shown here, with the microphone attached and placed at 1 meter from the horns. This was walked over 200 foot for each horn! It was also mounted on a stand that was acoustically ‘minimal’ as to avoid any reflections. Also the meter is shown here mounted at 90 angle to that of the horn, this was recommended by B&K for outdoor tests.

Here is a good shot of the setup, on the left is the 1,000CCA Battery and the 13.8VDC regulated power supply. This supplied a good solid source of power for the tests.
In the middle you will see the ‘Air supply’ this was made so quick connects for different sized line could be made quickly, and the zero restriction coupling prevented any flow restrictions. Last is the push button that connected to each horn for activating the horns valve for the tests.

For those curious just how loud the K5LA is and why it did so well, this may help.

And if you love raw data, you can always contact us and we will be more than happy to share our raw data from the tests.

Lost?

If you find yourself lost or wanting to know more, feel free to leave a comment below and we will do our best to answer it!

More Pages:
1) Review Video
2) Unboxing all the horns
3) Audio samples
4) Audio Waveform graphs
5) On Location