Acapella “Apollon” speaker disassembly after Munich HiEnd 2019

This video was taken on the 3rd, the last, day of this year’s Munich HiEnd Show at the Munich Marriott. The elapsed wall clock time of this 11 minute video was from 6:00pm (show close) to 8:30pm. As we were scheduled for a see-ya-next-year dinner with Audio Note at 8:00pm [luckily, we were by no means the last to arrive! 🙂 ], we had to stop videoing before the speakers were completely disassembled. It doesn’t usually take this long to do this – but it does seem like the Acapella crew take a more relaxed approach to tear down than some others who are almost frantic (some exhibitors are amazing – all done and off to supper they go) – but they did have the other room with a ton of speakers on static display to deal with as well – so there is that.

People in the video: Neli, of Audio Federation. Alfred Rudolph (speaker designer and co-founder), Richard Rudolph (runs the factory) and Robert Rudolph (marketing and Silver Surfer) of Acapella Audio Arts.

The Acapella Audio Arts’ Apollon speakers weigh about 900 lbs each, use a powered plasma (ION) massless tweeter and have four 10 inch woofers per speaker. The top bass unit is about 200lbs heavy [I love the pained look on Richard’s face as they take each one down off of its perch 😉 ].

 

Acapella Apollon speakers here at Audio Federation

s We just swapped  the Acapella Campanile [means ‘bell tower’] speakers for the larger Acapella Apollon speakers [who knew all those games of magic squares – now called sliding tile puzzles – we played as kids were training us for things like this?]. Hallway is chock full of boxes of Campanile top and bottom bass units. Campanile horns fill the dining room. And the garage? Every time we do ANYTHING it seems like half of the crates are out in the driveway making room for the other half of the crates.

The Apollon look like bigger Campaniles. Looking at before and after photos: Same color speakers, same color horns, same rack, same basic shape, but a bigger cabinet and bigger horn [better crossover, better drivers, more expensive, etc.].

The Campanile speakers that were here just last week will be playing at Capital Audio Fest early this November [in a few weeks] and then make their way from there to a new home.

The “Before” picture with the [cute, little] Campaniles. Neli is there ‘decabling’ things.

The HRS (Harmonic Resolution Systems) VXR equipment rack.

The Acapella Apollon without speaker grills or horns and with only one side-panel installed. The substantial side-panels [about 35 lbs I think] both reinforce the rigidity of the speaker as well as being aesthetically pleasing to the eye.

The Acapella Apollon speakers with horns but still no grill cloth.

The Acapella Apollon speakers with horns but still no grill cloth [but the rack is back in place]

The Acapella Apollon speakers in place. The Acapella La Musika integrated amplifier has been added up front as we put the system through its paces.

More resolution and integrated sounding [but less dynamic in the mids] than the similarly-priced Acapella Triolons. More open and dynamic and musical [but ultimately less resolution] than the Marten Supremes.

We are very happy with the sound. With what we have learned about system setup over the last many years, we expect we will eventually be able to make this the best sound we have ever had. O… M… G. we are so happy.

Should take about 30 to 90 days to fully break-in the speakers. [and the poor EMM Labs DV2 is STILL breaking in – it has been off for several weeks during the last 2+ months we have had it as we keep tearing down the system to nuts and bolts and cables over and over again…]

Have a lot more photos and videos…. just need to find time and I will post them all.