Grand. I'm looking forward to seeing construction updates. I wasn't sure that you'd opted for the (qty 4) choice, but the ideas in post 910 seem solid, the only unfortunate bit being more $ (more truck visits to pour the concrete 4 times)... but maybe you'll save that in needing less formwork & steel.
All the talk of multi cells may have seemed way off topic, but maybe look at this post?
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/subw...bass-horn-design-question-89.html#post4887986
The "point of origin" thing might be worth considering, if you want the possibility of running them high(ish).
Currently, I don't really get the idea (how do your ears 'know' where the driver(s) are? Can you fool your hearing with use of delay, if each horn has it's own driver?) - so I should simply dust off some midrange horns and try it for myself.
If you started off by building prototype 100Hz midbass horns (you talked earlier about doing a few versions), you could experiment with them, and then use that info for layout of the bass horns.
Conical Midbass Fronthorns – Volvotreter Homepage
Possibly you do, as far as a 20Hz tone can 'see'. At low frequencies, if your exterior walls are solid, relative to the interior walls and doors, the listening 'room' might be your whole house.
I built a modest IB system into a small factory once (a room of roughly 9x14 metres), and a reasonable number of the engineering / handy types on the forum have got something similar: audio rigs in big workshops, so 32' rooms is not crazy talk.
Seems the design is being driven by what might be an unhearable acoustic theory.
Can somebody devise an out of doors listening test to settle matters? With music (and with sine waves for the curious), stereo and mono. Naive listening panel (OK, Eric can listen too, maybe even include a mic).
Needs a bit of thought how to create a meaningful test but then pretty easy to conduct.
Ben
Can somebody devise an out of doors listening test to settle matters? With music (and with sine waves for the curious), stereo and mono. Naive listening panel (OK, Eric can listen too, maybe even include a mic).
Needs a bit of thought how to create a meaningful test but then pretty easy to conduct.
Ben
They aren't a problem or stereo would not work at any frequency. I explained, others did, horse, water, if the noble animal won't drink, tant pis.
i guess looking at a graph/sim that displays deep wide notches would make most say "hey that's bad, looks real nasty.... must sound bad"
if only the sim could be an animation and display time along with it.
the duration and position of these events would be all over the place.
which is why i think most people do not readily notice the effects.( one would have to be at the exact position in both place and time)
but in the ocd mind of an audiophile it's an unmitigated disaster!
if only the sim could be an animation and display time along with it.
the duration and position of these events would be all over the place.
which is why i think most people do not readily notice the effects.( one would have to be at the exact position in both place and time)
but in the ocd mind of an audiophile it's an unmitigated disaster!
Ben,
I have done the out-door listening test with pink noise, sine waves and music, heard and measured the results along with dozens of top engineers and thousands of folks in the "naive listening panel".
As the saying goes, "been there, done that, got the T-shirt to prove it".
But even though the tub full of T-shirts may last another four decades at the rate I have been wearing them out, they won't be proof enough to convince anyone that what I say is true, everybody must stick their own "finger in the hole" and lick it off to prove to themselves whether it is blood or chocolate syrup inside
To quote Stan Laurel: " You can Lead a Horse to Water, but a Pencil Must be Lead."
And don't forget what Freddie Blassie sang:
"Back when I was a kid, life was going swell.
Till something happened, blew every thing to hell.
That night my daddy stumbled in, all pale and weak,
Said "A woman up the block just gave birth to a geek."
Mom said, "Sell it to the circus, what the heck."
Dad said, "Nope, this one's a pencil neck.
And if there's one thing lower than a side show freak,
It's a grit eatin', scum suckin', pencil neck geek."
You see if you take a pencil that won't hold lead,
Looks like a pipe cleaner attached to a head,
Add a buggy whip body with a brain that leaks,
You got yourself a grit eatin', pencil neck geek.
Pencil neck geek, grit eatin' freak,
Scum suckin', pea head with a lousy physique.
He's a one man, no gut, loosing streak.
Nothin' but a pencil neck geek."
Cheers,
Art
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Glad to see smart people like turk 182 (and others) speaking up again.
But on music, I would also add to the zen koan, ".... you also need to know how loud the trumpet was on the source recording too, as well as being in the right comparison times and places and being able to remember how loud it was before...."
Granted, it is possible that people like weltersys can detect interaction defects - maybe really tiny defects - that others don't know how to listen for and couldn't care less about. Or maybe skilled people like weltersys are detecting shortcomings of a speaker array that have nothing to do with interaction but since there is no way to tell what is what........*
Ben
*didn't I say that hundreds of posts before in response to weltersys saying hundreds of posts before.
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1) One "big" advantage of a "big" system is being able to play a 125 dB SPL trumpet or Taiko drum back at the same level it is live, without the distortion of a "small" system.
2) My ears are too far gone to hear "tiny" defects of less than a dB, (-50 dB at 4kHz :^( ) but I have met plenty of engineers that can hear tiny details I can not.
3) Yes, I believe I mentioned I could easily teach you how to detect shortcomings in various system designs, but travel costs to hire me to come and teach you would be outside your audio budget
.Everyone has their own priorities in how they spend their resources, I have definitely overspent my time on this thread, will be "unsubscribing" to it, as I did this morning to many others that have consumed far too much time for the benefit of no-one but myself, keeping me from thinking morbid thoughts about a medical "condition" that after spending several thousands of dollars running a barrage of tests over the last several weeks turned out to be "nothing to worry about", thank god.
Time to start building the planned additions for my indoor and outdoor systems, rather than spending my time giving free design advice to people that probably have me at the top (or bottom) of their "ignore" list
.Cheers,
A. W. shucks...
Tell you what, Art, I'll come and charge you to teach you how to conduct listening tests that aren't invalidated by self-delusion and bad methods.Yes, I believe I mentioned I could easily teach you how to detect shortcomings in various system designs, but travel costs to hire me to come and teach you would be outside your audio budget
But I have the good grace and kindness to refrain from comparing my per diem to yours.
Ben
This is EXACTLY what I was talking about when I said Direct can't simulate the very narrow beams of OP's large horn - less overlap = less interference. I brought this point up myself, you guys are trying to make it sound like I'm either really stupid or trying to hide something.
I used the BC 418 in my sims specifically because it is the largest horn available in Direct (I think). The thing is 10 feet wide and 5 feet tall. The mouth is only about 4 feet wide by 5 feet high but it's certainly not 1 percent the size of OP's horn. In terms of mouth area it's closer to 20 percent and in terms of frontal boundary it's about 50 percent (but of course a different shape). This is compared to a single OP horn with a 14 x 8 foot mouth.
Here's the BC 418 in one of my sims.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
And here's a couple of them stack in real life for some size perspective.
Since these have a large boundary the horn bubble will expand until it reaches the edges of the frontal face, then it will propagate unrestricted in all directions. So my sim isn't as far off as you might imagine, the horn bubble is good out to 5 x 5 feet and out to 10 feet in the horizontal plane, the width of the front face.
I asked at least 3 times if anyone knew of any software that you could enter your horn data, polars, etc. I was ignored all 3 times. I'm trying to be as accurate as I can and specifically stating very clearly what the limitations of my sims are. What are you guys doing other than complaining? Push the conversation ahead in constructive ways, find a way to do a better sim than I have. My sim is not THAT far off, considering the limitations I've talked about a dozen times including in this post. It's not perfect but it's a lot better than anything anyone else has presented.
The points that are being discussed here would require a full size full scale model to experiment.
Clearly you are not paying attention. At mid and high frequencies comb filtering IS NOT A PROBLEM. At lower frequencies it CAN be a problem but unless you place your stereo mains a LONG distance from each other the problems are not huge problems even in the bass.
As I've said probably at least 5 times now, OP's present plan is very likely going to be fine. It puts the notches 30 feet wide at 80 hz at the hot tub location, so most (if not all) of his desired audience location is in between the notch valley where coverage is nearly perfect. And the notch valley won't be as deep as the software suggests because narrow directivity beaming = less overlap = less interference.
It's not duration and position, it's frequency and position. I've provided EXACTLY what you are asking for, an animated gif that shows the notches in relation to frequency vs position. And I got endless complaints for it.
Direct can show the same thing I did but with a coverage map with the pretty colors. It will step through the frequencies and make a nice moving picture presentation. You need a screen capture software to record it and then make it a .mp4 or .avi or .gif or some other format that people can easily view, preferably in a format that can be uploaded to the forum and even more preferably in a format that can play within a post without having to download the file and play it back.
The chances I am going to go to the effort to produce a Direct video stepping through frequencies to show locations of notch valleys is exactly zero percent. Everyone is a critic, you guys can figure this out yourselves.
OP has a gut feeling this isn't going to be a problem (which I already agreed with, although I said this is not how I would do it), weltersys says he can look at a system and tell you how it's going to perform, Ben thinks 20 db notches two octaves wide are not perceptible, and everyone else that has posted has complained about my sims.
OP's current plan is WAY different than stereo subs 60 feet apart and pointed at the hot tub sweet spot. If you guys can't figure out why that's your issue.
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My experiences make me beg to disagree. For recorded material, the vast majority of listening rooms seriously detract from the experience available outdoors in a reflection free environment. I've spent more time, money, and energy proving this to myself than I care to admit.
Way back in this thread, I gave a little background saying I had built a soccer field and pavilion to help support outdoor audio playback. Well, a big reason I did it was because it followed the building of a large listening room designed to overcome small room limitations, and small room sound. Room was about 39ftx23x11 built with a 'golden ratio' for dispersing room modes. I treated it for equal RT60 times through the spectrum. Played with live-end, dead-end, etc. Wonderful sounding room, I got clarity and imaging from some meyer gear that was very kin to 2 pair of electrostats running elsewhere in the house... . and with great volume, and dynamics. Then I made the mistake of taking the meyer gear outside and playing around a bit. WOW, my ears were opened.
Ever since then, I've been on one project after another to make the best sound outdoors I can....
I can assure you recordings don't need a room to recreate the ambiance in a recording. In fact, we hear more ambiance without the room....we hear more of everything without the room.
Outdoors, the major universal problem shows up just like indoors...the differences in how the recordings were made...hey, 'same as it ever was', huh?
I really believe this is why I've been unable to form any outdoor conclusions about mono vs stereo bass. Given recording vagaries and different spectral content... along with speaker non-linearities...well, I never know. IMHO though, odds favor mono bass.
Oh, and the other outdoor issue...more power, more bass, and lower hz
Go Eric Go
Ben,
Thanks for the offer, but I'm already quite familiar with several methods to conduct listening tests that aren't invalidated by self-delusion.
Not to say I ain't never not been deluded by my self or others
.Art
Mark,
Agree 100% with you, though I have a definite preference for bass located under stereo mains to insure the phase between the mains and bass stays "locked" in the crossover region in any listening location.
As I wrote in several other threads, whether the bass is mono or stereo makes little difference for most music, but the relationship of where the mono bass cabinets to the stereo mains does make a difference.
Note there is a difference between bass speakers and sub-woofers, the first true sub-woofers in a PA application only had bass instruments mixed in them, and in cinema, same thing, only LF signals are mixed to the "sub" channel.
For stereo playback to be true to the source, one simply can not use a mono low frequency section, unless like many, one is just using the sub for "effect".
For live sound there are a number of other reasons for my preferences for dual bass speakers that are not applicable to Entropy Eric's project.
Well back to my projects, looks like I'll be closing on a house and dedicated separate shop/studio sooner than expected, so building the studio walls and a small shop addition will soon move to the top of the "to do" list. Fortunately I don't have to deal with all the building regulations and restrictions Entropy Eric has in the county he has chose to build in.
I'll have to ask him to design the nuclear power plant (for free, of course) I plan to put in the back yard.
According to the calculations he has so freely shared, with the purchase of a few pounds of U-235 from some "associates" in Los Alamos, the costs of concrete, rebar, and the cooling pipes from the local water supplier should be around the same cost as his project, the U-235 should cost less than the B&C woofers and Radian HF drivers he plans to buy.
Once the mini nuclear power plant is completed, I won't have to pay another power bill for the rest of my life, and resale value on the house should be at least double, unless Eric's design does not preclude the "China Syndrome", in which case the property will be available for sale as two empty lots. Considering the water table height, the property might then be "beachfront" property, so it's a win/win situation.
I'll make sure I keep soft drinks away from the control panel to avoid the "Pepsi Syndrome", but I'll leave it to Eric for the rest ;^).
I'd like to pour concrete before any potential freeze, can we have the plans done before November 30, 2016?
Eric, thanks in advance for the inspiration, and your Mini-Nuke design!
Art,
P.S. Oops, my previous estimate of the amount of U-235 was off, a pound of it is equal to 2.5 million pounds of coal, so my up-front costs should be way less than I thought, hope you guys check my math, I'm more of a horn speaker kind of guy :^).
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I would not want to argue with a person who has the immensely good sound judgment to have ESL speakers in the house (ahem, ahem), but out of doors with a 5MPH breeze, you have a terrible S/N. And as the many admirers of Toole use the term, you have no ambience (although I don't recall reading his thoughts on out of doors sound).
Our whole HiFi development is based on taking music recorded in rooms and playing it back in rooms with walls, with the local park only used for low-echoic testing.
For sure, some music is intended for outdoor listening. Some of Berlioz' stuff and any marching band music. But otherwise, you are taking art-making into your own hands, which is your privilege always. Certainly for the kind of crap music on AM radio where the loudness never varies, S/N or any other measure of quality doesn't matter in your car or elsewhere out of doors.
Ben
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Then why were you advocating for the mains to be beside the dual subs?
Also you were advocating for the mains to be above the subs "perhaps at the top of a telephone pole". And pointing down.
For both situations, mains to the sides of the subs and/or mains 14 - 30 feet above the subs, there's absolutely no way to keep the mains and bass "locked" in the crossover region across the entire audience position. The center to center distances are simply way too far. The worst case scenario would be the mains off the to sides of dual subs and 30 feet in the air. In that case you would have problems in all 3 dimensions, horizontal, vertical (which will provide a checkerboard pattern of notch valleys in the overlap frequencies if the mains are pointed down) and the depth axis. There's absolutely no way it could be "locked in" anywhere other than at one single point of reference. At every single point in the audience area except one the triangulated distance of listener, sub and main would be different so it's impossible to lock in at anywhere besides the focal point.
That's a nice 7 paragraph passive aggressive poke at OP for not paying you. I'm pretty sure he (or anyone else here) would be more than happy to help with any project you need help with, and for free, a price you apparently think doesn't apply to you and your vastly superior wisdom. I wish you luck with this (imaginary) project and the jail time it will net you as soon as you start collecting the necessary supplies. Since you plan to live to 120 years old you might have a few free years left after you get out of the big house if you're lucky and don't get targeted by the wrong arm of the law. Some of big brother's departments don't require formal charges or sentencing and can keep you indefinitely, and it's exactly those departments that are going to be interested in your little (imaginary) project and it's ingredients. The weather in Guantanamo is nice though, so there's that.
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IIRC Toole advocates as many channels as possible very specifically so the ambiance comes from the speakers (and the recording) and not the environment you happen to be in. I can provide direct quotes if you absolutely need them.
You are always talking about the system being a REPRODUCER of sound, it should never be a PRODUCER of extra things that are not in the recording. You are especially rabid on this when talking about ported boxes and resonances.
Now you are advocating that you absolutely need a room to provide ambiance.
To be very clear (before somebody goes and looks it up) I did say room ambiance can be a welcome addition, and especially the extra dbs you can get from corner loading subs, but it's certainly not a requirement, and as far as Toole is concerned you should fight your room's contribution as hard as possible so the only contribution to the sound is made by multiple channels of surround speakers so that you only get what's on the recording.
This reminds me ....
of ....
WHG
This is EXACTLY what I was talking about when I said Direct can't simulate the very narrow beams of OP's large horn - less overlap = less interference. I brought this point up myself, you guys are trying to make it sound like I'm either really stupid or trying to hide something.
>snip<
And here's a couple of them stack in real life for some size perspective.
>snip<
of ....
WHG
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Dear Troll,
1) I never advocated anything other than mains located above the subs.
2) No, back early on when Eric was talking about "thinning the tree line" and I thought he might be listening on various parts of his large estate, I advocated elevating mains on crank lifts to mitigate inverse distance problems, it was who Eric prefers the "look" of telephone poles.
I also advocate that folded horns will work better than straight horns for the OP, but he does not give a crap about my advice, so why should you care? Oh, right, because you are a troll, and that's what trolls do, they look out for guys that don't let just any guy "get under his skin".
3) Jeez, check your facts, I have repeatedly said I plan to live to be 125, don't cut it short
.Thanks for your concern about my potential incarceration, but that ain't going to happen, so don't worry your pretty little head over it, dear
.
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Good old post 727. the post that keeps on giving.
Although I would "vote" for dual subs located directly beneath or surrounding the stereo mains ...
For all your posturing and subsequent backpedaling, the very first time you made a clear recommendation was in post 727, and VERY clearly at that time you made no distinction between mains above or beside the dual subs.
Also, I told you about the namecalling, it's not productive. Imagine the juicy names I could call you for this behavior of contradicting yourself over and over and lying about what you said.
You make this way too easy, this quote is from post 827 which was not "early on", it was FOUR DAYS AGO. Regardless of who cares for the look of anything, four days ago you advocated lifting the mains to the top of a telephone pole.
You have stated your bass horns will be on the ground.
Because of #2, and to mitigate the Inverse distance law, you will likely want the top cabinets elevated at least to the top of the bass horns, or perhaps flown as high as a "telephone pole".
This is not the first time I've pointed out your quotes directly contradicting yourself in a short time span and you denying that you said these things. Seriously, if you can't keep track of the things you say and keep on contradicting yourself I am going to continue to dig up the problems with your statements.
<Snip>
You keep complaining about how much time you are spending in this discussion but the vast majority of it is spent talking about yourself. I told you already, write a memoir. It would receive a lot more widespread attention than this discussion and it would free you up to talk technical details, although all that amounts to is constant contradictions and constant denial of saying things you said that I get to quote back to you.
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