Pros and cons of eliminating the front baffle

[xlr8]

Hello everyone,

I've been doing a lot of thinking about my next set of speakers. I have several ideas that I'm toying with and before I even begin, I'd like to gather some advice from some of you folks. I read through some threads where stuffed PVC pipe has been used as an enclosure. If there are actual benefits to this, would it be possible to eliminate the cabinet altogether? One of my ideas is to enclose drivers in the correct volume of pipe and then strap the pipe to pieces of uni-strut. Of course I'd treat and paint it so it wouldn't look stupid, but is this idea even feasable with no actual front baffle involved? A wiring mess is another concern, but I think I could make it look nice. I'd like to go with a line of like drivers to mate with my 60" ribbons, so I'll do that one way or another, just trying to come up with a simple solution. I could probably build a house out of uni-strut and one of the reasons I wonder about it is because I'd have infinite adjustability for testing/playing. It seems I could try sealed or dipole, stuffed and un-stuffed, as well as any combination of these VERY easily by using caps on the rear of the tubes. All thoughts and criticisms are welcome and appreciated. Feel free to these ideas...I don't need to be wasting time and money on fruitless endeavors.

[sdclc126]

http://www.partsexpress.com/projects...TotallyTubular

http://www.linkwitzlab.com/Pluto/photos.htm

http://www.t-linespeakers.org/projec...son/index.html

http://www.t-linespeakers.org/FALL/toobz/index.html

These are just a few examples of what people have done with pipes. By the way, you are not eliminating the cabinet - the pipe is the cabinet. A no-cabinet speaker is known as open baffle or dipole, a completely different design with different challenges and solutions, and the baffle by definition cannot be eliminated.

There are many issues when building speakers with essentially no front baffle, notably complex diffractions and early reflections, so proceed with caution.

[xlr8]

The first link you posted was the closest to what I was thinking. This encourages me to take a closer look at my idea.

I guess I should have phrased my question about the front baffle differently. I probably should've asked what the differences would be between a rectangular piece of 1" mdf with tubes mounted to it and the tubes alone. If I'm understanding some things I've been reading correctly, tubes alone would be a no-go for dipole without some sort of wings attached to the sides.

If someone can think of a reason why I should NOT stack a line of tubes 6'-7' high and then mount my 60" ribbons to one side of them, I would love to hear your thoughts.

[Dave Bullet]

Pipe resonances possibly

[woody]

You might want to get in touch with Audio Concepts. Back in the late 70's they had some designs using a line of 6 1/2" drivers in pipes along side a line of 2" jordan's. I don't think they pushed this design verry long.