Hi Everyone,
I have been reading up on CBT Loudspeaker technology and done searches here but to no conclusion on how to Design them.
My Idea is to build a proto type that runs off just one Amp Channel (the center channel output on a Av receiver for instance)
I have 10 x HiVi B3S drivers (at Normal 8 ohms) that I got on special and I am thinking of building a Center channel for a Home Cinema. (I can get more drivers if needed for the array design)
How do I start, the Maths really confuses me regarding the angles and resulting angle after Shading.
I know I will need tweeters at a later stage to avoid lobing because of driver spacing in the woofers)
Also once the maths for the angle and arc etc I have no idea how to do the shading/wiring for the 10 drivers, I know the center driver will be at 0db (full signal) and the left and right outermost drivers lower in Db - another thing I don't full understand is the shading depending on angle, do I do to -12 regardless of angle or it has to match the Curve Legendre Shading down to the point at which the drivers at 90 degrees past center each side are at 0 signal coming out (if it was indeed a full half sphere)
I might be confusing my self but I just need a proper step by step description of how to plan it depending on the needs instead of trying to strip out the crucial parts of patents and papers, this I think is why many Diy people are not trying it is because it is confusing.
Cheers
Robywan
I have been reading up on CBT Loudspeaker technology and done searches here but to no conclusion on how to Design them.
My Idea is to build a proto type that runs off just one Amp Channel (the center channel output on a Av receiver for instance)
I have 10 x HiVi B3S drivers (at Normal 8 ohms) that I got on special and I am thinking of building a Center channel for a Home Cinema. (I can get more drivers if needed for the array design)
How do I start, the Maths really confuses me regarding the angles and resulting angle after Shading.
I know I will need tweeters at a later stage to avoid lobing because of driver spacing in the woofers)
Also once the maths for the angle and arc etc I have no idea how to do the shading/wiring for the 10 drivers, I know the center driver will be at 0db (full signal) and the left and right outermost drivers lower in Db - another thing I don't full understand is the shading depending on angle, do I do to -12 regardless of angle or it has to match the Curve Legendre Shading down to the point at which the drivers at 90 degrees past center each side are at 0 signal coming out (if it was indeed a full half sphere)
I might be confusing my self but I just need a proper step by step description of how to plan it depending on the needs instead of trying to strip out the crucial parts of patents and papers, this I think is why many Diy people are not trying it is because it is confusing.
Cheers
Robywan
Last edited:
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Joined 2009
http://www.parts-express.com/cbt36/
Have you seen this page? It describes the Shading and Curve of the Part-Express CBT but it doesn't show the math. It would be easy to build a clone but I have no idea how one would go about scaling it for a different size array.
I am confused as well, I can picture this working for about an octave but how does it hold directivity over such vast frequency range?
Have you seen this page? It describes the Shading and Curve of the Part-Express CBT but it doesn't show the math. It would be easy to build a clone but I have no idea how one would go about scaling it for a different size array.
I am confused as well, I can picture this working for about an octave but how does it hold directivity over such vast frequency range?
Have you read Don Keeles 4th cbt-paper?
http://www.xlrtechs.com/dbkeele.com/PDF2/Keele%20(2003-10%20AES%20Preprint)%20-%20CBT%20Paper4.pdf
It has a practical explanation on how to implement the design. The math goes over my head, but the in practice it is as follows:
I think it is easier to think in half arrays. If you are going for a full array, just think of two half arrays laying feet by feet. The -6dB coverage angle is 64% of the full angle of the half array. If the CBT36 is 36 degrees, then the -6dB point will be at 23 degrees. That means if you are going to use two CBT36 as a center channel you will have a 46 degrees coverage angle. Just target the coverage angle you like and do the math from there.
The drivers are divided in 5 banks. Bank 1 is 0 dB, bank 2 is -3dB, bank 3 is -6dB, bank 4 is -9dB and bank 5 is -12dB. Bank 1 should be approximatly 40.4% of the drivers, bank 2 is 26.2%, bank 3 is 15.5%, bank 4 is 10.5% and bank 5 is 7.4%. You will now see that this is difficult to accomplish with just 10 drivers. For a half array the five drivers will be 20% each.
A practical example would be to use 16 drivers to approximate these numbers for a floor standing half array. Bank 1 would be 6 drivers, bank 2 4 drivers, bank 3 3 drivers, bank 4 2 drivers and bank 5 1 driver. The less drivers you use, the worse the approximation the per cent numbers would be. I have no idea how to do the shading with passive components though. I would have gone active like Monte Kay: Center Speaker
Hope this helps.
http://www.xlrtechs.com/dbkeele.com/PDF2/Keele%20(2003-10%20AES%20Preprint)%20-%20CBT%20Paper4.pdf
It has a practical explanation on how to implement the design. The math goes over my head, but the in practice it is as follows:
I think it is easier to think in half arrays. If you are going for a full array, just think of two half arrays laying feet by feet. The -6dB coverage angle is 64% of the full angle of the half array. If the CBT36 is 36 degrees, then the -6dB point will be at 23 degrees. That means if you are going to use two CBT36 as a center channel you will have a 46 degrees coverage angle. Just target the coverage angle you like and do the math from there.
The drivers are divided in 5 banks. Bank 1 is 0 dB, bank 2 is -3dB, bank 3 is -6dB, bank 4 is -9dB and bank 5 is -12dB. Bank 1 should be approximatly 40.4% of the drivers, bank 2 is 26.2%, bank 3 is 15.5%, bank 4 is 10.5% and bank 5 is 7.4%. You will now see that this is difficult to accomplish with just 10 drivers. For a half array the five drivers will be 20% each.
A practical example would be to use 16 drivers to approximate these numbers for a floor standing half array. Bank 1 would be 6 drivers, bank 2 4 drivers, bank 3 3 drivers, bank 4 2 drivers and bank 5 1 driver. The less drivers you use, the worse the approximation the per cent numbers would be. I have no idea how to do the shading with passive components though. I would have gone active like Monte Kay: Center Speaker
Hope this helps.
Using two drivers in series will set them down 6dB each. Or two in parallel then one more in series with them makes the two around 9.5dB down and the single around 3.5dB down. These numbers might be close enough but a few small resistors could be used. It should be possible to do this from a single amp channel.
First you might want to settle on angle, and whether it will be symmetrical about the listening position and how many drivers then the rest can be worked out.
First you might want to settle on angle, and whether it will be symmetrical about the listening position and how many drivers then the rest can be worked out.
Hi jeno,
Thanks for this I remember stumbling upon this paper then forgetting where to find it again.
I will see if I can figure out some of the maths and design and post my results here with what you told me.
There was a guy over on another forum that is friends with Monte Kay that works in the same factory I think, he had 12 woofers on a really crazy wedge angle if I remember correctly.
Thanks for all the comments
Robywan
Thanks for this I remember stumbling upon this paper then forgetting where to find it again.
I will see if I can figure out some of the maths and design and post my results here with what you told me.
There was a guy over on another forum that is friends with Monte Kay that works in the same factory I think, he had 12 woofers on a really crazy wedge angle if I remember correctly.
Thanks for all the comments
Robywan
Did you ever give this a go? I'm curious how terrible the result would be trying to scale down with fewer drivers
Hey There,
Actually what i did is contact Don Keele directly, he was kind enough to design most of the wiring on a 26x driver center channel. It is just 0.5 inch full range/tweeters forming the array.
I actually made a spread sheet that automates the driver grouping per bank the using Log20 to find the db loss etc.
I will post some pictures up at some point
Regards
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