Hi,
For anyone in the greater Seattle area, or those willing to drive a bit further, The Pacific Northwest Audio Society (PNWAS) is having their monthy meeting on Thursday, January 13th, 2011. What may be of interest to those who missed "The Puget Sound! DIY Speaker Contest", or would like to build their own speakers, is that a number of the contestants will be bringing the speakers that they entered in last Summer's Contest. This is just a "Show and Tell" meeting where the designers will explain a bit about their designs, answer a few questions and then the audience will get to listen to them played on the Club's system.
Of special interest for fullrange enthusiasts will be Howard Grim's downfiring BLH with Passive Radiator! I personally didn't think it could be done, but................well, you can listen and decide for yourself, it's pretty cool.😀
The meeting will be in the basement of the Church and is accessed from the lower parking lot. It's not too hard to find it. The meeting will officially start at 7:30 pm (the usual time). BTW: It's free to the public.
Here's the address:
Mercer Island Congregational Church (in the basement)
4545 Island Crest Way
Mercer Island, WA 98040
Hope to see you there.
Best Regards,
TerryO
For anyone in the greater Seattle area, or those willing to drive a bit further, The Pacific Northwest Audio Society (PNWAS) is having their monthy meeting on Thursday, January 13th, 2011. What may be of interest to those who missed "The Puget Sound! DIY Speaker Contest", or would like to build their own speakers, is that a number of the contestants will be bringing the speakers that they entered in last Summer's Contest. This is just a "Show and Tell" meeting where the designers will explain a bit about their designs, answer a few questions and then the audience will get to listen to them played on the Club's system.
Of special interest for fullrange enthusiasts will be Howard Grim's downfiring BLH with Passive Radiator! I personally didn't think it could be done, but................well, you can listen and decide for yourself, it's pretty cool.😀
The meeting will be in the basement of the Church and is accessed from the lower parking lot. It's not too hard to find it. The meeting will officially start at 7:30 pm (the usual time). BTW: It's free to the public.
Here's the address:
Mercer Island Congregational Church (in the basement)
4545 Island Crest Way
Mercer Island, WA 98040
Hope to see you there.
Best Regards,
TerryO
Terry, This sounds very interesting.
Driving from tri-cities to Seattle would be difficult on a Thursday though.
Should be a fun evening.
Driving from tri-cities to Seattle would be difficult on a Thursday though.
Should be a fun evening.
Ohhh.... simply awesome. I've been enjoying it so much. Thank you!
The music itself is of a high standard and the tracks have become a reference test.
The music itself is of a high standard and the tracks have become a reference test.
Thanks for posting this Terry! I looked up the PNWAS site last night and saw there were dues so I didn't know if it was going to be free to attend or not. My wife also wanted to come check it out, maybe make it a bit of a date night. That cool too or is this a "gentleman's club" ... at a church 😉 LOL!
Scott
Scott
Hi Scott,
Bring your wife, she's certainly welcome. From time to time wives do come to the meetings, although not many seem all that interested in Audio, I guess it's primarily a "guy thing."
I don't believe that it's a "Gentleman's Club", otherwise I probably wouldn't have been allowed to join! 😀
The Church? The Club has used the Church's Facilities since 1979 or so, when it was formed. The previous Pastor listened to Martin-Logan's in his home system and was quite a music lover in his own right.
Best Regards,
TerryO
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Excellent, thanks Terry! It does seem that there aren't many females involved in the hobby but my wife does enjoy what I've been able to build for the house 🙂
I sure wish my wife enjoyed my Audio stuff as much as yours seems to.
I really don't understand her, as I've sanded all the beautiful Bondo work with very fine sandpaper to make it look quite elegant. I probably shouldn't have done it on the kitchen counter while she was preparing food, although I'm sure the people at the Church Dinner couldn't taste it.
Heck, we'll probably have a good laugh about it, ...once she let's me back in the house.
😕
Best Regards,
Terry
Terry, I got a dozen 2" full range drivers on sale from PE.
I've been thinking about your curved line array. How did
you curve the wood like that? Is it a single chunk of wood
you cut it out from? Coz it sure was heavy. I know, I lifted
it myself!
Tymphany 2" Full-Range Neodymium Driver | Parts-Express.com
These were $5 a piece. Still not as cheap as your line array 🙂
I've been thinking about your curved line array. How did
you curve the wood like that? Is it a single chunk of wood
you cut it out from? Coz it sure was heavy. I know, I lifted
it myself!
Tymphany 2" Full-Range Neodymium Driver | Parts-Express.com
These were $5 a piece. Still not as cheap as your line array 🙂
Haha, I'm sure she will 😀
Unfortunately, my "building" is more of putting things together and putting holes in walls/running cabling/etc not building actual speakers. That's why I found this site 🙂 I'm hoping a foray into Single Driver speakers may be a good ticket to start. Just gotta get good at sanding on the kitchen counter
We're still trying to find a sitter for next Thursday but hopefully we'll both be there.
Thanks again!
Scott
"All politics is local."
Because of weather effects are, "all great speakers local designs?"
Could a speaker designed and voiced in the high elevation Tucson desert during a hot day win a competition in Seattle during a normal cold, wet evening?
I design my speakers during the warm, dry California summer and I notice that my speakers sound different if I open up a few windows after cold winter rain.
The speed of sound changes with temperature, a little bit with humidity − but not with atmospheric pressure. Frequency dependent attenuation varies with humidity.
So, do only "locals" have a chance of winning the Seattle speaker contest?
Should out-of-town speakers only get judged after several rounds of drinks?
Because of weather effects are, "all great speakers local designs?"
Could a speaker designed and voiced in the high elevation Tucson desert during a hot day win a competition in Seattle during a normal cold, wet evening?
I design my speakers during the warm, dry California summer and I notice that my speakers sound different if I open up a few windows after cold winter rain.
The speed of sound changes with temperature, a little bit with humidity − but not with atmospheric pressure. Frequency dependent attenuation varies with humidity.
So, do only "locals" have a chance of winning the Seattle speaker contest?
Should out-of-town speakers only get judged after several rounds of drinks?
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My curved, or focused, array was built with 1/2 inch MDF for the front baffle which was bent onto the cabinet, a bit at a time. My drivers are pretty small (~1.3 inches) and the distance across the face of the entire baffle was only 4 inches, so there really isn't any significant distance that's spanned. The bass unit is 3/4 inch MDF with a 1.5 thickness of MDF on the front baffle and is tuned to 33 Hz for the Adire Audio AV8 woofer.
You could laminate the front baffle with thinner plys of real wood or plywood such as Baltic Birch.
The secret, OK it's not really a secret, is to figure how far back your listening position is from the speaker. In my case, having a small room, the distance was 8 feet. Having figured out how tall the array would be with the number of drivers I planned on using in the Array, I figured on having the focal point of the drivers far enough behind my head to provide a 6-7 inch vertical "window" at my ear. It worked out that a 10.5 foot radius would accomplish this in my situation. If I was sitting further back, the radius would have had to be increased. The small drivers should be pretty close to each other, but as they are focused as well as being a small diameter the frequency that they start to beam is quite high (mine are a bit over 10 kHz) and due to the focused nature of the baffle it will not be an issue.
The timing and phase of these multiple drivers are always exactly right within the "sound cone" and there aren't any comb filtering issues when properly seated.
Now I must say that these are intended primarily for serious listening sessions, they're not what I would term a social (or party) speakers.
Added information: The weight of the arrays is a comination of the MDF itself and the fact that the entire interior of the array, other than the front baffle itself, was lined with some self adhesive vinyl floor tiles that also helped towards providing a mass loaded, contrained layer for further damping of the walls.
Best Regards,
Terry
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I hope this is ok to put a link here, but roughly 2 weeks after this event I'm hosting a GTG at my house. Since I'm new here I didn't do a thread as it isn't a hard core DIY event but I figured most audio people are open to good audio no matter who makes it. Its just more fun if we make it ourselves 🙂 Here is the thread I just started: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/club...elody-importers-january-29th.html#post2425918
If I shouldn't link to that or if I shouldn't have the event posted here on DIY Audio just let me know and I'll take it down. I don't want to be breaking any rules, especially being new 🙂
Scott
If I shouldn't link to that or if I shouldn't have the event posted here on DIY Audio just let me know and I'll take it down. I don't want to be breaking any rules, especially being new 🙂
Scott
Yes Linesource, there really is a Santa Claus!
Oops! Wrong thread.😕
Actually, I believe that nobody outside of "Cascadia" could possibly win a Seattle speaker contest, unless they're from Eastern Washington, Idaho, Oregon, Montana or one of the Western Canadian Provinces.
The secret to winning a Seattle Speaker Contest that's held "during a normal cold, wet evening" is to use extremely "fast" drivers to compensate for the effects of humidity. It also helps to voice them for a rather dry, etched sound, as this further helps to offset the effects of our miserable, damp climate.
Best Regards,
TerryO
this can't go anywhere but downhill, so let's just say - have a great time at your GTG
hugs
Chris & Cal
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