How to build a spherical speaker?

The volume of a sphere is 4.1888 * r * r *r where r is the radius (i.e. half the inside diameter of the sphere). E.g If the sphere has an internal diameter of 1.0 metre:

r = 0.5m

v = 4.1888 * 0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 = 0.5236 cubic metres.

Care: You also need to allow for any internal space lost due to battens, drivers etc...
That number 5236 is also The hypotenuse of a pair of cubes which has a 2 to 1 ratio as a rectangle.

And the sphere with a diameter of one in a cube 1x1x1 has a displacement of 52.36% the other while The Perimeter of the above mentioned as a a rectangle 2 cubes is pi.

Interesting is the swing of the pendulum in one second from 100 cm long it pulled up 15° and released will in one second traverse 30°. Which is pi divided by six and also the same number 05236.

If using 30 cm in 360Cm or driver separation of 300cm in a cabinet such as a compound horn or a series version of a tapped offset driver transmission line. The exact location for the driver entry points in the compound or 0.5236(30cm) from each end And in the same type of arrangement but only a single not compounded i.e. using once I have the driver that is then 104.76 cm in 300. Where is the location it feels in exactly and precisely the whenWhat is the location that fills in exactly and precisely the 3×1/4 wave Fb harmonic at the top of the bandwidth. Extending it to the next area where there’s a notch at 5/4. Truly an amazing coincidence but this goes even further because now the entire cabinet in a compound design is developed divided into pi divided by 12 effectively and everything is a gain and low pass filter folded at 90 cm in the 360 but this encompasses in that arrangement. Adding a 30 cm exit reveals some type of Nirvana or summation of vectors in perfect alignment between bounces at pressure phase intervals(node/anti node separations or distances,As seen at the three-quarter exist as well for other odd for harmonics in the cabinet.

300, is 5.236, or 0.5236×10.

that number alone is the single most important in all of mathematics and astrophysics. It’s more important than pi and more important than 0618 as well. Because it incorporates both of them and 2.618 is exactly half of that number and also 15° in radians where is where all this hides in the circle.

It’s the parallax angle of the speed of light. And you can calculate the exact location of earth using it and a Pythagorean theorem on a 30 6090 triangle using the diameter of the sun to locate the earth again logged iAnd you can calculate the exact location of earth using it and a Pythagorean theorem on a 30 6090 triangle using the diameter of the sun to locate the earth or any planet or anything in its orbit around the sun.

The hypotenuse is twice the time of the sun the short leg is the name of the sun and the long legs exactly 1496 million kms.

And if you put this into the compound subwoofer design you have absolutely Perfectly aligned phase that continues throughout the enclosure in all directions at all frequencies because using an exit dividing that at 270 and 90 he created harmonic interval..

But something amazing happens at 864 Hz and then 1728. And those are the two numbers used to locate the planet earth in that mouth above as well(Log scale up 10 factoLog scale up 10^x for all of these things or down)

And every single frequency in the 864 interval thereafter will be aligned to a perfect vacuum in the pressure wave hypothetically or in the math and simulation and lanAnd every single frequency in the 864 interval thereafter will be aligned to a perfect vacuum in the pressure wave hypothetically or in the math and simulation All the way out through 20,000 Hz every single one landing on 864 over and over again 23 times. However each of them lost four points along the way and follows its own Fournier transfer which is the basis for the entire universe and the 12 hours in 432000 seconds we experience in 24 hours a day as well.

The same exact math is occurring in the speaker every single frequency is lined with a location in the solar system we’re all familiar with at the same time even more beyond that.

It’s truly a little niche of numbers and things but it doesn’t have anything to do with a spear it’s all about perfect rectangles because the exact numbers in these exact figures in radians or proportionally the same in any numerical reference such as the centimeters Were carved out in the kings chamber of the pyramid of Giza in solid granite somehow already long long long ago??

only a few months ago did I realize this while searching for an answer of how this perfect compound subwoofer arrangement was revealing such an excellent result when it was surrounded by areas that were absolutely out of phase and horribly disruptive of things going on in the cabinet and out.


Sorry to interrupt but I really wanted to point that out since you brought up the mass of the volume of a sphere because if you look deeper into the centimeters you will see so much information about building perfect speakers and other things it’s absurd nobody tend to look into thiSorry to interrupt but I really wanted to point that out since you brought up the mass of the volume of a sphere because if you look deeper into the centimeters you will see so much information about building perfect speakers and other other things in physics it’s absolutely crazy!!

001/254mm

003/254mm

Both of those in the decimal points for reached to the point they start repeating again a sequence of numbers and angles represented in the metric system and imperial at the same time.


It’s amazing what those describe and if you drive or implemented in areas and decipher more numbers from that using radians and part of the circle or the description of things divided by seven which make up circles you’ll see what I’m talking about it’s truly unique and stanIt’s amazing what those describe and if you drive or implemented in areas and decipher more numbers from that using radians and part of the circle or the description of things divided by seven which make up circles you’ll see what I’m talking about it’s truly unique and Has countless applications in acoustics to say the least
 
Last edited:
The two larger bass spheres have internal damping in the center, but I think there is technical disagreement on whether spheres have this problem due to lack of standing waves (the opposite points are both nearly infinite and infinitely small unlike speakers with panel construction). The speakers are constructed with a center pole that prevents any waves anyway from going through the center, rather bend around the round pole. Here is a quoted post from the parts express tech talk forum (from "Rex") who in turn drew his info from the Gallo site, of course Gallo being one of the top makers of this shape.

The ellipsoid design is interesting but also this could be very difficult for a diy project. Emailed with US Enclosures recently and all they make for spheres is molded plastic composites, where the molds can cost about $10,000. Acrylic balls and other stuff you can buy online are thinner material. Researched a bunch of options.

What I can say is that with the damping I used, I cannot hear any audible resonances at high amplitudes (approaching 95 db) with bass drums and the like. Bass is extremely tight. I am sure microphone measurements would show some something but from a psycho-acoustic perspective, I can't hear problems. In doing this project, I took Gallo's word for it 🙂

The Ikea blanda bowls certainly seem "bush league" at first and making a 4-level system is not easy, but the end result makes me a believer in the sphere approach and the speakers look pretty good (passed the wife test). Very little diffraction will occur externally, which plagues all other shapes (ala Dr. Olson). There are of course some blanda bowl projects you can see online / YouTube, but usually just one sphere with a small, "full-range" driver.

https://techtalk.parts-express.com/forum/tech-talk-forum/3290-spherical-subwoofer:

Spherical Subwoofer​

01-26-2006, 07:49 PM


Anyone ever experiment with making a spherical subwoofer. If tubular is suppose to be better why not spherical. On the Anthony Gallo site they state:

1. A sphere has no internal standing waves where bass output and efficiency are lost.

2. A sphere has no external baffle diffraction to smear the signal. This allows our speakers to deliver the most open, transparent soundstage possible. ... Of course, special effects in movies will take on an entirely new dimension. The added details will convince you that you are one step closer to being there.

3. A sphere is the strongest, lightest, lowest mass cabinet possible and has long been known to be the optimal enclosure for a driver. The most important design factors for speaker cabinets are structural rigidity and lack of resonance. Box designs attempt to make up for lack of rigidity by adding mass. Mass simply stores energy which is then released to the environment as harmonics and ringing that are out of time and out of phase with the music, that old familiar "box sound". <A HREF="http://www.roundsound.com/anthony-gallo-faq.htm">http://www.roundsound.com/anthony-gallo-faq.htm</A>
 
plywood sphere

That is cool. Building a geodesic sphere and then spinning it down. Creates a fantastic looking pattern.

You would need a tool that allows you to precisiely make the 2 triangles, with the appropriate angles on the side. His assembly method is strange (i have built more than a few geodesics).

It should be noted that if you can live with the more polygonal shape, one would usually build the geodesic with pentagons on which one can mount drivers.

DesignAcoustics-dodecahedron.jpeg


I have drivers for a much smaller variation with a sub & a 2.1 system)

dave
 
The part about spherical subwoofers is plain nonsense
My thot as well. Except that the characteristics described can apply to many woofers.

At the frequencies involved the driver does not know the shape of the box. And, ecxcept in really big woofers, the wavelengths invoved are longer than any wavelength reproduced by the loudspeaker so no internal airspace resonses have room to form.

dave
 
The major manufacturers of spherical enclosures - such as D/B/A, Cabasse, Gallo and Reckhorn - will argue that the sphere does not resonate as it is the strongest possible shape and in order to resonate, it would actually have to "pulse" in and out. See their websites. These engineers appear to be well experienced and well versed. "Standing waves" are not really a factor as there are no parallel sides internally, only infinitely small opposite points which can deflect sound waves in any direction. A ball or pole or similar object can be put into the center very easily to keep waves from traveling from one side to the either if desired.

Meanwhile all speakers made from panels are separate pieces and although they have joints, panels can certainly vibrate.
 
This is from the Demand Better Audio (dba) site relative to their line of spherical speakers:

"The dba Sphere; Pioneering research from Dr.H.Olson during the 1950’s exposed the properties that make the most ideal speaker enclosure and the elements that hinder any design, work that is still referenced by experts to this day.
In any design of speaker enclosure designers strive to eliminate internal resonance and external diffraction. Dr.Olson found that when using a spherical enclosure these two main causes of loudspeaker distortion and colouration were neutralised more than any other possible design."


http://demandbetteraudio.co.uk/works/envy1-2/

They use carbon fiber for the enclosures and proprietary internal damping technologies. That said, in order for a sphere to resonate it has to pulsate in and out as a unified object. This plus the lack of diffraction coloration make it a superior enclosure shape.
 
Olson certainly showed that. of the shapes he tested, it had the lowest diffraction effect sat the 2π yo 4π transition.

olson-baffleshape-fr.gif


But it, effectively has an inifinite number of parallel walls ALL of the same length. This leads to a very strong single frequency internal air resonance, with a very big node dead centre.

B&W took the research further and cam up with, essentially, a teardrop, which has even better 2π to 4π transition and dramatically less internal resonance issues.

BnW-midEnclosure.jpg


dave
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Booger weldz
If any concern, any internal "standing" sound waves in the sphere can easily be mitigated by introducing a smaller ball in the center, and this can even be slightly offset. For a 12" internal diameter of a sphere, the frequency at that length is about 1,125 Hz. This won't cause the sphere to resonate especially with the singular strength of the enclosure, let alone any damping used. The ellipse shape is hard to manufacture and also the front end of it is pretty spherical anyway.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Booger weldz
There are DIYers that have made these. Others have made single spheres with a "full range" driver, with IKEA bowls and other methods (such as creating a fiberglass ball by spreading liquid fg over an inflatable ball). Many are shown on YouTube and Pinterest. Many sphere speaker manufacturers use two or more enclosures joined together by a pole or other means. The problem with many small drivers in one sphere can be the interference and overlapping of sound waves, as opposed to using one driver per sphere.

A good article about this developed at Princeton over a few decades of research:

http://music2.princeton.edu/delorean/history.html
 
Let me give you an example. This first image shows the concentric waves of a mode which has the driver in the middle of the sphere. I propose that this is the same mode as having the drivers on the outside all over the cabinet evenly.

Screenshot from 2022-06-14 13-07-36.png


Now, I created a quick and not very precise enclosure with 8 drivers around it. The point was to show a concentric mode, and it does. More drivers and neater placement would make it look more like the one above.

Screenshot from 2022-06-15 02-17-09.png