Hi Everyone,
I realize there's a lot I don't know about speaker design, especially in measurements, but I hope I can share with you another example of approaching a 2-way center channel WTW design with far-field measurements and OmniMic.
I have further realized that OmniMic is automatically blending gated and non-gated responses and that this is saving me a boatload of work. However the approach I will share should still work with REW if you know what you are doing.
My point is not to say this is the only way, but that this way is damn accurate and can save a boatload of work.
First, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and the proof of the speaker design is in the FR, so here it is. The FR below is in place on my entertainment center, 3' away on tweeter axis, using 1/24th smoothing:
I won't share the XSim predictions cause they are just too close. The deviation from flat above is pretty much what I wanted, and also matches my main speakers. That is, I chose the bass hump and downward slope to 1 kHz. That's not an error except in choice.
The bump at 90 Hz though is something I don't like, but chose to leave alone.
My process is fairly simple. I use OmniMic and measure everything at 3' away in cabinet. For the parallel woofers I had to do some cheating, which I'll discuss.
Anyway, here is the step-by-step process:
As I have elsewhere I acknowledge that this process is not suitable for speakers with crossover points in the critical bass regions where you must have near field phase and amplitude information to have any chance at designing the crossovers properly.
What I am saying however is that to design a 2 way speaker system accurately with these tools getting to done is a lot simpler than others may have realized.
If you feel there's a set of missing measurements which would help us better see the quality of the finished product, please let me know and I'll try to get it done.
As is true for 80% of what I post, I hope this is useful and informative. I know the rest is just me trolling while bored.
Best,
Erik
I realize there's a lot I don't know about speaker design, especially in measurements, but I hope I can share with you another example of approaching a 2-way center channel WTW design with far-field measurements and OmniMic.
I have further realized that OmniMic is automatically blending gated and non-gated responses and that this is saving me a boatload of work. However the approach I will share should still work with REW if you know what you are doing.
My point is not to say this is the only way, but that this way is damn accurate and can save a boatload of work.
First, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and the proof of the speaker design is in the FR, so here it is. The FR below is in place on my entertainment center, 3' away on tweeter axis, using 1/24th smoothing:

I won't share the XSim predictions cause they are just too close. The deviation from flat above is pretty much what I wanted, and also matches my main speakers. That is, I chose the bass hump and downward slope to 1 kHz. That's not an error except in choice.
My process is fairly simple. I use OmniMic and measure everything at 3' away in cabinet. For the parallel woofers I had to do some cheating, which I'll discuss.
Anyway, here is the step-by-step process:
- Estimate ports with WinISD
- Route baffle, and ports.
- Attach ports and drivers
- Measure tweeter
- Measure woofers, wired in parallel.
- Measure woofer Z in parallel in cabinet.
- Hack the woofer files. Reduce FR amplitude by 6 dB and double impedance in ZMA file. This is so I can still use 2 woofers in XSim. If you want to use a virtual woofer, skip this step.
- Import driver FR and ZMA files into XSim.
- Estimate driver distances.
- Design crossover.
- Build Crossover.
- Listen. Realize that box needs to be tilted towards user's head.
- Measure.
- Done!
As I have elsewhere I acknowledge that this process is not suitable for speakers with crossover points in the critical bass regions where you must have near field phase and amplitude information to have any chance at designing the crossovers properly.
What I am saying however is that to design a 2 way speaker system accurately with these tools getting to done is a lot simpler than others may have realized.
If you feel there's a set of missing measurements which would help us better see the quality of the finished product, please let me know and I'll try to get it done.
As is true for 80% of what I post, I hope this is useful and informative. I know the rest is just me trolling while bored.
Best,
Erik