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I'm not inviting controversy. I'm sincere. First off, I have no formal training in physics or acoustics and am not even what could be considered intermediate with regard to speaker design. I'm posting this here since htguide members seem to represent a realtively smaller, and relatively less broadly esoteric (i mean that in the most complementary way...fewer threads about cryogenic treatment of sintered unobtainium speaker spikes) approach to design. I hope that means any discussion is more likely to stay reasonable and stay on the rails.
I've generally been aware of a minority of tapped horn enthusiasts on the boards. An interesting category of approach to design. But recently I've had reason to look farther into it, specific to subwoofers, and am not, at present, very comfortable with some of the claims being made. To the point... If a 35 dollar eight inch woofer in a smaller (relatively) TH cabinet can equal or exceed the performance of a high xmax, high quality,150 to 300 dollar subwoofer driver such as the Dayton RSS, Peerless XXLS, Shiva, Acoustic Elegance, RythmikAudio, etc,... and 95 percent of subwoofer builders/designers out there are utilizing the latter drivers in sealed or reflex cabinets, then have all the latter simply just not gotten it yet? Including the majority of commercial designers? Including the majority of pro-sound designers/vendors/users? I don't mean sarcasm there. It's a serious question. The threads dedicated to TH sub builds lay claim throughout of "measuring flat to xx Hz" with small, high excursion drivers, using 1/6 of the wattage of simpler sealed or reflex designs, in TH cabinets equal in size or smaller. They appear to have all the data and graphs to back the claims.
It's sometimes noted that build complexity accounts for the relative lack of interest. But looking at many of the skills and effort put into most peoples subs I kind of doubt that is what's keeping them off. Quite often the bracing alone in such builds is more complex than the tapered baffles in a TH. Harder to model? Again, many designers are making use of software for such. So, with such demonstrable superiority, is the tapped horn going to dominate the landscape in short order?
Perhaps my non technical background allows me to wonder from the very start. The theoretical jargon means very little to me so I just skip to the end of the story. And I'm left trying to digest a claim similar to "this 35hp vehicle, at 70mpg, due to the continuously variable transmission, chassis design, and advanced aerodynamics, will equal and/or exceed, by all measures, the performance of your 280hp, 20mpg vehicle. Here are the graphs and testimonials to prove it." And my well earned consumer skepticism tells me pretty quickly to beware... I may not getting the full story here. Am I missing some fundamental of acoustics/physics that can only be gained in the classroom?
I'm familiar enough with motor vehicles, having driven dozens of makes and models in widely varying circumstances over the course of thirty years to make some pretty accurate guesses as to where that 35hp vehicle will not equal or exceed the 280 hp model. I'm far less acquainted with the performance of speaker systems of varying design. Maybe my analogy is poor. My laptop is 1/1000th the size of the 1946 ENIAC, consumes 1/1000th the energy, and performs 100,000,000 times better, by all measures. But a laptop's performance is not actually quantified by energy (spl, acceleration, torque) on the order of a subwoofer or automobile. So what am I missing?
I've generally been aware of a minority of tapped horn enthusiasts on the boards. An interesting category of approach to design. But recently I've had reason to look farther into it, specific to subwoofers, and am not, at present, very comfortable with some of the claims being made. To the point... If a 35 dollar eight inch woofer in a smaller (relatively) TH cabinet can equal or exceed the performance of a high xmax, high quality,150 to 300 dollar subwoofer driver such as the Dayton RSS, Peerless XXLS, Shiva, Acoustic Elegance, RythmikAudio, etc,... and 95 percent of subwoofer builders/designers out there are utilizing the latter drivers in sealed or reflex cabinets, then have all the latter simply just not gotten it yet? Including the majority of commercial designers? Including the majority of pro-sound designers/vendors/users? I don't mean sarcasm there. It's a serious question. The threads dedicated to TH sub builds lay claim throughout of "measuring flat to xx Hz" with small, high excursion drivers, using 1/6 of the wattage of simpler sealed or reflex designs, in TH cabinets equal in size or smaller. They appear to have all the data and graphs to back the claims.
It's sometimes noted that build complexity accounts for the relative lack of interest. But looking at many of the skills and effort put into most peoples subs I kind of doubt that is what's keeping them off. Quite often the bracing alone in such builds is more complex than the tapered baffles in a TH. Harder to model? Again, many designers are making use of software for such. So, with such demonstrable superiority, is the tapped horn going to dominate the landscape in short order?
Perhaps my non technical background allows me to wonder from the very start. The theoretical jargon means very little to me so I just skip to the end of the story. And I'm left trying to digest a claim similar to "this 35hp vehicle, at 70mpg, due to the continuously variable transmission, chassis design, and advanced aerodynamics, will equal and/or exceed, by all measures, the performance of your 280hp, 20mpg vehicle. Here are the graphs and testimonials to prove it." And my well earned consumer skepticism tells me pretty quickly to beware... I may not getting the full story here. Am I missing some fundamental of acoustics/physics that can only be gained in the classroom?
I'm familiar enough with motor vehicles, having driven dozens of makes and models in widely varying circumstances over the course of thirty years to make some pretty accurate guesses as to where that 35hp vehicle will not equal or exceed the 280 hp model. I'm far less acquainted with the performance of speaker systems of varying design. Maybe my analogy is poor. My laptop is 1/1000th the size of the 1946 ENIAC, consumes 1/1000th the energy, and performs 100,000,000 times better, by all measures. But a laptop's performance is not actually quantified by energy (spl, acceleration, torque) on the order of a subwoofer or automobile. So what am I missing?
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