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Author Topic: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?  (Read 6036 times)

Richard Stevens

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Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« on: July 23, 2014, 02:26:43 PM »

I was killing time in a bar the other night, waiting for the show I came to see to begin in another bar next door.  This place was pretty small, but had a good-sounding  built-in house system, installed ingeniously to save every inch of space, and thereby make it available for performers and paying customers. 

The system was all center-hung above the front edge of the triangular stage.  Behind the speaker array was a large rectangular box that I'm guessing house the power amps, up out of the way in an otherwise unused space.

The interesting piece that caught my eye was mounted about 7' high on one of the stage walls.  It was a cabinet containing what looked like six 12" speakers in a 3-wide by 2-high arrangement.  It was maybe four feet wide and three feet high  The top half was maybe a foot deep, the bottom stepped down to about 9" deep.  It had a DIY look about it, just painted black, with no grills over the twelves (no need for grills, since it was mounted so high on the wall).   The twelves were all pointing straight out, firing into the back of the amp/speaker array about six feet away.

Edit:  Bingo.  I found a clear shot of this thing, upper left corner of the video, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZDVvbi4jkw

Overall, it looked like the low-profile undersofa subwoofers that folks on PartsExpress' forum build for home theater systems, but giant.  Based on this, I assumed it was someone's design for a subwoofer that hangs on the wall, takes minimal headroom away from the stage, and takes up no floor space.  (The stage was only about a foot high, so no place to hide subs under there.)

Is this really a "thing"?  Has anyone seen such a design before in pro sound?  Workable design, or kludge? 
« Last Edit: July 23, 2014, 02:57:15 PM by Richard Stevens »
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Brian Jojade

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #1 on: July 23, 2014, 03:52:56 PM »

How did it sound?  The neat thing about audio is that there are plenty of neat ideas that can make great results.  When something is dramatically different than what people are used to, you'll often see a list of things that are 'wrong' about it, but audio reproduction will NEVER be perfect, so the 'wrong' things can be completely acceptable.
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Richard Stevens

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #2 on: July 23, 2014, 04:07:24 PM »

Well, it wasn't exactly the "normal" rock & roll program material I'm used to.  The act was a 9-piece all-female Mariachi Band, but they sounded good.  It's a quick setup, check & play deal.  They run five hour-long sets a night through this room.  I was impressed with their clever use of space. 
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Art Welter

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #3 on: July 23, 2014, 04:10:48 PM »


The interesting piece that caught my eye was mounted about 7' high on one of the stage walls.  It was a cabinet containing what looked like six 12" speakers in a 3-wide by 2-high arrangement.  It was maybe four feet wide and three feet high  The top half was maybe a foot deep, the bottom stepped down to about 9" deep. 

Edit:  Bingo.  I found a clear shot of this thing, upper left corner of the video, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZDVvbi4jkw

Is this really a "thing"?  Has anyone seen such a design before in pro sound?  Workable design, or kludge?
Richard,

The speaker in the upper left corner of the video appears to have only 3 speakers, and judging by the size in relationship to the drums they appear to be smaller than 12". They may be for playback rather than for live use. The cabinet size is rather small for sub use. The cabinet you describe is quite different from what I see in the video, but would net around 1.5 cubic feet per speaker, still on the small side but not unreasonably tiny.

Small enclosures with multiple suitable long excursion speakers can certainly be "workable", but require more power to achieve the same SPL as larger enclosures. The cabinet in the video probably is sealed, though it may have ports in a location not visible. Sealed cabinets are less efficient than ported or horn loaded designs, but also work better with limited enclosure volume.

Other than Bag End, there are few (if any) sealed enclosures sold for subs in the pro market, and a DIY sub using high excursion speakers can easily outperform the Bag End offerings, which use speakers with relatively little excursion.
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Richard Stevens

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #4 on: July 23, 2014, 04:52:59 PM »

Nope, you're only seeing the bottom half.  There's a stair-step across the middle, and three more drivers on the top row, where the cabinet is a few inches deeper.  In your capture above, you can just see half of the top-right driver.

I wish the iPhone crowd would pay more attention to the gear instead of the artists.  LOL
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Debbie Dunkley

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #5 on: July 23, 2014, 05:56:32 PM »

Can see more here...
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Jerome Malsack

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #6 on: July 23, 2014, 07:32:09 PM »

In home theater there are some that would create infinite baffle sub.  This requires two rooms of large size and the back pressure of the speakers goes into the back room. 

Some of the Part-express home theater subs are impressive  19 mm  Excursion. 
 http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-ts320d-4-12-titanic-mk-4-subwoofer-4-ohm--295-403
This is the 12 inch.  there is a 10 inch and a 15 inch. 

« Last Edit: July 23, 2014, 07:38:47 PM by Jerome Malsack »
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Scott Holtzman

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #7 on: July 23, 2014, 08:37:20 PM »

In home theater there are some that would create infinite baffle sub.  This requires two rooms of large size and the back pressure of the speakers goes into the back room. 

Some of the Part-express home theater subs are impressive  19 mm  Excursion. 
 http://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-ts320d-4-12-titanic-mk-4-subwoofer-4-ohm--295-403
This is the 12 inch.  there is a 10 inch and a 15 inch.

It does kind of look like a car stereo box.  Could you tell how low it was crossed over?

Too high and I can't imagine the feedback problems.

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Scott AKA "Skyking" Holtzman

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John Halliburton

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #8 on: July 23, 2014, 09:08:50 PM »

It does kind of look like a car stereo box.  Could you tell how low it was crossed over?

Too high and I can't imagine the feedback problems.

I don't know about that, given the pretty good sound quality on the video of Sam King linked earlier in the thread, sounds like it may be a pretty decent sound system there.

Best regards,

John
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paul bell

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Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #9 on: July 23, 2014, 09:44:11 PM »

Interesting that the upper three woofers are 4 or so inches further forward from the lower three. A small bit of time difference is there.

Here in NYC, I'm noticing a new trend of places being built by a younger generation and they have their buddies setting up sound systems. Most are pretty poor, some work as this place does. I'm seeing home stereo stuff, car cabinets and even DIY stuff from kits like from Parts Express.

Sadly, when these places call somebody like me, they've already blown their sound system budget and they only want what they have "fixed". I also see a lot of tiny home grade Bose speakers.

Ahh the power of the internet: anybody can be a sound engineer!
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ProSoundWeb Community

Re: Flat-pack sub? Is this a thing?
« Reply #9 on: July 23, 2014, 09:44:11 PM »


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