Detuned Demystified

[drmcclainphd]

Re: Detuned Demystified

Did you keep the meter at 1m away from the center of the cone in the second measurement? You have basically horn loaded your driver and I believe the low end measured the way it did due to the meter getting close to the horn as it was possibly moved to keep same distance to driver. I would set the meter 1m away form the expanded steel for all measurments as this would be where the imaginary baffle would be.

I had to keep the meter 1m from the mesh in all cases, as it was mounted to a 1/2" x 1m dowel to assure consistent exact distance.

[drmcclainphd]

Re: Detuned Demystified

You may be correct. I have never tried it so I can't really say, but in my head it seems like a bad idea. Of course we are talking about a guitar cab so it doesn't necessarilly need to be high fidelity.

Guitar drivers are expected to have a coloration more so than hifi drivers or speaker systems. This is so expected that almost all catalog listings give them. Or perhaps cart precedes horse. Whether or not that particular aspect has any significant validity, the differences in tone from box to box vary so much that among them hifi becomes just another option, not necessarily an ideal. Accurate reproduction is only important in miked acoustic work, and sometimes not even then. I've built some very accurate cabs and found that many players prefer the "dirtier" cabs instead. I've no doubt that some of the preferences expressed by those trying cabs with half the drivers removed stem from resonances within the narrower range of frequencies a guitar produces, and perhaps some pseudo-stochastic amplification based on the highly complex interferences. When it's all said and done, for electric guitars at least, it all comes down to preferences, as an electric guitar by itself doesn't "sound like" anything.