A Study of DMLs as a Full Range Speaker

linn selektions SACD

i replaced the right panel with the painters canvas and added my usual strip of paper ,i had to increase the volume on the canvas panel by about 3db to match the card panel.
i also added a small piece of paper to the tweeter on the card which seemed nice too.
both sound similar to me,but maybe the card has more detail.
100ohms .
maybe someone else could listen to these recordings and give an idea how they sound.
hopefully they sound OK?
steve
 

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  • martin taylor,Georgia on my mind..mp4
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  • carol kidd,havin a good time..mp4
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Use headphones!

If you use headphones to listen to the recordings ,this would give you an idea of what I am hearing from my seating position.
Playing over the speakers mucks it all up so please don't!but if you have to do please take this into consideration!
100homs.
Using a dome in the centre area is one of my ways of controlling the noise that can radiate from this area ,partly because of the tin can effect partly the cavity between the coils,maybe even a bit of phasing,how bad it all is depending on the material.
But having a pistonic dome tweeter in the centre isn't a bad idea,it works quite well.
As for the sound? I'm not very good at describing how the panels sound in my room,I've read too many gushing reviews in hifi mags.
For me dml is all about realism,the card panels are no exception,yes they have plenty of detail and are pretty ,what I would call clean sounding.
I usually prefer the sound from my good panels ,to the direct sound from my CD player to my headphones,they both sound good but the panels just sound so realistic in comparison.
This basic card panel really needs a decent mid bass driver to go up to 250hz or so to produce a full range speaker,but if done well ,it is worth it.
It plays all types of music,not just acoustic.
Some dml panels can sound weak below 300hz or so ,which favours acoustic music,but is easily fixed with LF drivers.
Steve
 
card panels only

thought i would quickly record the panels only ,from the same position as before 0ne mtr in front,they have good response down to 160hz with lower response down to 40hz.
i used the same tracks as before for comparison ,just for interests sake.
steve
 

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Frequency response of card panel

This is the response of the two card panels from the microphone position.
There is a lot of traffic noise below 40hz where the response drops like a brick,so ignore everything below 40hz.
Steve
 

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Actually these are probably more accurate ,I was kneeling down out of the way,I thought! But was affecting the response.
The two pics are one static and one with the mic swinging from left to right +- 10inches ,they look much the same.
Steve
 

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If you use headphones to listen to the recordings ,this would give you an idea of what I am hearing from my seating position.
Playing over the speakers mucks it all up so please don't!but if you have to do please take this into consideration!
100homs.
Using a dome in the centre area is one of my ways of controlling the noise that can radiate from this area ,partly because of the tin can effect partly the cavity between the coils,maybe even a bit of phasing,how bad it all is depending on the material.
But having a pistonic dome tweeter in the centre isn't a bad idea,it works quite well.
As for the sound? I'm not very good at describing how the panels sound in my room,I've read too many gushing reviews in hifi mags.
For me dml is all about realism,the card panels are no exception,yes they have plenty of detail and are pretty ,what I would call clean sounding.
I usually prefer the sound from my good panels ,to the direct sound from my CD player to my headphones,they both sound good but the panels just sound so realistic in comparison.
This basic card panel really needs a decent mid bass driver to go up to 250hz or so to produce a full range speaker,but if done well ,it is worth it.
It plays all types of music,not just acoustic.
Some dml panels can sound weak below 300hz or so ,which favours acoustic music,but is easily fixed with LF drivers.
Steve

Thank you Spedge
Your description sounds good and I had been curious about the 1 mm material you have used. I‘m also working with a 1 mm board, wood fiber called kraftplex, and hope to make some descriptions about the work soon.
Eric
 
Eric.
I use VLC free on my computer,phone and tablet,to listen and convert recordings to mp4.
For recording I use the Hi-Q free recording app on my Samsung phone.
I mainly use in ear headphones to listen to all three sources.
As for the kraftplex,I would expect it to sound similar to card ,they would both be easy to work with, I even used scissors to round the corners of my 2mmm balsa ply panels.
At first ,some time ago now ,I tried to make my own paper maché panel ,which was surprisingly good,considering how badly I made it.
I was trying to mimic a paper cone material,it ended up far to thick ,but was still quite light.
Took ages to dry and was very messy,so decided to give card a go,I looked around the craft store, but I thought I throw this stuff away every week ,cornflake boxes,pizza,you name it.
Many years ago I used two 1mm aluminium sheets glued together to give them a little bit of rigidity and damping,which were OK but were not very efficient.
This technique works quite well with thin card and is quite efficient.
By the way thin card will not support the weight of an exciter,it will buckle and bend with time,better to have the card hanging off the exciter if it is lighter,or support both.
Thicker card also works well and will support the exciter better.
Steve
 
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Well this thread is a bit of a read...
Thanks to XRK, Veleric, Burnt, Bradley, Spedge, and many others I'm forgetting for your experimenting.

I'm using the DAEX30HESF-4 as well since the PE posted frequency response looked best, though they are kinda goofy shaped and will likely require a spline (some consideration might be given there, if you planned to hang them from the ceiling).

*
I'm still playing around with panel material, size shape, and # of exciters, but here's one tip that I don't think was mentioned yet:
I use Velerics method of having the panel horizontal with exciter sitting on top for testing position and panel types, but rather then weight the exciters down I use a very small bead of sticky tac (blue tac is the same I assume) to stick them to the panel - without peeling the backing off the tape. They don't stick great, will come off if you tilt the panel too much, and will dislodge if you crank up the volume too much, but otherwise it's pretty workable. Yes, maybe there is some HF output loss due to the sticky tac material, but doesn't seem like much to my ears.
*

Jesse
 
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Eric.
Interesting,I had a quick look on line ,and from what I could find,you have to buy a minimum of 5.
Although they do do a free sample kit.
Can't find any in the local craft shop,but I did come across a needle craft 12 inch stretching ring that could be interesting?
Steve.

Steve, the panel I‘ve got from my colleague is 1m2. He has plenty of them for the children workshops. The kraftplex board has a structured surface and I made a 3dimensional construction with a 0.3 x 1m piece and compared it with the 0.7 x 1m board. The sound isn‘t correct yet and there is some more work required.
Cheers, Eric
 
Testing drive ideas.

These are a few panels I quickly knocked together to see which ,if any worked.
1 an old chalk board .
2 card with dome tweeter made from pva.
3 card with dome tweeter made from recycled red milk bottle top.
4 is the first and easiest method of making a tweeter (concave) from an exciter,for me anyway.
5 the CD was just to see if I could do it,have not attached an exciter as yet.

The first three panels surprisingly have a very good sound and good response up to 20k and probably a lot higher.
LF is about 160hz ,but with a more solid frame the chalk board could go to about 50hz or there abouts ,I believe? Similar to the art panel.
Not bad for a small panel.
The card can also go lower as well,with a bit of clamping,when I've got time I'll check this out at some stage.
I'm afraid I've too many projects on the go at the moment

Steve
 

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Patricia Barber cafe blue

just did a very quick recording of the two domes red bottle top left and pva right.
for you to make up your own minds about sound quality .
the mics only go up to about 10k but the domes are working way below this.
steve
 

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  • the thrill has gone.mp4
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black sabbath

another quick recording of these two panels on their own, so please forgive the quality ,they were playing quite loud full range,and they were shaking about a bit!
the mic was over 10ft into the room.
i thought the room response of the two small panels was quite interesting ,the low end seems stronger than the pink noise shows,i will post a pict of the actual peek hold response of this whole track.
i think the low end could be increased considerably by placing in a rigid frame?
steve
 

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This is the peek bold of all the frequencies played during the track.
Ignore anything below 40hz as this CD has nothing below this!!!
The hump in the midrange is the guitar solo and ozzies vocals .
While the low end is not strong but it is still there,unlike some bookshelf speakers that I have heard .
Steve
 

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I'm waiting for this one to dry,it's an old circular plaster midrange housing my wife now uses as a plant holder in the garden.
It has a 6 inch hole at the bottom ,hopefully it should be ok for testing?
Steve
 

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The plaster housing is back in the garden.
Basically it sounded like a speaker in a box ,I was also unable to keep a good amount of tension on the surface.
There was an increase in db between 150hz and about 1k but dropped like a brick below this.
I wil nowl try to increase the rigidity of the chalk board to see what happens,there will not be any problems keeping the surface tension?
Card.
The great thing about using free card from boxes is it is so cheep and so easy to cut using scissors,I have been changing the size and shape of this test panel to see what happens,all very interesting.
I can't wait to get my blue Peter badge😀
Steve
 
Another quick recording, this time a direct mp4 recording, no conversion!
It does pause after 3 minutes though,.
This is with the more solid frame attached to the small chalk board on the right,I have reduced the level of the left chanel so you can hear the chalk board better.
This panel goes down to 125hz with no room suckouts, so have xo the lf at 120hz 48db slope to the subs.
So the panel is doing everything from 125hz to 20k and beyond.
Steve
 

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rigidly mounted Chalk board

These are pics of the chalk board after adding a stronger frame,I would have liked a thicker heavier frame but these 1inch off cuts were just handy and quicker to test.I
Steve
 

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