Ed-you-ma-Kaition-al Muhnday

Burnout and I went in today and began the clean-up phase of the shop and Son of Bossmans basement.    Wasn’t near as bad as a couple years back, when we had to use shovels to clean out the muck.   Today was hoses and brooms.    Left the floor fans runnin’ to try and dry stuff out a bit between now and tomorrow when HOPEFULLY the rest of the crew shows up and they can help put the polish on things and get the business back up runnin’

Still lots of water that needs to go downstream yet.   it is receding, but these hills are still shedding copious amounts of water so the drop is slow.  Just runnin’ around, fingers crossed, that we don’t get any more monsoon type days between now and then.  It sure wouldn’t take much to bring the tables back up.

Now, for the educational side of things; My drivers and amplifier came in today.    I set the whole shebang up in a temporary fashion to play with it.   Mostly because I had no clue what to expect.    I set up the initial amp setup using my two sony studio monitors: I know those drivers and I wanted to see what the amp was capable of with known good sound outputs.   Not bad, could use the subwoofer IMO, but that dinky amplifier drove them just fine without distortion, even into the upper limits.

Now, its time for the DML’s.    I had a couple of peices 3/4″ insulation board, nothing I want to use as they are scrap, but they were big enough for my curious side.   Hung them from the bookshelf with care and slapped the ‘exciters’ (what Dayton calls these drivers) on and ran my wires to the amp.    hooked everything up and re-established bluetooth connection to the amp with the phone,,,,,

HOLEY FRACKIN’ SHIRT PILES OF DOG!!!!!

Oh MY DAWG are these things LOUD!!!!!   

The levels I had coming out of my sony’s was where I started.   Not even 40% amp load and these things were LOUD CLEAR and THUMPY!!!!    HoleySHeeeettttttsssssss!!!!!!

A solid subwoofer on the ground would be PERFECT (needs crossover and seperate amp for that, future project) BUT, I am telllin’ ya as they stand right now (hang actually) THEY NEED NOTHING but fine tuned.  Properly sized boards, properly hung and this set up is fillin’ the void of silence.   FILLING that void.   Simple 40w driver and what I was hearing reminded me of a 400w mid driver with a 1″ horn driver

I’m inclined right now, to install this thing at the shop so I have tunes for work.    I haven’t had a system at work in a couple of years and sorta miss it. and the sounds I was hearing today, they will fill the gap and cover the noises of shop perfectly.  

And I think I am going to do just that.   Spend a little more for a better amp with crossed over points built in so I can have that subwoofer/satellite set up, here at home.  

Anywhoooossss,,,, I am going to include some links for anyone that wants to play with these things.   If you love sound (I DO!) this is a stoopid cheap way of getting something really cool to play with.

Dayton Audio Surface exciter 32mm 40w@4ohm

Sunbuck 300w mini stereo amplifier with BT

Total expense for me was $70 and that included tax (and shipping was free for the amount of purchase)

The board can be pretty much anything,, but every one I have read or watched suggested steering clear of metal plate.   The suggested BEST material was Acoustic ceiling tiles, but I have seen balsa wood, bamboo tiles, glass, drywall and 1/4 laminates.     

Oh, And DO NOT mount the exciter dead center,,,, you want it off center, like 2/5ths x3/5ths.    And DO figure some solid ways of attaching your hanging system.   These points will be rattled around like you have no idea.    I’m considering running some bungee cord through them for mounting.   Sort of a pain to run a long hole that far through the foam, but I think the bungee will allow better response. (and I am fully accepting of being proven wrong,,, this is a learning curve thing.)

I’m tellin’ ya: if you are a Sound snob, these are gonna surprise you! 

Live

LEARN

Laugh

LOVE

LOAD

Update: no measured outputs, no analyzer, just rough descriptions from old sound dude.   Test songs: Shakira Me Enamoré, (pop beats) Rush Vital Signs(classic prog rock with killer drum and bass tracks) Billy Joel Vienna, Mozart Sonata 11, and the Real MacKenzies The Tempest (for those awesome bagpipes!!!!)

Response is all the way down in the basement around 100hZ and as far up as 7khZ (and seeing Kat response, way higher!!!)  VERY flat!!!!   Holding the panel,  Neil Pearts kick drum rattled my paw!!!!  I would say the actual response is lower,  but wont reliably ‘sound’ below that 100hZ

Near feild (@1m) levels at 50% are about 105dB(totally rough guess) and clear as a bell.

WOW!!!  I see some serious system building in my future.

(( I had forgotten, I have a tone generator app in my phone (tested a few systems in my time, even some since leaving that world.),,,,    I set everything back up, and did a freq sweep from 20-18K.   I could hear some low around 40hz, but picked up a resonate rattle right at 50 from one of the plates.   Could be a fault of the driver, could be a fault of the boards construction, could be install error, could be a bad signal in the amp.  its only on the one side.  I didn’t swap things around to see if it followed or stayed on channel, but I don’t see me driving into the 40hz range.   Usual for me is that Lo-D when I am getting into some grungy metal stuff.    Those are the days where I WILL have a subwoofer and the range will be limited to 90hz up with the sub pulling all the power for the low end. 

as for the top end stuff, I was able to track it (with my handicapped ears, no aids) up to 8500hz.    Further up around the 11K range, every single Kat in the house decided that outside was easier on the ears, so I know these units were outputting the bright stuff just fine.

I’m in love with sound again  LOL.

))