Exile XM9's more mid bass

[David Analog]

There's a speaker design principle called "Hoffman's Iron Law":
1) Bass Extension.
2) Efficiency.
3) Small Enclosure.
Hoffman's Iron Law states that you can have any two of the above three attributes in any speaker. But not all three.
A speaker that can go deep in a very small enclosure will be terribly inefficient...which isn't going to work in a tower speaker that needs
high efficiency to project over distance and overcome high noise levels.
Could you get high efficiency AND decent bass extension in a single speaker? Sure, if the speaker enclosure is larger than a 5 gallon drum. But that won't pass on a wake tower.
As mentioned before, tower pods are mostly filled with the speaker displacement and that leaves very little interior air space. Imagine blowing air across a soda bottle. As a resonant chamber, it provides a certain lower tone. Now when the bottle is half filled with liquid, and has a smaller volume of air mass, it now produces a distinctly higher tone. That's what is going on inside a tower speaker.
So the only way you will truly get deeper midbass extension is with a larger speaker in a larger pod.
Can you equalize the speaker to sound differently? Yes and No. You can re-shape the sound by attenuating the tweeter, BUT, you cannot accentuate the midbass extension or output before you begin running into severe distortion and risks. Why? That air mass inside can only be rarified or compressed to a very small degree before the resistance becomes virtually unmovable. At that point, trying to drive the speaker harder creates all kinds of thermal and mechanical stresses on the speaker, not to mention distortion. If the speaker already has an inherent resistance to playing lower, then additional power going in will be wasted, as a very, very small portion of that added power (or equalization) will result in any audible difference. The bulk of that excess power (or equalization) becomes destructive. So be careful with equalization, especially at the lower end.

[trayson]

There's a speaker design principle called "Hoffman's Iron Law":
1) Bass Extension.
2) Efficiency.
3) Small Enclosure.
Hoffman's Iron Law states that you can have any two of the above three attributes in any speaker. But not all three.
A speaker that can go deep in a very small enclosure will be terribly inefficient...which isn't going to work in a tower speaker that needs
high efficiency to project over distance and overcome high noise levels.
Could you get high efficiency AND decent bass extension in a single speaker? Sure, if the speaker enclosure is larger than a 5 gallon drum. But that won't pass on a wake tower.
As mentioned before, tower pods are mostly filled with the speaker displacement and that leaves very little interior air space. Imagine blowing air across a soda bottle. As a resonant chamber, it provides a certain lower tone. Now when the bottle is half filled with liquid, and has a smaller volume of air mass, it now produces a distinctly higher tone. That's what is going on inside a tower speaker.
So the only way you will truly get deeper midbass extension is with a larger speaker in a larger pod.
Can you equalize the speaker to sound differently? Yes and No. You can re-shape the sound by attenuating the tweeter, BUT, you cannot accentuate the midbass extension or output before you begin running into severe distortion and risks. Why? That air mass inside can only be rarified or compressed to a very small degree before the resistance becomes virtually unmovable. At that point, trying to drive the speaker harder creates all kinds of thermal and mechanical stresses on the speaker, not to mention distortion. If the speaker already has an inherent resistance to playing lower, then additional power going in will be wasted, as a very, very small portion of that added power (or equalization) will result in any audible difference. The bulk of that excess power (or equalization) becomes destructive. So be careful with equalization, especially at the lower end.

Isn't it also correct that you can cheat on #3 a little by adding polyfill?

[David Analog]

Isn't it also correct that you can cheat on #3 a little by adding polyfill?

If the subwoofer enclosure is just shy of the ideal air mass, then the right amount and density of insulation (polyester polyfill or other) can simulate a slightly larger enclosure...by converting acoustic energy into thermal energy that is then dissipated.
However, in this tiny tower pod it won't make any noticeable difference in the above sense. But it can be useful in attenuating the reflections (standing waves) from the interior of the pod. And that reflection can be very coincidental at a single frequency since the pod is round in shape. In other words, all reflections being of an equal distance. In this case, try a small sheet of 1" thick polyester batting (not the loose fill) around the pod interior. But easy does it on the quantity.

[viking]

If the subwoofer enclosure is just shy of the ideal air mass, then the right amount and density of insulation (polyester polyfill or other) can simulate a slightly larger enclosure...by converting acoustic energy into thermal energy that is then dissipated.
However, in this tiny tower pod it won't make any noticeable difference in the above sense. But it can be useful in attenuating the reflections (standing waves) from the interior of the pod. And that reflection can be very coincidental at a single frequency since the pod is round in shape. In other words, all reflections being of an equal distance. In this case, try a small sheet of 1" thick polyester batting (not the loose fill) around the pod interior. But easy does it on the quantity.

If I remember right my bullet 770 pods a few years ago came with these already in them!!

[David Analog]

If I remember right my bullet 770 pods a few years ago came with these already in them!!

Yes, they did. The Bullet HollowPoint dealer usually added that touch. And they often came with a spiral of solvent based foam that did a great job of damping the aluminum enclosure. Many Wetsounds tower speakers also contain an interior wrap of polyester batting.

Although polyfill, in one form or the other, can help with the internal standing waves, which helps the mids, there is a reason why polyfill will not change the appearance to a larger enclosure in tower pods. In a subwoofer enclosure the driver displacement might only be 10% of the entire enclosure gross internal displacement. So if the enclosure is 10 to 15% shy of the ideal target, the polyfill can make a small difference. However, in a tower pod with an HLCD driver, the driver can easily displace more than 1/2 of the pod's total internal volume. So a little polyfill won't make a dent in the problem in this case.

[Brianinpdx]

Russ - Your faced with a fairly common debate on Horn versus non horn tower speaker setups. SURF versus WAKE.

The XM9 actually has 14% more mid cone area than other brands that I've seen.It's kinda unique in that nothing about it is standard. We molded the housing into the cone parts to actually be part of the enclosure itself and becomes more efficient from an internal space point of view. However, it's still a horn speaker designed to project high frequency out to a long distance rider. Period. The XM9 also has a horn attenuation switch built into it that allows a 1.5db. I'd start there. Engaging that will make it sound more surf like.

Also confirm you amp settings on the XM30.2 -- HF (high freq), crossover @80hz and gain ~20%. You should be money.

The total sound field in any given boat is the sum of all three zones (Tower / Cabin / Sub). If I remember right, you haven't upgraded your cabin speakers right? Doing so will help balance out the dynamic range of your entire boat. Often times when one zone is lacking, the other zones feel over emphasized.


Lastly- if you confirm your tower tuning and think, "hey this still pretty bright..." contact the office and we can arrange to swap you into the Surf version of that speaker. It sounds fantastic up closer to the boat, wider high freq dispersion and over all blends better with the other 2 zones.

On my boat, I run the Hybrid setup that combines both wake and surf style speakers. That might be a good option to but I'd def like to see your cabin get upgraded before any of that talk.

Hit me up. you've got my digits I think?

-Brian

[russellsmojo]

Bust out another thousand. Haha!! I am going check out tuning and jam it all weekend and then decide next step.


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[dusty2221]

Are you going to be on Texoma Sunday by chance Russell? You can take a listen to my surfs and we could make some adjustments to yours.

[russellsmojo]

I will hit you up if we get up there. I am out of commission for lake sports ( have stitches on shoulder) until next weekend. May do some island time though. Speaking of the island we pulled a beached black and green mojo off the island Sunday of Memorial Day weekend. He was beached like a whale. Ever seen a black/green mojo on texoma before?


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