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For a time I was very into home/pro speakers that produced tons of bass. I recall reading once about a Kenwood speaker about the size of a fridge that, when dri

For a time I was very into home/pro speakers that produced tons of bass. I recall reading once about a Kenwood speaker about the size of a fridge that, when driven by a measly 25 watts or so, could rattle the windows of a house across the street. I have no idea if it was real and can't seem to find where I originally read it, but I remember being really taken with the idea.

iaw 8y ago
According the wikipedia page Hillard's noise generator was ran on a 220 kilowatt diesel motor.
AndrewKemendo 8y ago
See the trick to really "loud" bass is finding resonance between the environment and the driver FS (Free Air Resonance). Enclosure size isn't really directly relevant. The trick is to try and couple all of it, so that there is a resonant point in the environment which matches the resonant point of the Enclosure and the enclosure matches the FS of the driver. If you line up all of these then you can get the whole world to shake on a tiny amount of power. It's possible that the Kenwood driver just accidentally did that for someone's house and it all lined up. There were tons of old wives tales like this. Wattage is misleading too. If all your frequencies are dorked up and you have standing waves and cancelling waves all over the place, then you have a sonically chaotic environment no matter what the power you are pumping is.
- emmelaich 8y ago
  I was in an elevator recently when this guy with a deep voice started talking. His voice obviously matched the elevators resonance because it just drowned out and dominated everything else. Quite a peculiar experience! I can do a deep voice, and I've found I can resonate in a small room like a toilet or bathroom. I don't make a habit of trying though, haha.
- erikpukinskis 8y ago
  Are you familiar with any of the theories that prehistoric megalithic structures were cut and moved with sound waves? There are lots of 20, 50, even 100 ton solid stone blocks around that no one really knows how they were cut or moved about.
  - AndrewKemendo 8y ago
    No I don't recall ever reading about that, though it sounds interesting - if implausible. Do you have any reference materials?
- mirimir 8y ago
  On decent systems, "Warning"[0] will hit the resonant frequency of most residential spaces. 0) https://www.google.com/search?q=an-ten-nae+warning&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b https://www.google.com/search?q=an-ten-nae+warning&ie=utf-8&...
- neuralRiot 8y ago
  I used to design speakers, our best subwoofer was a helmotz resonator which is a bandpass, it has crazy efficiency but on a very narrow band, like everything in life is a trade.
aasasd 8y ago
Horn speakers are afaik among the most efficient, and they have designs compactly enclosed in boxes, essentially folded horns: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_loudspeaker#Exponential https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_loudspeaker#Exponential

iaw 8y ago

According the wikipedia page Hillard's noise generator was ran on a 220 kilowatt diesel motor.

AndrewKemendo 8y ago

See the trick to really "loud" bass is finding resonance between the environment and the driver FS (Free Air Resonance). Enclosure size isn't really directly relevant. The trick is to try and couple all of it, so that there is a resonant point in the environment which matches the resonant point of the Enclosure and the enclosure matches the FS of the driver. If you line up all of these then you can get the whole world to shake on a tiny amount of power. It's possible that the Kenwood driver just accidentally did that for someone's house and it all lined up. There were tons of old wives tales like this. Wattage is misleading too. If all your frequencies are dorked up and you have standing waves and cancelling waves all over the place, then you have a sonically chaotic environment no matter what the power you are pumping is.

emmelaich 8y ago
I was in an elevator recently when this guy with a deep voice started talking. His voice obviously matched the elevators resonance because it just drowned out and dominated everything else. Quite a peculiar experience! I can do a deep voice, and I've found I can resonate in a small room like a toilet or bathroom. I don't make a habit of trying though, haha.
erikpukinskis 8y ago
Are you familiar with any of the theories that prehistoric megalithic structures were cut and moved with sound waves? There are lots of 20, 50, even 100 ton solid stone blocks around that no one really knows how they were cut or moved about.
- AndrewKemendo 8y ago
  No I don't recall ever reading about that, though it sounds interesting - if implausible. Do you have any reference materials?
mirimir 8y ago
On decent systems, "Warning"[0] will hit the resonant frequency of most residential spaces. 0) https://www.google.com/search?q=an-ten-nae+warning&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b https://www.google.com/search?q=an-ten-nae+warning&ie=utf-8&...
neuralRiot 8y ago
I used to design speakers, our best subwoofer was a helmotz resonator which is a bandpass, it has crazy efficiency but on a very narrow band, like everything in life is a trade.

aasasd 8y ago

Horn speakers are afaik among the most efficient, and they have designs compactly enclosed in boxes, essentially folded horns: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_loudspeaker#Exponential https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horn_loudspeaker#Exponential