With the advances in free speaker simulation software (VituixCAD), DIY morons like myself can now design speakers of extremely high quality; we can now adjust passive and active filters and see the resulting acoustic summation in whatever form we please; directivity graphs, spinorama, listening windows.
However, the accuracy of these simulations is dependent on the data you feed them. In the case of VituixCAD, you're going to want horizontal and vertical polar measurements of each driver. For an asymmetrical 3 way speaker, using 10 degree increments, you need to make...something like 210 measurements.
If you're getting up to walk to your turntable, and it takes you 20 seconds to get set up for the next measurement, this is still going to take over an hour, and it will not be a fun hour. Lack of fun creates the risk for lack of focus, which can then result in mistakes.
Inspired in part by the ASR Community Speaker Project, I have been refining my measurement platform, building something which has a robust enough motor to rotate a large speaker on a tall platform, and also working on software which allows ARTA, my measurement software of choice, to automatically control the turntable - rotating it a set number of degrees, capturing a test signal, rotating again, etc.
Since this is where most of my efforts are going right now, I've decided to share information about this platform here rather than in the speaker thread.
However, the accuracy of these simulations is dependent on the data you feed them. In the case of VituixCAD, you're going to want horizontal and vertical polar measurements of each driver. For an asymmetrical 3 way speaker, using 10 degree increments, you need to make...something like 210 measurements.
If you're getting up to walk to your turntable, and it takes you 20 seconds to get set up for the next measurement, this is still going to take over an hour, and it will not be a fun hour. Lack of fun creates the risk for lack of focus, which can then result in mistakes.
Inspired in part by the ASR Community Speaker Project, I have been refining my measurement platform, building something which has a robust enough motor to rotate a large speaker on a tall platform, and also working on software which allows ARTA, my measurement software of choice, to automatically control the turntable - rotating it a set number of degrees, capturing a test signal, rotating again, etc.
Since this is where most of my efforts are going right now, I've decided to share information about this platform here rather than in the speaker thread.
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