Dick Pierce

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Hi Does anyone know if Dick Pierce is still around? TIA

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"Northstar" wrote ...
> Hi Does anyone know if Dick Pierce is still around? TIA

Someone calling himself "dpierce" just posted to this newsgroup
a couple hours before your question. Is that who you are seeking?

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In article <d2c7ur$ev5$1@news01.intel.com>, richard.7.crowley@intel.com
says...
>
>"Northstar" wrote ...
>> Hi Does anyone know if Dick Pierce is still around? TIA
>
>Someone calling himself "dpierce" just posted to this newsgroup
>a couple hours before your question. Is that who you are seeking?
>
>

I think so. Thanks.

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"Magnus" wrote ...
> Does anyone know what Dick Pierce uses for loudspeakers?
> I like to make my own without breaking the bank.

I'd bet that Mr. Pierce does. Or is this a game?

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On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 14:24:45 -0500, Magnus <Magnus@none.none> wrote:

>Does anyone know what Dick Pierce uses for loudspeakers?
>I like to make my own without breaking the bank.

Save the bank even more money, and buy a good commercial pair from a
reputable maker like KEF or B&W.

Sorry, unless you go to a *really* competent kit like the Linkwitz
Orion, you have no hope of competing with commercial designs. This has
been done to death a gazillion times.

And yes, I built my own for about twenty years. With age (and rotsa
ruck!) comes wisdom..........
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

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Magnus wrote:
> Hard to believe one cannot make a respectable 2-way speaker with all
the
> new drivers out there and computer evaluation methods. Surely the new
silk
> dome tweeters and fibre drivers would exceed anything we can buy
> commerically if we keep the budget down to $400.

I suppose since my name is in the topic, I might as well actually
contribute to the thread, knowing full well that some idiot out
there will completely misrepresent what I say anyway. Better, I
suppose, to misrepresent what I say instead of misrepresenting
what I don't say. Now, to the immediate question at hand.

Designing a speaker to be sold into a market and designing a speaker
for oneself are VERY different excercises at almost every step. The
requirements are VERY different, and the results can often be very
different. Why is this so? Well, let me, by example, illustrate
some of the issues that are crucial in one realm but largely
irrelevant the other.

The BIGGEST difference is that in the case of designing a system
for yourself is that you don't have to worry about selling it. That
alone makes a huge difference in the way you approach it, in areas
of appearance, shippability, and much more.

Another example: manufacturability and costs. One often hears that
the ratio between the raw parts cost and suggested retail in the
speaker business is around 1:4 or 1:5. This is largely true and
results in an economically viable model based on some assumptions.
One assumption is that labor costs are reaosnably controlled, and
that assumption has a string influence on, for example, the cabinet
design. If you only have to make one pair, and you're doing this
in your spare time, cabinet manufacturing labor costs are of no
consequence: nobody with any serious cash is competing for your
spare time anyway. That's not true when you're trying to pay your
employees and your rent and more.

Yet another example: One can take advantage of any number of
crossover optimization programs that can optimize the system
acoustic response, but many if not most ignore the consequential
system impedance. If you end up with a system that has dead nuts
flat xial and power response and dips to 1/2 ohm impedance at 250
Hz, you do not have a speaker that has ANY hope of making it in
the market, because it just won't work with most amplifiers.
WHo's going to buy it? Imagine, for example, a 2-way under $700
system that's +-2 dB 50-22 kHz, but with an impedance under 2 ohms.
It's price point suggests it gets mated with middle of the road
receivers, all of whom are intolerant of such loads.

COmmercial speaker have to survive UPS intact. They have ot be
serviceable. A manufacturer must have a steady, consistent
supply of specific components to support the product over its
projected larket lifetime and beyond (for repairs). All these
issues weigh heavily on determining the design, and are largely
irrelevant for a home DIY'er.

One of the consequences of all these issues is that the components
that go into a commercial model may not be available, even though
they look an awful lot like what you could buy off the shelf. I know
of a number of manufacturers that purchase their drivers from Seas,
Peerless, Scan Speak and such. I also know that the drivers these
manufacturers use are different in not-very-subtle ways from the
off-the-shelf versions that one can get in small quantities.

On the topic of "computer evaluation methods" I assume that we are
talking, among other things, about the relatively inexpensive and
widely available sofwtare and hardware packages out there for
measuring speakers. And, yes, their widepsread proliferation has
in some respects "democratized" loudspeaker measurement. But easily
available equipment DOES NOT make you an expert.

Measuring speaker RIGHT is a REAL tough job. Interpreting the
results and including that interpretation into the system
optimization is also quite tough. In some respects, the DIYer's
job is made easier by the fact that they DON'T have to sell it,
fix it or support it, that they DON'T have to worry about the myriad
of design contradictions (well, many they DO have to worry about,
but if the system breaks because they didn't, no great harm is done).

So, here are two tasks:

1. Design a speaker system that you'll like. Take as much time
as you want, don't worry about how it looks, don't worry about
what other people think about it. You have no size, weight
or cost restrictions. You can pick the exact piece of equipment
it will be used with. You're going to be the only one using
it, it never has to be "finished" because you're going to
be tweaking it to suit what YOU want it to be.

2. Design a speaker system that 25,000 people will like enough
to make them part with a substantial junk of change. You have
no more than 2 months to bring the concept to final design.
It has to have a footprint not exceeding 10" wide by 14"
deep, can't weigh any more than 60 pounds per cabiner, has
to have a retail price of no more than $1300. It's got to
look like a million smackers and fit with any plausible decor.
It has to withstand abuse. It has to be able to survive a
3 foot drop off the tailgate of a UPS truck unscathed. It has
to work well and ALL the time with ANY piece of electronics
And, when all is said and done, you'd like to have at least a
LITTLE more money than when you started.

Will you end up with the same design?

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<calcerise@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1112377546.678186.191890@l41g2000cwc.googlegroups.com

> A homebuilt speaker is as different from a manufactured design as a
> SR is from a Wittman Tailwind.

More calcified bollocks from one of the most calcified minds on
Usenet.

A homebuilt speaker and a highly-regarded commercial speaker can be
quite similar, if not absolutely identical. The design of a
loudspeaker is one of the easier things in the world to
nondestructively discern from a working example. In many cases the
drivers are off-the-shelf designs. The crossover components are
relatively easy to purchase or fabricate. The enclosure is often just
a fairly small woodworking project. There ain't a whole lot else in
most speakers.

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Mr. Pierce:

Would it be possible to critique any of the designs found at the site
listed below?


http://home.hetnet.nl/~geenius/

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On Fri, 01 Apr 2005 08:57:09 -0800, dpierce wrote:

<big snip>
>
> One of the consequences of all these issues is that the components
> that go into a commercial model may not be available, even though
> they look an awful lot like what you could buy off the shelf. I know
> of a number of manufacturers that purchase their drivers from Seas,
> Peerless, Scan Speak and such. I also know that the drivers these
> manufacturers use are different in not-very-subtle ways from the
> off-the-shelf versions that one can get in small quantities.
>
This is pretty much the reason given for Seas not being interested
in continuing to manufacture those bass elements I mentioned
elsewhere in this thread: Too tailored compared to the standard
(off the shelf) product for the small production volume. The kit
market isn't big enough. The other two elements are also modified
but only midly so.

<another big snip>

--
====================================================================
Martin Schöön                    "Problems worthy of attack
                                  prove their worth by hitting back"
                                                           Piet Hein
====================================================================

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<normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:kaqdnbTTq4lBsc3fRVn-hg@comcast.com
>
> Re gas turbine engines: At what horsepower does the gas turbine
> become cheaper than an ever larger internal combustion engine?

It depends on whether you count operational costs. It depends on
operational conditions. Gas turbines as sea-level power sources, are
significantly less fuel-efficient than say diesels. I believe that at
30,000 feet in an high-performance airplane, gas turbines are net more
economical than a diesel.

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Arny Krueger wrote:
> <normanstrong@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:kaqdnbTTq4lBsc3fRVn-hg@comcast.com
> >
> > Re gas turbine engines: At what horsepower does the gas turbine
> > become cheaper than an ever larger internal combustion engine?
>
> It depends on whether you count operational costs. It depends on
> operational conditions. Gas turbines as sea-level power sources, are
> significantly less fuel-efficient than say diesels. I believe that
at
> 30,000 feet in an high-performance airplane, gas turbines are net
more
> economical than a diesel.

Gas turbines running at design power and designed to run continuously
at that power at sea level are roughly comparable to diesels-large slow
speed diesels have only a small advantage in BSFC. Getting efficiency
from a gas turbine over a wide range of speeds and conditions requires
thermal feedback in the form of regeneration or recuperation. Chrysler
and GM in the United States and Rover in the UK all demonstrated
entirely succcessful powerplants-in some markets some of these designs
could be profitably marketed today. Indeed, WIlliams Research was in
effect financed by Chrysler stockholders. Sam Williams left Chrysler
just as Edson de Castro split from DEC to form Data General around what
would have been the PDP-11 as the Nova.

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First, it's not unnecessary and secondly, in the grand scheme of
things, it's not that expensive.

I think the best way to use "modern" amp technology is to build it
into the speaker. I like active, multi-amped speakers in principle. The
execution hasn't been there yet, except maybe for some really expensive
products. Active speakers by prosumer recording /sound reinforcement
companies are not realistic choices for serious home listening
(although I'd love to have a pair for barbecues and so forth). If you
are determind to have more channels than ears this makes even more
sense.

The Sonus Faber speakers-I assume you are talking about the expensive
one that has an airfoil leading edge cross-section, looking for all the
world like someone attacked a junked Bellanca-sounds merely okay. I
have heard them. A frst rate horn system blows them so far away it is
incomprehensible anyone would pay serious money for them except for the
belief visitors will think they are massively endowed to own such a
speaker. (As they would have to be, financially at least.) Reviews by
audiophile magazines aside, there is no question that a determined
amateur could build at least as good sounding a speaker. In fact, it's
sort of a low goal.

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still learning wrote:

> If a smooth transition can be made with a passive xover,
> why not use it?

First there is the "if" part of it, next there is the cost. Quality
components are costly, big high quality components are costlier, be it
polypropylene caps or be it air cored copper coils.

If that doesn't make the point, the do try listening to the same system
as active and as passive. I have once upon a time rolled a system back,
but that was because the intended mid- and high range amplifier (Luxman,
possibly called the MQ80, dual 40 watt valve amp, ca. 1977) was too
noisy for use with the compression driver of a Tannoy 12" dual
concentric.

Which is to say that there are always trade-offs to consider, what I did
do was to trade the valve-amp off .... O;-) ... sold it to a guy running
dual Lowther PM6's in ACE horns so that he could have one amp channel
pr. unit.


Kind regards

Peter Larsen

--
*******************************************
* My site is at: http://www.muyiovatki.dk *
*******************************************

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still learning Apr 2, 1:01 pm show options

Newsgroups: rec.audio.tech
From: "still learning" <desks...@peoplepc.com> -
Date: 2 Apr 2005 13:01:42 -0800
Local: Sat,Apr 2 2005 1:01 pm
Subject: Re: Dick Pierce


Mr. Pierce:


Would it be possible to critique any of the designs found at the site
listed below?


http://home.hetnet.nl/~geenius­/


OK, I f not Dick Pierce, how about any of the EE's here?

Notice the Soup speaker is nearly a clone an Avalon system.

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Arny sez:

It's difficult to look at a loudspeaker design on paper and obtain a
sense of how it would sound.

OTOH, the designs appear to be fairly orthodox, using reasonably high
quality parts, etc. They might sound pretty good.


One major weakness is that the only performance information provided
is an on-axis frequency response curve.


Orthodox is OK by me, although the "Progress" is not a design that
shows up all that often, and it does include graphic evidcence of off
axis response, which looks pretty damn good.

I wonder if the fact that the Netherlands has had a voucher type school
system for about 100 years ahs anything to do with the seemingly higher
level of interest and accomplishment (IMO) of audio DIY projects that
oringinate there?

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W wrote:

> was raised in Holland..but what on earth do you mean by >voucher
>type?

The government passes out money or vouchers for money and the parents
send their kids to the shcool of their choice. This is how it was
explained to me. Can't remember now if was something I read or heard,
please correct any misconception on my part. I understand other
European countries have something similar.


>The Dutch are well trained in math etc, with the world's best
>highschools (with Japan, typically).

The Japanese bust their ass with extra tutoring as well from what I
hear.

>The TU Delft is also excellent.

There's only so much blue I can stand. I do miss ny ex-wife's dad
making olly bolla ever year for the holidays.

>The Dutch also spend the most money per capita on audio of >any
>country.
>Not sure what there is to explain here, but yes, we're damn >smart


>But lotsa great audio engineering goes on elsewhee too of >course!

You can keep the Double Zota Drop (sp?). Blech!

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W sez:

>oliebollen en dubbel zoute drop!
>Acquired tastes, not unlike spicy food...

Oliebollen is a much easier one to aquire.

My ex-wife and I went to the beach with some other families and their
kids. The kids saw her eating dubbel zoute drop and were so very
disappointed when they tried it.

I guess the difference in tastes between Zaandam and L.A. are wide when
it comes to salted snacks. :-)