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10s vs. 15s

#21
So how does the size of the speaker affect what frequencies it puts out(
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Determining how a particular driver may perform is calculated from its Theile/Small parameters, which the last time I looked numbered at least fifteen. Cone area is only one of them. You need to know at least three more parameters before being able to make even an educated guess on how it might work.
 
#23
If it's the sealed Ampeg SVT bin, that thihng has a big bump in the 60 to 80 and not much else going on underneath it. Not the cab for dropped C in my book. If you can locate one, the old Music Man 2x12 would fill the bill. SHould be in the used market for $350 range. Plop a decent 2x10 on top of that or a pair of the MM 2x12 HD's if you can find them and you'll be cookin'

To my way of thinking, it isn't so much about 10's vs 12's vs 15's in other than the most general terms. It has more to do with the way that the particular 10, 12 or 15 was integrated into the design of the box. I've heard properly designed cabinets for 15" JBL's that absolutely rock. Super punchy and clear. No muddiness at all. I've also heard cabinets for 10's that were muddy and undefined (Eden Nemesis for one) as well as cabs for 10's and 12's that rock...
 
#24
theshadow2001 said:
How does a 15" produce better lows than a 10" speaker?

The way I see it is that a 15" driver has to push more air than a single 10" driver so it would be suited to lower frequency ie its going in and out less. But 15" speakers are almost exclusively full range(unless your running bi amped blah blah blah...)so they seem to be able to handle the same frequencies that 10" speaker do. Conversley a 10" speaker seems to be able to handle low frequencies that a 15" does as well.

What Im saying is 10's and 15's are usually full range speakers. So how does the size of the speaker affect what frequencies it puts out(or possibly doesnt put out)???? Is it just the cabinet and not the speaker at all, giving us the opposite opinions of people here (15's are muddy, 15's aren't muddy, my 10's have loads of lows, 10's cant handle lows as well as....etc)
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Well, you would be surprised to find out that 4 10's don't have as much speaker area as one 15....I learned this the hard way and was directed to eminence's web page to see this fact. Then you have the option of ported, (muddy) or sealed, tight, but less efficient. Ported will go lower than a sealed system, at the expense of sloppyness, (boomy)AT TIMES (don't get all rilled up if you have a ported cab). It all centers around the type of enclosure...810's were/are the standard...then came along "detuning a four", and then the 5 string. Ampeg specs my 810 at 40 hz at -10db...ported at -10db, 28 hz. Add to that most rooms and/or stage resonances...and you have plenty of lows...although, if I played a five string..I would probably go with a ported design...muddy as they CAN be...they get a bit lower....but bottom out easier...nothings perfect in this world... :rollno:
 
#26
specplyrz said:
Well, you would be surprised to find out that 4 10's don't have as much speaker area as one 15
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Are you sure about this I would imagine that 2x10 would be slightly less speaker area than a 15" but a 4x10 would be more.

Area = (PI)(d^2)/4

15"
(3.14)(15^2)/4 = 176.6 inches squared



4x10"
4(3.14)(10^2)/4 = 314 inches squared


2x10" is half that area so would = 157 which is less than a 15"
 
#27
specplyrz said:
Well, you would be surprised to find out that 4 10's don't have as much speaker area as one 15....
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Well - if we approximated them as circles:
15" = pi * ((15 / 2)^2) = 176.714587
3x10"= (pi * ((10 / 2)^2)) * 4 = 314.159265

So there's more surface area for 4x10. But if it's in the same size box as a 15", chances are they're not tuned to as low a frequency as the 15". You'd probably need a much bigger box for 4x10" which you just don't see. They seem to be the same size as a single 15" for stacking reasons.

On the size thing. Headphones produce great bass and they're little tiny things. They just don't have much efficiency. On the other end, you can get great bass out of an motorcycle engine by taking off the muffler and feeding it into a tuned chamber. Not much piston area compared to 4x10.
 
#28
seamonkey said:
Well - if we approximated them as circles:
15" = pi * ((15 / 2)^2) = 176.714587
3x10"= (pi * ((10 / 2)^2)) * 4 = 314.159265

So there's more surface area for 4x10. But if it's in the same size box as a 15", chances are they're not tuned to as low a frequency as the 15". You'd probably need a much bigger box for 4x10" which you just don't see. They seem to be the same size as a single 15" for stacking reasons.

On the size thing. Headphones produce great bass and they're little tiny things. They just don't have much efficiency. On the other end, you can get great bass out of an motorcycle engine by taking off the muffler and feeding it into a tuned chamber. Not much piston area compared to 4x10.
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Ahhhh, but seamonkey....you forgot to take in the depth of a 15 compared to the tens....that's where your formula is wrong....put a 15 next to a ten ....the 15 is much deeper....please take my word for this...I DON"T want to get into an argument about this FACT.
 
#30
seamonkey said:
On the other end, you can get great bass out of an motorcycle engine by taking off the muffler and feeding it into a tuned chamber. Not much piston area compared to 4x10.
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Heh Heh - my first belly laugh for the day!
Ever tried making a "toilet didgeridoo"????
Great bass outta those things!

I guess the main reason why the 15" can replicate those lower freq.'s better than a 10" has more to do with its' ability to vibrate stronger at those lower freq's than the 10's, regardless of surface area, although that does help too.
Now, I'm not to clued up on this, but Isn't this ability more to do with the voice coil than anything else? Anyone? :confused:
 
#31
Speakers are truncated conical sections, not circles. Using the formula for area of a circle will not give you the surface area of any speaker.

SurfaceAreaCone = pi * r * (r^2 + h^2)^0.5

Since you have a truncated cone you need to calculate the whole cone then subtract the missing portion for the cone section, then add in the circle the lies at the "top". Although I don't believe that even that "circle" is truly 2-D. Technically it's a section of a sphere... Oh well, that'd be close enough for the girls I go out with.

Sorry, my math nerd gene just kicked in.
 
#33
Corwin said:
I just popped over to the Eminence web site. According to their stats, a Kappa Pro 15 has a surface area of 856.3 cm^2, whereas a Kappa Pro 10 has a surface area of 344.9 cm^2. From there, it's pretty simple math to figure out if four 10s have a greater or lesser surface area than one 15.
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I stand corrected...2.5 tens equal one 15.....in surface area...still seems weird to me, I remember this guy posting four 10's did not have as much surface area as one 15...I bet there is a 15 somewhere out there that is super deep that meets the 4/10's equal....Anyway..thanks for your research...


After further memory it was an 18" speaker. My mistake. At 1150...it equals about four tens in surface area. That was what the discussion was about....moving air...I stated that 410 could move more air than a single 18....as you can guestimate, the 410's vs 118 are about even.
 
#34
bassybill said:
What about the actual frequency range of the driver?
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Doesn't matter. Cause the frequency range of 4 10" is not the same as the freq range of 1 10" driver. The freq range depends on the size of the driver(s) relative to the wavelength. larger drivers are more efficient reproducting the lows, one on one. But a number of smaller drivers can gang up on one larger driver and kick its butt.

There are many other parameters involved than just cone area, but that's the easiest to visualize.

Is a $100 bill better at reproducing $100 than 5 $20 bills?

Get enough smaller drivers you can match the cone area advantage of the 15" driver for low freqs.

Randy
 
#35
Don't forget part of the volume of air moved is also excursion, not just surface area. But that's only one aspect, really the cab design and how it interacts with the driver makes more difference, or at least as much as surface area/excursion alone. The small/thiele parameters all play a part.

The point above is that whatever advantage the 15 has over the 10 from its size can eventually be overcome with enough 10" drivers working together. The only question is whether that point is with 2 10's, 3 10's, 4 10's, etc.

Randy
 
#36
Kael said:
Speakers are truncated conical sections, not circles. Using the formula for area of a circle will not give you the surface area of any speaker.

SurfaceAreaCone = pi * r * (r^2 + h^2)^0.5

Since you have a truncated cone you need to calculate the whole cone then subtract the missing portion for the cone section, then add in the circle the lies at the "top". Although I don't believe that even that "circle" is truly 2-D. Technically it's a section of a sphere... Oh well, that'd be close enough for the girls I go out with.

Sorry, my math nerd gene just kicked in.
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The surface area enters into the amount of air that is moved when the piston moves in an out by a certain distance. This is equal to the frontal area of the cone, not the surface area. The calculation based on a circle is correct.

What is even more correct is to use the effective cone area provided as one of the standard Thiele-Small parameters, because it automatically takes into account the effect of the surround.
 
#37
"Is a $100 bill better at reproducing $100 than 5 $20 bills?"

You gotta be kidding!? :eyebrow:

There is no difference between twenties and 100 dollar bills. Just the number. sheesh....5 20's and one 100 bill are worth the exact same thing...their denomination is all that is different....what an analodgy..... :rollno:
 
#39
specplyrz said:
"Is a $100 bill better at reproducing $100 than 5 $20 bills?"

You gotta be kidding!? :eyebrow:

There is no difference between twenties and 100 dollar bills. Just the number. sheesh....5 20's and one 100 bill are worth the exact same thing...their denomination is all that is different....what an analodgy..... :rollno:
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That's precisely the point. It doesn't matter how you get X amount of surface area in your speakers, one big driver, or many smaller ones. Its obvious in dollars because everybody can do the math easily to figure out the equivalency. Not so easy with complicated conical speakers.

Randy
 
#40
Randy, I'm still with Bill Fitzmaurice on this one, but I'm certainly no expert, and very interested to find out more.

As you said yourself, the cone area isn't the only factor, there are many other parameters involved. In particular, the resonant frequency of the driver will generally be lower for larger drivers. As far as I'm aware, the enclosure has an effect on this, but only to raise it (in a sealed cab), or split it (in a ported cab). Will using multiple 10s change their resonant frequency to that of a single 15? The frequency plot of large and small drivers is going to be different, surely?
 

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