Whatever happened to that idea? I remember an Electronics Illustrated project that used 5 in. speakers in a four by four grid. The the idea was to move a large volume of air with inexpensive small speakers and the claims were quite impressive as to frequency response.<BR>Ed<P>------------------<BR>

I remember this. I think that it was a flop. sounded like 16 five inch speakers, not very good.<P>------------------<BR>Don

There was a followup article in AUDIO a year or two later, basically explaining why the idea didn't work, and what to do about it (saw the panel in half to make two mid-range arrays).<P>------------------<BR>

Ah yeah, I remember the Sweet Sixteen setup. A friend of mine built it and a nice cabinet to enclose them in the high school wood shop. I forget the exact speakers he used, but he ordered them from Olson Electronics and they were not the el-cheapo speakers they offered, but the highest quality ones he could afford.<P>A lot of work went into finishing the cabinet and such and we were all prepared to have some nice listening to the Beatles, Rolling Stones, and such. But what a disappointment it turned out to be. Another kid got a nice set of speakers from Valu-Mart (before the days of Wal Mart) that cost about a third of what he had invested in the Sweet Sixteen and in a side by side comparison, there was absolutely no doubt that the Sweet Sixteen was a total failure.<BR>An expensive lesson, but we were all young kids then and had to spend our lawn mowing money somehow.<BR>Curt<P>------------------<BR>Curt, N7AH<BR>(Connoisseur of the cold 807)<BR>QCWA# 25085 AMI# 242<BR>CW forever

It appears that my recollection was correct!<P>------------------<BR>Don

I built one of these, went through all the work of making a nice cabinet, ordered the speakers and assembled it. What a disappointment. A 6X9 car speaker in a box sounded better. And to think some audio engineers designed this thing.<P>Dave<P>------------------<BR>Intelligence is the ability to use your knowledge

Not really a flop, Don. It allowed me to buy some brand new high quality speakers el cheapo that I installed in my 61 Chevy to listen to that horrible mobile record player that played 45's while driving down the road.<BR>Curt<P>------------------<BR>Curt, N7AH<BR>(Connoisseur of the cold 807)<BR>QCWA# 25085 AMI# 242<BR>CW forever

There is a high-end speaker system available today, well a couple years ago, that consists of a panel full of very small speakers. IIRC, it costs something like $40,000 and is supposed to sound fantastic. I'll have to try to find more info on it.<P>------------------<BR>Mike<BR>From the homestead on the banks of the Big River<P>Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

Yes, I remember this arrangement. Common sense should tell you that when you use 5" speakers good down to 150-200 cycles, you have an array which will still only go down to 200 cycles. No bass.<P>------------------<BR>

I'm guessing that the problem with this concept is that the multiple speakers, although they have enough area to move a lot of air, don't have enough travel to handle low frequencies. The speaker cone needs to be able to *move* ! Maybe if the speakers had a big rolled cloth or foam surround, and a longer-throw voice coil, the array might have worked?<P>What did they use in the Bose 901? They sounded great to me.<P>------------------<BR>Tom AE6XD

During the 1960s, it seems that every other issue of the various electronic hobbyist magazines was publishing yet another speaker system project or enclosure design -- or another automotive project! <P>When I look back, I wonder (T-I-C) how many of those auto projects would be popular construction articles today: automatic headlight dimmer; AM radio RF amp; sequential turn signals; pulsed windshield wipers; FM converter for the AM car radio; electronic gauges; tachometer; dwell meter; headlight-on reminder; turn signal-on reminder; electronic ignition system; electronic voltage regulator. Ain't it a hoot how most of these projects ended up as standard equipment for autos or have been made obsolete by modern engines?<P>Dean<BR><P>------------------<BR>

I didn't know it was a flop. Of course then - I never heard one. Whenever someone spoke of it they always praised the idea. Perhaps they never heard one either. <BR>HOWEVER: I have listened to a BOZAK "Concert Grand" back in the 70's that used somewhat of a sweet 16 layout but with variation. HUGE cabinets! 32 speakers. BITT; They weren't 32 little speakers. Shoot; I can't recall exactly - Maybe like two 12s, four 8s, and ten 4s or 5s ( times two for two enclosures )<BR>On thirty watts them Concert Grandes were my "benchmark" for many years. <P>------------------<BR>Da Duffer

Holy smokes...<P>I not only remember that Pop Tronics article--I was in junior high or high school when it appeared--I saved it for years thinking one day I would build a pair for my parents' hi-fi system...I never did and now--reading these posts--I'm glad to have saved myself the embarrassment and head-scratching question of "Why don't these things sound better?"<P>As they say in professional sports around trading deadlines, sometimes the best moves are no moves at all.<P>Bruce<BR>WC5CW<P><P>------------------<BR>

I don't see how this could have ever worked.<P>If one small speaker can't reproduce good middle and bass, how can 16 of the same possibly do the job? I am assuming here that this was to have been two of the desired outcomes, having not seen the original article or the followup that Alan Douglas refers to.<P>It's not like you just add them all up to get more air moving....that may happen, but the frequency response of each individual speaker cannot just be added or multiplied to come up with a new frequency response in total. The individual speaker's frequency response parameters are fixed and mutually exclusive with respect to any other speaker. <P>Ron.<P>------------------<BR>

People listen with more than their ears. If this speaker had been named the Sweet Fifteen nobody would have noticed or remembered it.<P>------------------<BR>

I suppose that if you take it to the nth degree, it would make sense that it wouldn't really work well: the "Sweet 144", consisting of a 12 x 12 array of 2-1/2" transistor radio speakers. On the other hand, kids these days have the "Sweet 2" in their cars, two 18" woofers driven by a 1000-watt amp and a bass tape. That seems to drive air OK .... and me nuts.<P>Dean<BR><P>------------------<BR>

Da Duffer...THat Bozak Concert Grand was one of my favorites...Heard one at the HiFi show and thought it was honest and very neutral. My favorite though was the JBL Paragon. Just the looks of that baby was enough to make you want to take a listen.......<P>------------------<BR>

You know, there is actually a lot of science around this, the latest being a line array of 16 speakers just about touching each other, about 7' tall...sealed stuffed box. ...not an attempt at an infinite baffle like sweet sixteen. If I remember right ,it was supposed to be put in a wall, with the back sound going somewhere else? Listening to sweet sixteen leaning against a wall in your basement is not a fair test... Measured, no opinions,on the 16 speaker line array in question showed good response to very low frequency, if the equalizer is adjusted to comp the fallout in speaker response..which is a perfectly reasonable thing to do...Otherwise, why equalizers at all or bass and treble knobs? All you guys leave it dead flat for purity of sound right? Bose ,too??. That is how Bose does it, with tiny speakers..they fix the drop by more bass drive. Anyway, the big feature this guy with the line array is touting is no phase distortion from crossovers/crossover components. He is right..LC networks shift phase between big and small speakers as they pass in and out of frequency rolloff points...That has to garble up the midrange pretty good. -plus you don't have any frequency dependent components at the speaker, which immediately gives the audiophools the golden screwdriver they love. ( "All about crossovers" silver wire and oil caps!)And most of these super high end stereos in cars with 5" speakers sound one hell of a lot better than the best Scott with an 18" speaker, so who is right?<P>He also claims very uncritical stereo, as real sound does not come from a point source, it is well distributed around you side to side, if you are a reasonable distance away, as you must be, say for classical music. My point of this post is to prevent yet again the birth of another "reforming electrolytics in moonlight " type thing(always works for me), where this design is classed with bad ideas. It is a good idea ,if done right. <P>This from a guy who swears by triode driven no feedback Klipshorns...the real #1. I am thinking of building a line array..seems like OTL parallel triodes would work great with 16 X 8 ohms...<P>------------------<BR>

I suspect that speaker phasing would be critical to success in any design of this type. Could very well be that the semi-cheapo speakers used in the Sweet 16 project were either incorrectly connected by the constructor, or the phasing was incorrectly marked on the speakers - ie you could have a mix of speakers with different phasing.

I built one of these with my brother in law back when the PopElec article came out. I know all about phasing and we had the speakers all phased so that they moved in unison. And they did sound like a giant 5" speaker. Plenty of power-handling capacity: would probably have made a great PA speaker, but no bass. If they had been hi-fi speakers, with flexible surrounds, big magnets, and long throw voice coils, the speaker probably would have sounded good: but then, the $$$ would have made more sense invested in a larger diameter hi-fi speaker.

We ended up taking some of the speakers out of the center of the board and cutting it for a 12" woofer.

Reece