I’m testing DML (distributed mode loudspeakers) with suspended disks of acrylic, polycarbonate and polystyrene 1/4 inch thick and 2 feet diameter. The Visaton EX 80 S (8 ohms) with a 100 Watt amp is the best and the Dayton DAEX25SHF-4 (4 ohms) was doing good until the glued system that comes with it went of (some propose to use epoxy or crazy glue once the hot spot is determined), i’m using it in a vertical position, that is in my design… Of course, the bass is missing, but the mid’s and highs have a great presence. I wonder if anyone tested a Clarke Synthesis in a similar king of DML set up? Thanks.

Martin

The application wat the long roof of a bare metal limousine: It has the perfect resonant surface area for 0.0001 Hz through 150 Hz.

The Clark worked (functionally), but I made one miscalculation, and two horrible mistakes. I miscalculated the force required to be applied to the roof for proper roofline deflection. The Clark only provided about 50% of the desired effect. The first mistake was pretesting it without mounting it first to a solid surface. Applying ~125 watts caused it to overheat, and it smelled like the voice coil was burning. The second mistake (fatal) was driving it with the out-of-range intermittently peaking signal of ~325 watts. It happily took the abuse until the internal guts failed and broke loose. It sounded like ball-bearings in a coffee can. Although it has internal overcurrent protection, driving it at just under its threshold can still significantly reduce its lifespan.

Next,

The Buttkicker is different. It does not operate on a voice coil/permanent magnet arrangement. Instead, the BC is a linear actuator / motor. It can handle the current, and based on my application, it thoroughly enjoys the abuse.

There is one major requirement that I have not found listed anywhere, and you will thank me for sharing the following fact: Do NOT use a Class D amplifier to drive your low-frequency tactile transducers. It barely works… it hardly works… do not waste your time with cheaper, energy-efficient, smaller, cooler Class D amplifiers. The answer is A, but all you will find is AB. Class AB amplifiers will reproduce frequencies below 5Hz with huge amounts of power and force. You NEED this for your transducer.

The last consideration when building your transducer/amplifier system is filtering. You must completely filter out anything above 250 Hz. You will need to let your subwoofers punch out anything higher than that. Going higher than 200Hz will strain the transducer, and there is no internal filtering that will prevent it from trying to buzz itself to pieces.
My car stereo has menu options to electronically adjust a low-pass crossover, and has a dedicated subwoofer output (Kenwood $250 dual-DIN). The amplifier I am using is a bridged R.F. Renegade 550 (probably 450 watt peak). It has band pass and subsonic amplification control knobs. I am considering upgrading to a higher wattage amp because after about 25 minutes of SHAKING the car at 7Hz, it overheats, and shuts down. It does auto-reset, no permanent damage is done.

The amount of action I get from my 550 watt amp is too much for the car to handle. I have had to bolt things back together throughout the car. Windows shake out of their tracks, a side mirror fell off, people are hurting their necks from turning to look. It really is too much, but think about it this way: the trunk is empty, and my wallet is phat. The money invested is $600 between the head unit, the transducer, and the amp, but the system sounds like I invested a few thousand!

To summarize:
FILTER
CLASS AB
BUTTKICKER 1000watt
8 AWG (30A fused at the battery)
A SOCKET SET
CONTACT ADHESIVE
ICE
DARK SUNGLASSES
(and preferribly an old 6-door Cadillac service limousine)

___________________

Please share this information everywhere you can, you all have my permission. I couldn’t find these answers on the internet, nobody tries stuff like this anymore. I hope my efforts will save someone some time and money.

-Nathan, PDX

I’m sure you have noticed as I have, that Tactile Sound has begun to disappear into obscurity.I would like to let you know that it is resurfacing as a therapeutic means under the title of Vibroacoustic Therapy. This has been a passion of mine for many years as I have experienced what I believe are the physical manifestations of being in contact with tactile sound probably longer then anyone else on the planet.

To answer one of the questions above about the NASA reference, I have personally tested a number profoundly deaf individuals for tactile response and found that 5kHz is the upper limit of their tactile perception range, Most individuals can feel up to 1 kHz at reasonable amplitudes but much of this is dependent on the coupling material, Foam, which we humans like to be in contact with,is bandwidth limited to about 800 Hz and that frequency is what is most quoted on the web. Glass on the other hand will produce a much higher tactile sensation. The tests I did utilized a now extinct BioForm chair that used high density polystyrene with very little padding and a bent hardwood frame.

I don’t know if NASA has conducted like experiments, but I do know they use vibratory stimulation (yet another name for tactile sound) to reduce bone loss in weightless environments, go to https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2001/ast02nov_1/ for the article.

That’s probably enough for now, let me know if you would like to know more about the subject. Oh, if you have the means, run the YouTube videos on the hifiwellness site through your tactile system, you’ll be glad you did.
Looking UP,
Tomqwest

You can find on bigstockphotos.com and searching on “sound wave”.
Cheers,

Justin

Many thanks
Gerry

Thanks a lot

Felipe