I have been covering all the interior surfaces of our company car with our foam technology. I have our 2″ foam on the dash board and our 1/2″ foam on the windshield itself. I have our 1/2″ foam positioned between the speaker and the glass to minimize that first reflection point. The problem is keeping the tape stuck to the window when the outside air temperature is 120 degrees in the Sonora desert. There is 1/2″ on the ceiling and the rear windows. My goal is to over absorb this glass “fishbowl” and then peel back certain surfaces and hear what happens to the total sonic picture as far as absorption is concerned. Who knows if over absorption is even possible in a “fishbowl” let alone good sounding car audio.

The car audio sound system is made by bounce energy everywhere Bose and it does fill the “bowl” with sound energy from front and rear speakers. There are adjustments for bass, treble, and even mid range. One can use the fader control and change the energy distribution pattern between front and rear speaker systems. There is also a left/right balance control.

The auto or truck is at best your worst acoustical nightmare. What kind of room is this? Glass windshield front wall. Not only is the windshield made of glass, it is shaped in a convex manner to reduce air flow resistance on the outside of the vehicle and direct all the glass reflections back at the driver and front seat passenger on the inside. Yikes! Our side walls are also made of glass right at the ear level which is that critical listening plane. Rear walls are glass and if you push the right button on the console, the ceiling turns into glass also. Yeah ! more glass.

Stay tuned for sound checks.

www.acousticfields.com

There is a school of thought in hi – fi that subscribes to the ideal that music played through our two channel system is supposed to sound as close to a live performance as possible. We are supposed to be acoustically positioned in the front row, live, with the artists in front of us. Two channel sound, I mean good two channel sound is supposed to recreate the original source performing live. I believe we are asking too much from our two channels and the room we are listening to it in.

There is no way to recreate the sound of a live event held in a large concert hall with current two channel playback equipment. There is no way even with home theater playback equipment. No software or digital program can recreate the sonic ambience of a live venue or the specific sonic nuances a large volume building can do for a 55′ low frequency wave. No rear channel speaker has ever convinced me that it has all the voices of the 60,000 member audience coming from its 6″ driver. None of these big room effects can be recreated in rooms with much smaller volumes. It is just not possible since the current laws of physics do not allow for it.

What we can do is emotionally connect to our playback systems. We do this by setting up our system in the best spot in our room. This will take awhile. We next find that right listening chair: the one that has a high enough back that we can support our heads without blocking the backside of our ears. Place diffusion/absorption on the front wall, rear wall, and ceiling. Middle and high frequency absorption on the side walls. Low frequency absorption throughout the 4 vertical walls; extra behind speakers.

Sit back. Listen at same level for 1 song. Increase level. Listen for 1 song. Increase level. Listen for one song. Did you find your emotion. It is there. Dancing is permitted.

www.acousticfields.com