Open Baffle Experience

Listen to the speaker designer folks. He agrees with me. 

I thought all speaker designers are wrong all of the time. You have been saying that over and over for years. I guess they are ok with if they agree with any of your random ideas. But he will be wrong, wrong, wrong, when he disagrees with one of your brain storms. 

bpoletti 

The sound coming from the back of the open baffle speakers IS out of phase with the front, 

I dont need you to tell me that. You need to convince @holmz 

Hes the one disputing that not me

@kenjit I need no convincing, his understanding seems on point.

The OB may be out of polarity, but who cares in the upper freq ranges?
You used the term “not in time”.

The front and back waves are not in time with each other. Show me an open baffle that has both back and front in time.

That may make the impulse response off of the wall negative, whereas it would hav been positive. It should show up there, but is that a problem?

Many speakers have drives that are out of polarity with each other, and people like them… so how is OB different in the reflected back wave?

@erik_squires

I get edge diffraction, but my speakers have 1/2" rounds on the edges and I defy anyone to tell me they can hear where the speaker is.

If a box is unavoidable, it should definitely have the largest radius edges possible, and ideally the curvature should go all the way to the driver frame - like the concrete speakers I had once. Think those were made in some Scandinavian country - wish I could remember the name. Someone on A-gon probably knows this company. But I wasn’t referring to edge-diffraction (that’s a whole separate issue), I was talking of flat front baffle reflecting surface area (initial reflections allow acoustical localization).

I’ve heard many other speakers that do a great job of disappearing as well, some with very narrow (Vandersteen)...

Yes, to maximize ’disappearance’, surface area perpendicular to the listener should be minimized - like you said... narrow baffle. My GoldenEar Tritons are an example of this, also most KEF and many others including the Anthony Gallo Strada’s as an extreme example and the tweeter pods on most B&W - for that matter we all know what the B&W Nautilus looks like (all the same philosophy).

Both of my above statements are witnessed in the KEF Blades and B&W Nautilus (extremely rounded and narrow-as-possible front baffles) - I count these as great designs (judged soly by their visual aspects).You can look at either of these and say, "Those are likely to disappear in a room" because of how they are shaped. Now, there are other factors that can draw attention to a speaker, like resonances, drivers sounding forward or unnaturally bright - but at least these designs have a shape that will allow greatness.

and some with broad baffles (SF Amati Heritage). I’ve never felt this was an attribute of baffles which could not be dealt with.

Yes, your correct in the statement, "...which could not be dealt with." Notice what SF have done to "deal with it"; front baffle narrow as the drivers will allow (does this sound familiar?), entire front baffle surface covered in (expensive) absorptive material, the front-baffle is also curved and the cabinet sidewalls are curved and form a triangular profile. I said in previous post of this thread, "...throw $ at it", and Sonus Faber exemplifies this method.

Also note that controlling reflections in a room can cover-up speaker localization too - I put that in the category of "throw $ at it".

The OB may be out of polarity, but who cares in the upper freq ranges?
You used the term “not in time”.

A lot of folks do care. Magico, Kef, B&W, Wilson Audio, Focal, Genelec, Revel,

Unless you only like listening to upper freq range then its a big problem.

Theres more closed box speakers than open. What do you gain by throwing the box away? you just LOSE all the bass. I dont see any advantages whatsoever.

I switched to OB speakers (Emerald Physics) a while ago, and I don't think I could ever go back to a box speaker.

They need lots of room to breathe and placement can be tricky, but they sound absolutely glorious when you get them dialed in. Anyone who tells you differently is talking out of their ass.