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Inflatable Loudspeakers
fm6 sent in an article running at New Scientist talking about new technology that allows Inflatable Loud Speakers. The technology is apparently patented and there's not a lot of technical details, but I have to say the concept amuses me. And I somehow doubt that this technology will ever be used in high fidelity home systems.
All I need now is an inflateable stero and some inflateable CDs. Seriously though, how cool is this? And wouldn't it be awesome to inflate/deflate them while their ON? Bet that would sound awesome.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
If you fill them with helium, will your music sound like the chipmonks?
Disconnect your television. Do your own research. Draw your own conclusions. They're probably lying. Don't be a sheep.
A speaker driver is mounted in a flat, rigid board bonded to a large bladder. When the bladder is inflated, it expands to form a box shape resembling a speaker cabinet.
I'd like to see the first time someone tries to dramatically smash their guitar against the speakers at the end of a set.
thats correct, the tech. details are disclosed in an american patent(can't speak for other countries, but its probably the same)
If this is a patented item, as opposed to patent pending, you should be able to go th the US Patent and copyright website and look them up.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Now I am starting to get scared.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Pump up the Jam! Pump it Up! Pump it UP!!
Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati
"..rock groups need roadies to hump.."
No. Those are groupies.
The audio world is crawling with hopeful inventors who don't understand much about sound and electro-accoustics. I've had the privilege of seeing many of these "inventions" first hand. The article failed to address the key issue behind "inflatable speakers": rigidity. In a vented box, which is the most common type of low-frequency and very-low-frequency system, the walls need to be pretty rigid to prevent distortion and energy loss. If these inventors have some way to make a balloon as rigid as 3/4" birch plywood with closely spaced transverse braces, the article doesn't mention it.
The only kinds of speaker enclosure that aren't concerned with rigidity are those that simply enclose rigid horns made of fibreglas, plastic or wood. In these situations, the enclosure merely protects the components from dust, water and damage and does not serve an accoustic funciton. JBL among others has realized this and is making a series of touring speakers which are simply frames of metal tubing with no side walls. Again, inflatable walls would add nothing to such a system.
As for the "beach ball" idea, this can be interpreted in two different ways, due to the lack of detail in the article. If you make a conventional (sealed or vented box) speaker system with spherical form, it will have a sharp resonant peak related to the diameter of the sphere. This peak can be reduced by increasing the absorbent material inside the enclosure, but still reflects a design mistake. A sphere is the worst possible shape for a conventional speaker enclosure. A second application of a sphere is to place it in front of a speaker (possibly a tweeter) creating in effect a radial horn. By careful positioning, two or even three transducers could share one sphere. An inflated beach ball could work for high and even mid frequencies. As the frequency gets lower, however, the need for rigidity of the sphere increases. In general, the sphere should be hard and rigid.
Such a system will never work as well as separate, properly designed horns for the separate transducers. Its only benefit is visual gimmickry and possible cost savings.
If you could make speakers and enclosures out of lightweight materials, it would have been done long before now.
They're made out of 3/4th-inch plywood to take the stress of constant packing and unpacking.
I predict the first tour that tries to use these things will end up with what looks like the first all-duct-tape speaker enclosures by the end of the trip.
--Blair
I don't believe it for a minute.
Distortion down to 'unheard of low levels'? Hype city. There is absolutely no plausible mechanism to support this claim. As for transdcuer shapes, such as tetrahedral, it's almost completely irrelevant as far as sound quality goes.
Loudspeakers don't have a limited lifetime because of corrosion. It's usually fatigue of the constituent materials, of which an inflatable plastic would certainly be about the worst.
These might be a good gimmick, but nothing more. I think their egos need a bit of deflating.
They're apparently using NXT flat panel techniques. No wonder this is so full of mindless hype.
I think it's time to deflate the hype surrounding these things a bit.
They basically use an inflatable structure (not unlike a beachball) as a loudspeaker enclosure, and attach a flat-panel loudspeaker to the front. Voila.
Performance of these will be questionable, at best, and they will certainly not have the performance they're claiming. Utter nonsense. They've provided absolutely nothing to support their claims.
Loudspeaker enclosured are designed to be rigid for a reason - they're essentially used as baffles and resonant structures, that, when properly designed, will provide a reliable, efficient, output of sound. An inflatable loudspeaker will not have any rigidity, thereby eliminating its use as a baffle, and severely diminishing low frequency performance. Second, the fact that the air will be expected to leak over time will change the resonant structure significantly, eliminating any possibility of consistent performance, if it even could be attained in the first place.
Now, an inflatable loudspeaker might be a nice gimmick, but it will absolutely not be a performance product. Not even close.
This is all hype, folks, nothing to see here - move along.
Oh, they're apparently VC funded? Go figure with the outlandish claims!
Anyways, don't discount the inflatable speakers as things that wouldn't work... these guitars worked really well. I saw them first in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts...