I intend to order the Tempest and build it out in the most attractive way I can for my living room, well over 50% music usage with subwoofers TBD - veneer on everything but the baffle, possibly a curved cabinet although that may turn out to be too ambitious. I'm in lust with the ~30" tall form factor done to such great effect by craig484 and java on their 2512 mains, that's the shape I'll be going for. Adjusting the dimensions of the cabinet to accommodate a taller baffle is not a problem, but frankly the configuration of the triple ports on the standard kit drives me nuts, visually. It's tempting to just move the ports to the rear and call it done, but since Jeff Bagby apparently did some careful voicing on these I'm concerned that leakage from the ports might now be part of the intended results, sound-wise. Am I crazy to be concerned about that? And what would be my other options as far as front-mounted ports, be it a single or a pair or a trio at slightly reduced diameter? Or a slot port? In my dream world, I'd inset round ports from the baffle a tiny bit (1/4" or less), routing out a rectangular area and covering them with their own miniature grill - maybe with a SEOS badge glued on the front, like the logo on a guitar amp. Of course this doesn't work with the ports taking up almost the entire width of the baffle like they currently do. Let me know if I need to draw a picture LOL. According to Jeff the three original ports are 2.25" diameter, 4.25" long, for a 50 hz tune. Any thoughts?
First port resonance is above the crossover frequency so there shouldn’t be any issues from leakage or the like. You should be able to move them to the rear without any problem. Two 3” ports of the same length as the current ones may work. You could also use three 2” ports that are 3” long if you plan on crossing over above 60 Hz. The port grill idea sounds interesting; I think it would be cool to see something like that done.
Thanks for the reply. What's going to be the deciding factor on whether a pair of 3" ports works or not? I like the sound of that better than perhaps not being able to run these full range for music with the 2" ports.
Depending on how shallow that cabinet is, I've got some interesting curved ports that are about 2.5" in diameter and I think up to 10" long. But because of the depth, they're about 7". I got them to experiment with some super shallow designs. Antisuck, if you nail down dimensions, please let me know and I will do my best to get some baffles cut the size you need. The only issue would be shipping in a different sized box, and by themselves. So it might cost you a little extra for shipping.
Erich, thanks for the offer but I'm pretty sure I can use your existing 30" tall blank baffle (with just the SEOS12 cutout). Currently I plan to partition off the part that contains the waveguide so I should end up with a box of similar depth to the original - just taller. The only thing that might come in handy is secondary baffles without the countersink for the waveguide - dunno if it makes sense to pay shipping on such simple pieces, but if it's easy for you to get done it might be worth having them show up on my doorstep knowing they are identical size to the front baffles and the same precision CNC cuts. Let me know. And I sure don't expect you to come up with special ports in support of my harebrained schemes. When the time comes I'll order the complete kit with baffles rather than flat packs, any extra/different ports I'll plan on finding myself. I'm just dumb about modeling ports so I thought I'd ask here.
I've already got the ports. What I meant was that I could get the baffle cut for Jeff's speaker, but in the height you wanted. Recesses and everything. The inner baffle is very easy. You simply build a solid box, then put the outer baffle over top and trace the woofer hole, waveguide hole, and the ports if you need them. Then just cut out the holes. It won't matter if they're perfect or not because the outer baffle is.....and it covers everything up.
Thanks Erich, when I get a solid plan I'll let you know and we'll see how it goes from there. Now back to my main question - sounds like a pair of 3" ports could work, but now I'm seeing that PE only carries: - 3" Precision Ports (outer flare ridiculously huge for my purpose) - 3" buyout ports with huge flares like the Precisions - 3" non-flared cheapo ports - new modular port tubes and flares that are advertised as 3" but seem to be 2.75" in reality. A pair of these would be perfect for what I'm thinking - if they would really work for this box model, and if I knew how long to make them. Bends are available too if needed. Someone want to school me on this stuff? :-[
I've got 2.75" flared ports that are only 4.25" wide at the flare. They have about 5.75" worth of usable port length before the flare.