[SAM ZEOLI]

Hi, I have gotten a wealth of great information on DIY bass traps and acoustical treatments here. But I have seen almost nothing on diffusion treatments for the rear of my room. When I looked at purchasing premade diffusiors I couldnt beleive how expensive they were. Is their an inexpensive source or way for a DIY guy without a lot of money to make decent diffusiors? Thanks a lot! Sam Zeoli

 

[bpape]

If you have time, you can make your own pretty easily. There are MANY 2 dimensional diffusor calculators out on the web. Finding something that will do a 3 dimensional one is more difficult. The Master Handbook of Acoustics has a grid in it showing the relative heights for a 3D grid.

http://www.mhsoft.nl/Diffusor.asp

 

[garyfritz]

I've always wondered how important it was to have a perfect quadratic prime-number grid (or whatever it is) for these diffusors. I mean hell, they say a half-full bookshelf is a great diffusor. How much benefit does one of those rocket-science diffusors have over something with semi-random grid heights?

 

[bpape]

2D diffusors just disperse sound horizontally (or vertically if you hang it that way.) A set of books does some diffusion and also absorbs some. The idea of an exact set of heights is that it spreads things more evenly throughout the particular plane than something purely random will.


3D diffusors (the grids) are designed to disperse in both horizontal and vertical axis - more like a spherical dispersion pattern.


Diffusors also are somewhat absorbtive due to some minor cancellations that are generated.


As usual, something is better than nothing. However, with all the plans out there on how to do it, it really isn't that bad other than a lot of time for construction - especially for the 3D ones. The material costs aren't bad. The biggest thing people have issues with are the looks and the depth they take up depending on how low you want them to work.