[calraith]

I received my Aura Pro Bass Shakers yesterday. I had to track them down, as FedEx was holding them hostage. It's such a pain when vendors require signature for delivery. But I got them, and got them installed last night. Woohoo!


The first question was, where do I mount them? Ideally, it should be in a place close to the center of the chair (center from back to foot rest) and near lots of frame supports to make the vibrations radiate to as much of the chair as possible.

Next problem. How do I mount a 4" square device onto a 1 3/4" strip of wood? Two of the Bass Shaker mount points could be screwed directly into pilot holes I drilled into the wood. The other half of the transducer would have to be braced. I opted for the steel slotted angle bar you'd typically find in a garage holding up a garage door opener, available at pretty much any hardware / home improvement store. The angle makes the bar rigid. I got a 5' strip of it and used a grinder to cut it into 6" pieces. A lock washer, nut and machine screw secure the shaker to one end of the bar; and a flat washer and drywall screw join the bar with the chair.

Incidentally, the screws I use are magic. You buy them by the plastic bucket at Wal-Mart. They're black -- I think they're labeled as drywall screws -- and 1 3/4" long. I use them for everything. I use them to hang pictures and mirrors, and used them instead of the crappy little flimsy screws that came with my window blinds. One time in college, I screwed one into a cinder block with a manual screwdriver just to see whether I could. It's nearly impossible to strip the heads of them, and they will hold your entire life together.


In retrospect, if I'd realized I would be mounting the slotted angle bars at angles, I would have just used 6" steel repair bars instead and saved myself the trouble of grinding. You find them wherever you find angle braces, chair braces, and the like; also at pretty much any hardware / home improvement store. Hindsight = 20/20.


Eh well, they're installed nonetheless, they're stable, and they don't interfere with reclining. I got them wired up and tested them. They provide ample kick, wired for a 4 ohm load on a 100w mono sub amp crossed over at about 70Hz with the gain at about 6/10. My wife and I watched the opening sequence for Quantum of Solace to break them in a little, and watched a few minutes of a comedy to make sure they aren't going to rumble inappropriately. The wife approves.

 

[elmalloc]

great!

 

[munchcolo]

Thanks for posting. My powered 12003's are coming next week, and I'm going to mount Aura Pro Bass Shakers in them, so I'm very interested in this topic. I have just a few questions.

Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18166571


Two of the Bass Shaker mount points could be screwed directly into pilot holes I drilled into the wood. The other half of the transducer would have to be braced.

From looking at your photo, it looks like you mounted the "front" of the transducer (the end where the speaker wire connection is located) to the wooden chair rail, and the back to your angle bars. Is this correct?

Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18166571


In retrospect, if I'd realized I would be mounting the slotted angle bars at angles, I would have just used 6" steel repair bars instead and saved myself the trouble of grinding. You find them wherever you find angle braces, chair braces, and the like; also at pretty much any hardware / home improvement store. Hindsight = 20/20.

The 6" steel repair bars you're talking about, are those angle bars or flat bars? Do you think the bracing bars need to be angle, or would flat steel suffice?

Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18166571


I got them wired up and tested them. They provide ample kick, wired for a 4 ohm load on a 100w mono sub amp crossed over at about 70Hz with the gain at about 6/10. My wife and I watched the opening sequence for Quantum of Solace to break them in a little, and watched a few minutes of a comedy to make sure they aren't going to rumble inappropriately. The wife approves.

How many are you running on your amp? Are they wired parallel or in series?


Again, thanks for sharing your experience with us.

 

[calraith]



Quote:
Originally Posted by munchcolo /forum/post/18346007


From looking at your photo, it looks like you mounted the "front" of the transducer (the end where the speaker wire connection is located) to the wooden chair rail, and the back to your angle bars. Is this correct?

That is correct. I mounted the shakers with the speaker wire connections easily accessible so it would be easier to connect / disconnect the speaker wire if I ever need to.


I apologize that the pictures are so dark. I just snapped these with my cell phone camera. To be honest, though, you'll get a better idea of how to mount your shakers by your sense of touch than you would from pictures. Just feel for the edges of the rail through the fabric, hold your bass shaker with the mounting holes halfway between the edges you feel, and drill pilot holes using the shaker as a template.


Drilling pilot holes is important. If you don't, you could split the wood you're mounting to.

Quote:
Originally Posted by munchcolo /forum/post/18346007


The 6" steel repair bars you're talking about, are those angle bars or flat bars? Do you think the bracing bars need to be angle, or would flat steel suffice?

They're actually called "mending bars" I believe. They're flat. It probably doesn't matter about the shape of the bars as much as the rigidity of them. Mending bars are thick metal and VERY rigid. The bars I used are thinner metal, but they're rigid because of the bend. Just try not to use something that's bendable / flexible. If it's bendable, I think some of the vibration will be wasted when your mounting frame flexes and acts as a shock absorber.

Quote:
Originally Posted by munchcolo /forum/post/18346007


How many are you running on your amp? Are they wired parallel or in series?

I'm running four on my mono amp. I have them wired as two pairs. Each pair is wired in series for 8 ohms per pair. Then the pair of pairs is wired in parallel to drop the impedance back to 4 ohms.

 

[munchcolo]

Calraith, thanks for the response to my questions. Here's how I attached the Aura Pro Bass Shakers to my Berkline power recline 12003's. There's a wooden frame piece along the back and bottom of the chair. It's what the dust flap attaches to. The frame piece is about 5-1/4 inches tall, so it's just the right size for the mounting holes of the Bass Shaker. I drilled pilot holes and screwed the Bass Shaker directly to the frame piece. Here's a picture.

The Bass Shaker is mounted vertically, and the wiring terminal is up. Here's a picture with the dust flap pulled down.

Right now, the Bass Shakers are just attached with 2 inch wood screws, since that's all that I could find locally. I'm concerned about the wood screws loosening over time from the vibration, so I'm going to order some long #8 machine screws and lock nuts and attach the Bass Shakers in a more permanent fashion.


Some of you may wonder about having the Bass Shaker stick out from the back of the chair. Yes, the Bass Shaker is about 2-1/2 inches tall. However, as you can see in the second photo, it is covered almost entirely by the dust flap. It doesn't interfere with chair placement against a wall, as the chair needs to be 3 to 4 inches from the wall anyway.


I have 8 Bass Shakers (one for each chair), wired as 4 pairs. Each pair is wired in series, and each pair goes to a separate channel of a surround receiver I had laying around. Each channel is rated at 75 watts on 8 ohms. That's plenty of power to add more than enough rumble to each chair. I really thought about going with Clarks or Buttkickers, but that was more than I wanted to spend for 8 chairs, factoring in the cost of the amp. For $40 each, and using a spare surround receiver, I was able to add a nice touch to the movie watching experience.


Last night, we had friends over to watch 2012. Everyone was duly impressed.

 

[calraith]



Quote:
Originally Posted by munchcolo /forum/post/18393781


I have 8 Bass Shakers (one for each chair), wired as 4 pairs. Each pair is wired in series, and each pair goes to a separate channel of a surround receiver I had laying around. Each channel is rated at 75 watts on 8 ohms. That's plenty of power to add more than enough rumble to each chair.

Are you using a crossover or low-pass filter of some sort, or are you running your bass shakers full range? Are you going from the subwoofer pre-amp out on your main receiver into an input on your bass shaker receiver?


37.5 watts per transducer sounds like good, clean power. I'm running 25 watts per transducer myself, and have no complaints with the performance. I did have to turn the subwoofer channel up on my receiver to compensate for dividing the preamp voltage between my sub and my transducers. But I still can't hear or feel any clipping.


The only complaint I have is that my mono amp automatically goes into standby after a few seconds of low voltage. When it turns back on, there's a turn-on thump. It's annoying when watching a drama or comedy, or there's a lull in the action. The idea of using an old receiver intrigues me for this reason. An old receiver wouldn't turn off until I told it to. It might be time to hit up some area pawn shops for an old receiver.


Anyway, you missed a good episode of 24 last night.

 

[munchcolo]



Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18403490


Are you using a crossover or low-pass filter of some sort, or are you running your bass shakers full range? Are you going from the subwoofer pre-amp out on your main receiver into an input on your bass shaker receiver?

My surround receiver (Sherwood) is set at 100 Hz crossover, and I'm not using any other low pass filter. I simply ran a "Y" cable from the subwoofer out of the Sherwood. One side of the cable goes to the subwoofer, and the other side goes to the Shaker receiver (Denon).

Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18403490


37.5 watts per transducer sounds like good, clean power. I'm running 25 watts per transducer myself, and have no complaints with the performance. I did have to turn the subwoofer channel up on my receiver to compensate for dividing the preamp voltage between my sub and my transducers. But I still can't hear or feel any clipping.

I, too, had to bump the output of the subwoofer channel on the Sherwood. Before I bumped it, I was getting almost nothing from the Shakers. After I bumped it (and turned down the amplifier on my subwoofer), everything worked fine.

Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18403490


The only complaint I have is that my mono amp automatically goes into standby after a few seconds of low voltage. When it turns back on, there's a turn-on thump. It's annoying when watching a drama or comedy, or there's a lull in the action. The idea of using an old receiver intrigues me for this reason. An old receiver wouldn't turn off until I told it to. It might be time to hit up some area pawn shops for an old receiver.

I agree; my Shaker receiver stays on all the time during the movie. An old receiver (with enough power, but none of the fancy new features required) should be pretty cheap.

Quote:
Originally Posted by calraith /forum/post/18403490


Anyway, you missed a good episode of 24 last night.

I never miss 24; I recorded it and will watch it tonight or tomorrow night. I've watched 24 from the first season. Recently, I heard that this is the last season. Too bad; I'll miss it next year.

 

[calraith]

Just a quick longevity update for posterity. After nearly a year, the bass shaker mountings are still tight. There's still no unintended vibration, just butt-rocking bass.


At some point, I ended up feeding the speaker wires through the holes in the angle bars on their way to the Bass Shaker terminals. You know how if you wiggle a copper wire back and forth over and over, it'll eventually break? Well, I guess reclining was doing the same thing to my speaker wire. Running the wire through the holes keeps the shield-stripped tips from flexing.


Someone asked me how I like my 12003s now. My wife and I got four seats in |o|oo|o| configuration. We use the love seats in the middle most often. Anyway, after having used the 12003s for nearly a year, I can tell that the sections in the middle are somewhat softer than the outside sections. It's true that when you break them in, they may not be as stiff in some places as you'd like.


I still love them, though. Whenever my wife and I sit in them, they suck out all our will. We are powerless against their lure. That could be why we've broken them in so well, though.


My biggest complaint about them is the included arm tables. The tables look great, but they wobble and they don't sit level. Really, though, this is nitpicking.