BassCAD - Speakerbuilding as easy as possible
The new ultimate tool to design your new speakers 
 
What's New? 
Download 
About 
Screenshots 
How to install? 
Java & Internet 
F.A.Q 
Support 
Known Bugs 
BeOS 

Related links: 

BassWEB, hem.passagen.se/basscad 

Java: java.sun.com 

BeOS: www.be.com 

Speakerbuidling Page: www.speakerbuilding.com 

Ljudia: www.ljudia.se 

HIFI-kit: www.hifi-kit.se 

In future releases of BassCAD you'll get this features: 

All bugs will be fixed. 

More enclosuretypes will be added to the program. 

More exact frequency response table. 

An even nicer user interface. 

There will also be function to calculate the outlines of the enclosure. 

Function for crossovercalculations. 

BeOS & Java versions of the program. 
 

WinZip is a program which let you manage your Zip-archives in an easy way. In most cases you don't have to start the program in a separate window - just right click in the exlporer and you can both expand and compress files.
 

How to use BassCAD?
This is a short introduction in how to design a very good speaker with help from BassCAD. In a few minutes you can design your own speaker.

1: First of all you have to how big speaker you want to build. Do you want a nearfield monitor or do you want a disco speaker? Then you have to make the big decicion: sealed or vented enclosure? I have not space enough on this server to write about what differs between to enclosure types but I can tell you this much. In most cases a vented enclosure is a better compromise than the sealed box even if the sealed enclosure is more accurate.  

2: Then you have to decide what speaker you want to use. There are four things you must consider. How big enclosure you want, the total Q of the speaker, the lower cutoff frequency and at last the prize. The bigger Vas the speaker has the bigger box you must build to reach the fs. But the boxsize also depends on Qts. For Vented box: 0.20 < Qts < 0.45. For sealed box: 0.40 < Qts <0.70. This only recommendations. When you found the right speaker you can start BassCAD.

3: First of all you have to fill in the speaker parameters. Can be found in most dealers catalauge. When you have done that you can press the Optimize button. Then you get the optimazed enclosure volume for that particular speaker in that enclosure type. When you done that you can press the Open Graph Window button. Then you should see a pretty nice graph. If you want a moderate peak in the frequency response you can lower the enclosure volume by about 10-20% and/or tune up the fb 5-10 Hz. Then you click Draw and a new graph will appear in the window. That graph should have a little peak about 1-4 dB over the zero-level depending on the originally enclosure size. This is a good compromise between deep bass and a punch bass in the higher bassfrequencies.

4: Now you have the enclosure volume. Now you only have to build an enclosure containing this exact volume. There will be a function to calculate this in a future version of BassCAD but it's an simple operation to do on your own. At last you just have to calculate the port. Press the Port... button. Then the port dialog appears on the screen. There you choose the port diameter you want to use. If the port length become negative or very little (length<5) you have two alternatives. You can increase the diameter or increase the number of ports in the enclosure.

5: Build your own speakers. Good Luck!

Here are some recommended minimum port diameters depending on the size of the speaker:

     Speaker Size        Port Diameter
     5"                         3 cm
     6.5"                      4 cm
     8"                         5 cm
     10"                       6.5 cm
     12"                       8 cm
     15"                       10 cm
     18"                       13 cm
 

 
(C) Daniel Sundberg 1998, updated 98-07-27