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Just how much do speakers suppose to vibrate?

I have a pair of Totem Staff speakers and when I play music with some bass content I can feel the top of the speakers vibrating to some degree. I like the sound of the speakers and I just wonder if the speakers suppose to vibrate this way. I do not play music very loud (around 85 dB peaks) and yes I tried stuffing the lower chamber with sand, but I did not like the result. Also I tried putting some iron weights over the top of the speakers and the vibrations lessen about half (this according with a vibrometer app for android). According to the vibrometer the vibrations go as high as  IV in the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scale. Is this level of vibrations normal for this speakers? Also I should mention that the speakers are spiked directly to the floor which is compose of tiles over concrete.
tiofelon
mapman's avatar
mapman
22,927 posts
 
Yes of course it’s the speakers that are the source of vibration. That’s what dynamic speaker drivers do. Who said anything about seismic waves? Not me.

Speaker interacts with floor and waves propagate through the floor. Anything in contact with the floor is vibrating to some extent from there including the entire speaker not just the drivers which are the true source.

If the floor is massive and rigid like a concrete foundation for example the waves produced by the speaker driver movement is not likely to make the floor vibrate so likely not a real issue that case.
redfuneral
36 posts
 
There are varying design philosophies on the issue whether a speaker should resonate to quickly disperse energy or be completely inert. As sbank mentioned above Totem sells a product to reduce vibration and by the marketing they would fall into the second camp. Why you had poor results with sand fill could be a matter of altering the cabinet geometry or of Totem designing the speakers with that resonance in mind(the beak only focuses on the top of the speaker.)
danvignau's avatar
danvignau
935 posts
 

I put the 6" drivers from my vibrating B&W DM 14's in my B&W Matric cabinets, ad they sound much cleaner with the wine rack innards to damp the vibration. I put 803 drivers in the DM 14 cabinets and they got muddy.

Reversed for good.

soundsrealaudio's avatar
soundsrealaudio
756 posts
 
The wave energy from the back of the drivers can not be destroyed. An example of how this will affect the sound…..If the cabinet has an area that is 100 times larger then the driver then if it vibrates at only 100th as much the sound coming from the cabinet will be equal to the sound from the front of the driver. 



soundsrealaudio's avatar
soundsrealaudio
756 posts
 
Weights may or may not work. The best outcome would be to absorb those vibrations so the whole room isn't affected. Since good speakers, or the best speakers cabinets use composite cabinet walls, thus combining the beneficial effects of two different materials, you might try different materials to place on top of your cabinets. A good example of this would be to ping  a wine glass. When is resonating simply place your finger on one edge. It stops pretty quickly. Sand bags or even a small bag of a grain like quinoa just to test things out. Heavy weights are not likely to be good absorbers rather they might make that energy move to the front panel and worse yet out through the front of your driver, a disaster that few designers consider. 

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