How thick should the front baffle of speakers be?


Some manufactures advertise or hype a thick front baffle, two layers of MDF,  if the woofer is as thin as  paper cone how could it change anything. Could be just hype
soundsrealaudio
There used to be a loudspeaker manufacturer named Hales that featured ultra-thick front baffles-I believe of birch ply. They were reviewed multiple times by Stereophile. As with any loudspeaker, they still had strong points and weak, and the company ultimately folded.
There have been tiny loudspeaker ventures in the past that featured cabinets made of concrete. They failed for obvious reasons.
I listened to Magicos extensively at this year’s Axpona in two different rooms. They sounded dull to me. Not terribly dull, but not worth the long green.
I am of the humble opinion that there is simply no one single design approach that solves all of the problems inherent in loudspeaker transducers. I also happen to think that there is a large segment of the audiophile community who wish to believe that cutting edge technology is the path to loudspeaker-happiness. Exhibit A is Kalman Robinson of S’Phile. Take a look at this months edition of his column. KR is indisputably 100% correct as to his choice for himself, but one has to wonder how much of his opinion is based on the real versus the perceived versus placebo. Put differently, would he like his choice of loudspeakers just as much if he were blind? How about if he had no preconceived notions?
There can be no argument that loudspeakers-every design currently known to mankind-introduce more distortion in music reproduction in the home than any other component in the chain assuming lack of glaring defects. Eliminating cabinet resonance does not change that fact. Loudspeaker distortion has to be managed because it can not be eliminated.
Back in the mono days (well before Thiele-Small ) I built a woofer using two 15" JBL drivers mounted on a sand-filled plywood "sandwich."
Getting the back panel of the "sandwich" not to leak the sand turned out to be a problem.

Sound? Yikes!
fsonicsmith, it does not have to be eliminated. There are two types of distortion, Linear and non linear (this is psycho acoustic babble now, not my own) Linear distortion is alterations in frequency response which are very noticeable. Enclosure resonance would be in this category. Non linear distortion is IM and Harmonic distortion as well as mechanical distortion, buzzing, rattling and so forth. Studies (not mine) Have shown that Humans will tolerate non linear distortion levels up to 20% under certain circumstances the reason being that the distortion is being masked by the music. Non linear distortion is also more noticeable at lower volumes. This could be why some of us like higher volumes until system overload. This is the reason MP3 files sort of work. 
Frequency response is now completely manageable in the digital domain. You can correct virtually everything including enclosure resonance with room/speaker control. And, according to the psycho acoustic folks non linear distortion does not matter that much until it reaches ridiculous levels. Probably why we tolerate listening to such crude devises as loudspeakers. I guess their message is get full spectrum room control and be happy.......right.     
brayeagle, that was a Warfdale in the old days. Cost too much to ship the things. 
Many designers are using smaller woofers, they understand that the back waves often bounce back and right through the diaphragm. Not good. Those large woofers 10" and 12" suffer the worst. Not to mention the listener.