Is anyone thinking about building Walsh drivers?

HEy, I like this thread!

Walsh drivers are a principle. The general principles are fairly well documented. Specific Walsh driver implementations realize the principles differently.

The principle involves a downward firing driver where the sound is emitted 360 degrees in the horizontal plane via the rear of driver.

So I have read that basically any open back cone shaped driver can function as a Walsh driver. But only those that are well designed and tuned will sound good. Also making one that is full range and robust as well as being even remotely cost effective is a trick that few if any have ever mastered. I would expect only a highly skilled engineer or technician could actually accomplish this. I know of only one these days that makes the claim (see Dale Harder's "My Walsh Dream" virtual system published here on Agon).

What is not well documented and also happens to be the magic sauce is how to design and tune a driver to function well as a Walsh driver. The shape of the cone, materials used in regards to rigidity and density along different portions of the cone (to realize the wave bending aspect of a Walsh driver) would seem to be important ingredients.

To do it well, even for a limited range Walsh driver, would seem to require understanding of the principles and a lot of testing involving trial and error and tuning to get the desired results, I would expect. Could be quite time consuming R&D type work! Not for the faint of heart looking for optimal results for sure! Or maybe you get lucky and happen to stumble onto a driver that works well out of the can (ha, ha, no pun intended)?

Those who know how to do this well are generally not prone to make their intellectual property public, so I do not know if there is such a thing out there as a quality Walsh driver design spec that one can attempt to realize themselves rather than start from scratch.

I have seen an internet thread or two on the topic on other sites where DIY'ers share their experiences, but I was not able to discern much I would bank on there.

Audiogoner Mamboni is the one I know of that might have the most practical experience with commercial Walsh drivers as well as DIY versions.

Another approach I would recommend is reverse engineering.

In other words start with a quality working Walsh driver design, and reverse engineer the specs to create one yourself based on your observations and any measurements possible.

I believe that the German Physiks DDD could be considered an evolution of the original Walsh Driver.

Great idea.

Technology and materials should be there.

I liked the old Ohm Fs.

Everything else I've heard from Ohm in the last 20 years (including 'updates' or 'upgrades') has been VERY mediocre.

Westborn - I won't argue taste with you, but have you heard the current models in the Ohm Walsh line? I had never heard Ohm Walsh speakers prior to my home trial of the 2000s, so my only comparison was to other brands of speakers. IME, the 2000s compete extremely well in and a good bit above their price point. John Strohbeen has refined his products, and, obviously since I bought them, I find them to be among the best speakers out there. Of course, YMMV, but if you value warmth, detail, large soundstages, well-defined imaging, accurate timbre, and clean extension at both ends, you might be surprised by the current Ohm line.

OF course any good speaker including omnis and the newer OHMs can sound mediocre if not set up well. Personal tastes aside, the same speakers can sound absolute top notch if set up optimally.

Like most things, it all depends...

Also worth mentioning that Dale Harder's website has perhaps the most information I have seen anywhere regarding what goes into creating a quality Walsh driver. Pretty daunting....