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roads31
12-30-2019, 08:32 PM
Hello all-
Does anyone have any experience with a Metregon set on a slab foundation? I used to have it set up in a house with a raised foundation and have since moved to a house with a slab floor. I really miss how well the Metregon coupled to the old house, the total lack of bass has left me not really ever wanting to turn it on, very uninspiring and bleh. Any suggestions?
Using the same McIntosh 2105 and Dynaco PAS3X combo

Thanks

Mr. Widget
12-30-2019, 10:58 PM
I am not aware of any research on how the foundation type effects the bass response, but room proportions, size, and speaker location can play a significant role in bass performance as well as your listening location. Can you try moving the speakers and your listening position? Listening from a position up against a wall will almost always increase your bass response. Can you try that?


Widget

roads31
12-31-2019, 06:40 AM
Widget-
Thanks for the reply and suggestion but don't really have any other options for placement.

I believe the biggest response attenuator is that it's ported downward, directly to the floor. I might try to make a test rear panel and move the port to the rear so it at least has a friendlier surface to hit.

Mr. Widget
12-31-2019, 09:39 AM
Thanks for the reply and suggestion but don't really have any other options for placement.


I believe the biggest response attenuator is that it's ported downward, directly to the floor. I might try to make a test rear panel and move the port to the rear so it at least has a friendlier surface to hit.Sounds like a lot of work. I can’t imagine that will change anything.

Your experience does highlight the unfortunate fact that while our listening rooms are one of the most important components in our systems, they are also the most difficult to change.

My previous living room was a real pain! It caused my speakers to have an over powering one note bass that I eventually tamed with an equalizer, but a room that kills your bass output will be harder to overcome. Good luck with your battle!



Widget

Titanium Dome
12-31-2019, 07:17 PM
Hello all-
Does anyone have any experience with a Metregon set on a slab foundation? I used to have it set up in a house with a raised foundation and have since moved to a house with a slab floor. I really miss how well the Metregon coupled to the old house, the total lack of bass has left me not really ever wanting to turn it on, very uninspiring and bleh. Any suggestions?
Using the same McIntosh 2105 and Dynaco PAS3X combo

Thanks


Reading between the lines, I'm assuming your raised foundation was topped with a wood plate, wooden floor joists, and wooden subfloor with whatever finished floor surface was used: carpet, tile, linoleum, finished wood planks, etc. I'm also assuming there was a crawl space (or maybe a basement)—in other words a space with a volume of air and a resonant surface (the house floor) on the top side. It's not unusual for the floor and the chamber of air beneath it to resonate low frequency sounds.

Some enthusiasts have been known to tune these spaces to support a desired bass-centric effect. My assumption is that the down-firing Met was exciting the floor and beefing up what was perceived as richer, fuller bass.

Concrete poured on the ground doesn't get excited like that.

Titanium Dome
01-01-2020, 12:29 PM
As an addendum to the above, in one instance I'm personally cognizant of, a basement music room I had was improved by the installation of a false or floating floor over concrete. I don't think I'd try this in my current one story home, which we bought to eliminate any stairs, steps, thresholds, or drops. It's one slab from end to end and side to side with a deep, contiguous concrete foundation all around. This not only exceeds the earthquake code here, but provides easy future access if one of us needs walking assistance like a wheel chair or walker.

From a practical standpoint, installing a floating floor over the concrete floor would create and area that might exclude one of us in the future, or at least create the need for an ugly and obtrusive ramp.

A pair of old Fosgate Audionics subs that I have and still use are down firing, which sounded wonderful on my traditional joist and subfloor wooden floors in our former home. They have JBL LE14H-1 drivers, so they are very hard to give up. As a solution here, they now sit on their side with the woofers firing into the room rather than the floor, and they sound wonderful again.

I realize putting your Met on its side is not an elegant or practical remedy.

SEAWOLF97
01-01-2020, 02:02 PM
I believe the biggest response attenuator is that it's ported downward, directly to the floor. I might try to make a test rear panel and move the port to the rear so it at least has a friendlier surface to hit.

then why not a deflector panel from the rear of the met and it's front side on the floor ?
resulting in a 45 degree or so angle on it ?

HCSGuy
01-08-2020, 11:28 PM
When I used to design media rooms, we would specify or build a floating floor if the room was on slab. Auralex Acoustics and others all sell U shaped rubber ground isolators. You can build a 2’x2’ frame using 2x2s, then cover with two layers of 1/2” plywood (we specified marine grade), with the top layer oriented 90deg to the lower layer so that the seams don’t overlap and screw the crap out of it. Final thickness is about 2 3/4”. While this will get you much more of a sense for the bass in the room via vibration, it will not cure room acoustics. One room I did ended up with a monster 17hz Peak in the back row and a 26hz suckout in the front row. We went around and around with subwoofer placement and EQ, but like you, we didn’t have much flexibility as it was a completely acoustically paneled theater room with fixed seating and no extra room behind the panels, though we had the entire front stage, behind and to the sides of the screen to play with. In the end, we added a pair of tactile transducers to shake the front row during movies and that ended the complaints, though the back row still sounded better:)

If you can’t build the floating floor, add a good subwoofer that you can move around. It may not end up in a pretty place, but you may be surprised by how much difference it’s placement makes. One trick I’ve used a few times (It’s not mine; don’t remember where I read about it) is to put the subwoofer in your seating position, then walk around the room until you find where the bass sounds best. Then put the sub in that place, and your butt back in the seating position, and enjoy the music. Good luck!

Michael Chavez
01-09-2020, 05:07 PM
I am not aware of any research on how the foundation type effects the bass response, but room proportions, size, and speaker location can play a significant role in bass performance as well as your listening location. Can you try moving the speakers and your listening position? Listening from a position up against a wall will almost always increase your bass response. Can you try that?


Widget
bunch of material at the Klipsch forum - even P.W.K. got peripherally involved, expressed an interest, way back
some of it was in relationship to building faux corners for K-Horns and some of it was with regard to mechanically coupling K-Horn to rooms that already did have suitable corners
there was discussion of floors and reinforcing them, matters of resonance and a bunch of things I can't remember
don't know how useful it'd be for a Metregon though?
a former Klipsch employee named Clay I believe and some other dude were the primary posters if you want to try and dig it up
I know for a fact it's there but it was a long time ago I saw it in inadvertently
a lot of material actually
Michael