Check OGR Forum

Hi Brian, 

I’ve seen them discussed in the OGR Forum. Check out GP9um on YouTube, I think he’s used pretty much just those speakers with ESU though. It’s the speaker I’m considering using for my O locos.

Tang Band modules with passive radiator

Right on Greg!

I use the Tang Band complete modules with the passive radiator as well as the full range driver though. The passive radiator adds lower bass. In my O scale locos I can fit either the TB1925s, 1931s or the 1942s. There's also a smaller TB 2008s module that may fit in some HO locos.

Here are two RS-32s with TB1931s with LS5 DCC HO decoders:

By the way, Loksound now offers two similar modules which look like they're from TB. The smallest one might fit in some HO locos perhaps? 

https://www.parts-express.com/Tang-Band-T0-2008S-Speaker-Module-2-5-32-x-1-264-943

http://www.esu.eu/en/products/accessories/loudspeakers/speaker-24mm-x-55mm/

Well worth the $$ if you can fit them in!   No relation, just a happy customer.  

Pete

Big fan

of Scale Sound Systems speakers.  I've got three and they are orders of magnitude better than anything I've heard.  However, I have not heard the Tang Band's up close to know the difference.

HO size?

Now you have made this very interesting for smaller scales. Has anyone out there experienced these or similar in HO? Base sound has always been a goal. Very difficult to get good base in small speakers. The video by PeteM is especially nice.

another vote for SSS

I got a couple of the Scale Sound Systems speakers and now I won't use anything else. I have a huge backlog of locos to put sound into, and they're all getting SSS. After I get done with that I'll go back and replace the others with SSS. They're that much better than anything else. (I haven't heard Tang Band.)

Larry Linger, Solo Contracting, on YouTube has just

done a series of Scale Sound Systems speaker installations and uses Decoder Buddys to save space.  A lot have stay alives included also.  I highly recommend taking a look at Larry’s work.  Here is his latest of many to get your thoughts moving.

Tang Band speakers are pretty big.....

...............but they have unbelievably 
 ......to great sound. Here’s one going into an O scale SP 4-6-0 tender.

Some cutting but it fit. Heed the gentleman’s caution about the adding a resistor to these 4 ohm speakers. You will loose the sound and have to get it repaired like I did. 

Peter
 

Dual Speaker possibility

I haven't researched the idea at all at this point, and not even the size of these speakers. But my initial thoughts were that even if they were a bit large for mounting in a 'conventional manner' in HO trains, couldn't they be mounted in a somewhat unconventional manner/orientation where one was looking to get their bass sound qualities, ..since bass sounds are omni-directional??

Then another speaker utilized to get the higher frequency sounds.

That's the theory of Rolling Thunder

The Broadway Limited product that uses a (radio-connected) 14" subwoofer generally under the layout to reproduce bass in a notionally "omnidirectional" sense. I wasn't that impressed with it in the short time I had it here.

Only vaguely familiar with

Only vaguely familiar with Rolling Thunder, having seen it demonstrated at the factory store here in Florida.

What was it that didn't impress you Candofan?

I was always of the opinion this would be a good idea to separate out the bass frequencies and send them to a proper bass speaker. I have several of these on my home stereo, and they work good.

Several things

First, I didn't have it for very long - just a few days. I did some tinkering with it, but it's certainly possible that additional tweaking would have yielded better results. I agree that the basic idea - a big, stationary subwoofer synced to the rolling sounds - is reasonable.

The problem that I had was that, despite the directionless theory, in practice it's at least somewhat directional. Deep bass is in fact mostly directionless, but that's down at, say, 30 Hz. Most of our little tiny speakers are producing sounds in the 100-300Hz range, and that definitely is directional. When the crossover is set to something in the 100+Hz range, the sound is somewhat directional. (On my stereo, the sub is crossed over at 40Hz.) I suppose that on a small layout (4x8) there isn't enough change in direction to make that significant. But even on my prototype layout that is not terribly large - 8x11 - it's pretty apparent that the loco is over there and the sound is coming from over here. It also does not move.

I also found that it was a bit unsubtle - well actually quite unsubtle - if you set the crossover and volume as they suggested in the manual. I turned the volume way down and lowered the crossover point and that was definitely better. That might be exacerbated by the shiny hardwood floor that the sub was sitting on (and firing into).

There is also the limitation that it can handle only one source at a time, so for example if you have a meet on a double track right in front of you it's pretty obvious that the sound is not equivalent to the visual scene. That's particularly obvious in an extreme case like a diesel powered streamliner arriving first (and thus capturing the Rolling Thunder channel) but meeting a steam powered freight... which of course has no RT support.

Another SSS fan

JT's new BOMB speaker is targeted at adding lower frequency power to F-units. I have installed several in F and E series B units with very positive results. The size precludes their being installed in hood units.

His Boiler Barker series of steam speakers have a decent amount of low end especially in locos using the Tsunami 2 steam version which provides DDE. Nice grunt when the load increases. And you achieve the the prototypical characteristic of the sound being localized at the front of the boiler.

.

I installed some of the Tang Band speakers in my pair of Baldwin Sharks and was really impressed with the burble and bark they produced ....

Mark.

boiler barker...

The fact that this works at all to localize sound from the front of the boiler strongly suggests that the "directionless" property of the sound is not all that it's cracked up to be. And that, I believe, is the reason that Rolling Thunder doesn't work as well as it's supposed to. If it were rolled off at 24hz or something really low, sure. But at the much higher frequencies that it's crossed over, no. And I don't think it can even be set to cross over at those really low frequencies...