Redneck's Anechoic Chamber?

[gregz]

Would my back yard work as a poor man's anechoic chamber? Assume the neighbor's dog isn't barking and there are no lawn mowers running at the time. There would be no nearby sound reflections, and no room reinforcement of bass.

What say you, people?

 

[Az B]

Yes. With all of the applicable warnings about bothering neighbors, background noise, reflections from natural and man made elements, your mileage may vary.

 

[Rob Babcock]

That's the best forum topic headline I've seen in weeks!

 

[Mudcat]

Greg,

I agree with Rob. And my question is the the avatar a picture of you, or did it come with the frame?

And now to actually answer you question about the backyard, NO.

The reason being is that an anechoic chamber reflects nothing, absolutely nothing. Your backyard with a house and fence and trees and ground and variations in air temperature and pressure will reflect a lot of sound. Unless your backyard includes the top of a mountain peak.

Now if you just want to test the frequency response of your speakers, it will work fine.

 

[Rob Babcock]

Hmmm...I think he looks quite, er- dignified. Um, or maybe indignant. I actually hope the picture is of him, 'cause any other explaination would likely be disturbing. Well, I don't want to "welcome' a guy to AH by making fun of him, so I'll just say he has an "interesting" avatar and say, "*'day, and welcome to AH!"

 

[gregz]

Thanks for the compliments and jeers, folks. Yes, the avatar is of me and yes; it's twisted. I have several more twisted photos, but they weren't coherent after I shrunk them down to avatar size so you'll have to settle for my impersonation of Mathew Polk on Thorazine.

Now Mudcat, you're not taking into account the dense humidity down east - it will easily quell any and all echoes! Yes, my intent would be to measure speaker response at 1 meter, so I wouldn't expect echoes from 25' away to botch things up too much.

Great forum here, guys.