Hi Guys,
To someone this is going to sound a fairly daft question, but: How do I get the speaker (in this case a 14x25mm mini speaker) to stay in the baffle and get to the wires, with the cone side facing out of the baffle? With the cone facing outwards (which seems correct?!) there seems no way to get to the pads to solder the wires on.
I have tried loose fitting the speaker into the baffle upside down - that is with the cone side pointing into the baffle - and it fits snugly with easy access to solder onto the pads, but having no experience of this I have no idea whether I'm about to cancel all the noise when I get around to wiring it up?
All suggestions greatfully received,
Ian
I suspect by "baffle" you actually mean the speaker enclosure. If so, the enclosure should cover the back of the speaker, so the part of the speaker the sound is coming out of is facing out. It's like a speaker for a stereo system, you have a speaker facing towards you, but the box around it helps make the sound of the speaker deeper and richer by eliminating competing sound waves from the rear of the speaker.
Generally you have to solder the wires to the speaker before installing it in the enclosure. Some enclosures come with two small holes for the wire to come out when you install the speaker in it, in some you have to add an opening yourself. In some cases if you're using small size wire you can just squeeze it around the edge of the speaker when you press-fit them together.
The idea of the enclosure is to completely isolate one side of the speaker so that the sound energy comes out the other side only. As David said, it doesn't matter which side goes in, but if you put the face into the box, then the back sticks out, and generally we're tight for space with these things.
Drill a couple of small holes for the wires, solder them to the speaker and run them out. I use a bit of glue around the edges of the enclosure, and I also seal up the wire holes with glue once the wires are positioned. This both cuts off any air flow through the holes, and protects the wires from being pulled off the speaker connections.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Keep in mind that the engine's body (or the tender shell) is part of the enclosure. In some cases like a steam engine tender with holes in the floor, you can put in a speaker facing down without using an enclosure, because the tender body seals in the sound coming from the "wrong" side of the speaker. I
t can come down to trial and error...if you find you have room in say a diesel for a large speaker but only if you don't use an enclosure, try it. It could be once the body is in place it will be enough of an enclosure that the sound will be good. If not, you can use a smaller speaker with it's own enclosure.