most effective bass traps


It seems that ASC has very popular bass traps, but at a significant cost. There are other companies that claim to have more effective bass traps. Is there any empirical (or subjective) evidence that one companies traps are more effective than another?
bflowers

Showing 2 responses by ngjockey

The ones in the corners.

Depends on the frequencies you want to trap. Although I'm skeptical of their product claims to go as deep as they state, I'm in no position to argue. The methods of measuring sabines for an individual trap have little to do with a typical listening position or overall effectiveness. It might be fun to have a shootout between the brands with a single microphone in the same room. Should the constraints be dollars or square footage? Would it be relevant? Probably not. It wouldn't be your room and your speakers.

The science of these is not complex, often misunderstood and, sometimes, misrepresented. What it comes down to is addressing your unique situation, which is the probably the least understood. However, no matter which brand or type, most who have just taken a stab at it have been impressed with almost everything, which seems to indicate it's all worthwhile.
I found this comparison of 3 different traps and a lot of info where I found the link.

http://forum.studiotips.com/viewtopic.php?t=537
http://www.bobgolds.com/AbsorptionCoefficients.htm

The results are so uniform and illogical, it only goes to show the flaw of the test. The microphone was in the room's 100 Hz null. Perhaps, the best trap actually reduced the null and had the least measured absorption. I can't see any conclusion from this test.