Jim Lee wrote:
> I have been following this thread for some time now. Very interesting
> and informative. Now I have come to wonder if the varying perceptions of=
> the expected behavior of waves hitting a parabolic reflector are not
> based on the varying ways we visualize waves. It is common practice to
> illustrate sound waves using the familiar sine wave graph. While that
> does help us understand issues of frequency and amplitude, it does not
> help very much in visualizing how sound waves actually travel through
> air or any other medium. I think it might be helpful to make the
> distinction between transverse waves (which often tend to look
> sinusoidal) and longitudinal waves (which are a little harder to
> illustrate easily). Here are a couple of sites that I find helpful in
> the visualizations.
>
> http://www.gmi.edu/~drussell/Demos/waves/wavemotion.html
> http://www.cbu.edu/~jvarrian/applets/waves1/lontra_g.htm
>
> Jim Lee
>
I personally believe that this is a major part of the problem. The
entire model of how a parabolic reflector, or any other sound apparatus
interacts with sound is generally based on only one view for a good
many. Which is how you get these differences between theory and practice.
Walt
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