The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom whilst she has a shower or soak**.
The plan: to install a single, but stereo, speaker in the bathroom ceiling
which would be connected to existing stereo system. No controls or high
quality required, just a stereo speaker.
That's where the problems start.
18c house with solid walls.
Bathroom and stereo are both ground floor, separated by 2 single skin brick
walls and a hallway, total distance about 5m.

Possible solutions:
battery powered portable radio/cd. Herself not impressed.

Hardwire from hifi to speaker. Very difficult without going vertically to
loft, across loft and then down to bathroom. There is no way of running
cables via any route from stereo to bathroom otherwise, the way the hall and
stairs are built prohibits this. Cable run from hifi to speaker would be
about 25M and would cause problems in bedroom above stereo.
It would be possible to wire externally but this would not be easy given the
layout of the house etc and is hardly ideal.

Another hifi in bedroom above operated by remote from bathroom. A good
possibility but I have tried a couple of hifi's in this way and the remote
won't work through the ceiling.

Transmit audio wirelessly to speaker. I have googled this for hours and
cannot find a solution. Plenty of ways to transmit from pc to stereo system
but I can find anything to do what I want.
We don't have ipods or similar, just want a speaker (not Bercow) in the
bathroom.
Aside from the physical difficulties of laying wiring, the bathroom has just
been totally rebuilt and the entire upstairs was recarpetted within the last
6 months.
Any access for wiring etc.to the bathroom has to come from the airing
cupboard in the bedroom above.

Many thanks,
Nick.

** before anyone say it, bad planning on my part

Nick wrote:
The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom whilst she has a shower or soak**.
The plan: to install a single, but stereo, speaker in the bathroom ceiling
which would be connected to existing stereo system. No controls or high
quality required, just a stereo speaker.

No Controls. Check.

Hardwire from hifi to speaker. Very difficult without going vertically to
loft, across loft and then down to bathroom. There is no way of running
cables via any route from stereo to bathroom otherwise, the way the hall and
stairs are built prohibits this. Cable run from hifi to speaker would be
about 25M and would cause problems in bedroom above stereo.
It would be possible to wire externally but this would not be easy given the
layout of the house etc and is hardly ideal.


OK, not such a good plan.

Another hifi in bedroom above operated by remote from bathroom. A good
possibility but I have tried a couple of hifi's in this way and the remote
won't work through the ceiling.

I thought you said no controls? This is by far the best solution. If you
*do* want to use a remote then you should use a hard-wired remote
control sender, such as Dinky Link.

http://www.letsautomate.com/index.cf...IRAccessories&

See: http://www.letsautomate.com/12742.cfm? for a receiver

http://www.letsautomate.com/10063.cfm? for an emitter

You will also need cable and a power supply. Give them a call and
they'll help you to get a compatible set of parts.

===

You could also use a radio/wireless remote control extender, but I don't
recommend this for a bathroom as it will be steamy and you will have to
run the power in from outside the bathroom anyway.

===

This is perfect for ceiling mount but they're £86.95 each and I'm not
sure they're water resistant. Better get the cheaper one and replace it
if necessary.

http://www.letsautomate.com/11591.cfm?


===

Finally, you can get them on Ebay as well, but the usual arrangement is
that the gubbins are in the receiver which needs to be powered. Simply
automate will give you a system that can be powered from the emitter end
in the bedroom adjacent to the hifi. Don't buy one for a Sky box as
these use the satellite downlead to transmit the signal.

Nick wrote:
The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to
the radio or cd in the bathroom whilst she has a shower or soak**.
The plan: to install a single, but stereo, speaker in the bathroom
ceiling which would be connected to existing stereo system. No
controls or high quality required, just a stereo speaker.
That's where the problems start.
18c house with solid walls.
Bathroom and stereo are both ground floor, separated by 2 single skin
brick walls and a hallway, total distance about 5m.

Possible solutions:
battery powered portable radio/cd. Herself not impressed.

Hardwire from hifi to speaker. Very difficult without going
vertically to loft, across loft and then down to bathroom. There is
no way of running cables via any route from stereo to bathroom
otherwise, the way the hall and stairs are built prohibits this.
Cable run from hifi to speaker would be about 25M and would cause
problems in bedroom above stereo. It would be possible to wire externally
but this would not be easy
given the layout of the house etc and is hardly ideal.

Another hifi in bedroom above operated by remote from bathroom. A good
possibility but I have tried a couple of hifi's in this way and the
remote won't work through the ceiling.

Transmit audio wirelessly to speaker. I have googled this for hours
and cannot find a solution. Plenty of ways to transmit from pc to
stereo system but I can find anything to do what I want.
We don't have ipods or similar, just want a speaker (not Bercow) in
the bathroom.
Aside from the physical difficulties of laying wiring, the bathroom
has just been totally rebuilt and the entire upstairs was recarpetted
within the last 6 months.
Any access for wiring etc.to the bathroom has to come from the airing
cupboard in the bedroom above.

Just got these wireless speakers last week and they're brilliant
http://tinyurl.com/y49xs6f (link goes to dabs.com).

On 9 May, 18:41, Tim Streater wrote:
In article ,



"Nick" wrote:
The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom whilst she has a shower or soak**.
The plan: to install a single, but stereo, speaker in the bathroom ceiling
which would be connected to existing stereo system. No controls or high
quality required, just a stereo speaker.
That's where the problems start.
18c house with solid walls.
Bathroom and stereo are both ground floor, separated by 2 single skin brick
walls and a hallway, total distance about 5m.

Possible solutions:
battery powered portable radio/cd. Herself not impressed.

Hardwire from hifi to speaker. Very difficult without going vertically to
loft, across loft and then down to bathroom. There is no way of running
cables via any route from stereo to bathroom otherwise, the way the hall and
stairs are built prohibits this. Cable run from hifi to speaker would be
about 25M and would cause problems in bedroom above stereo.
It would be possible to wire externally but this would not be easy given the
layout of the house etc and is hardly ideal.

Another hifi in bedroom above operated by remote from bathroom. A good
possibility but I have tried a couple of hifi's in this way and the remote
won't work through the ceiling.

Transmit audio wirelessly to speaker. I have googled this for hours and
cannot find a solution. Plenty of ways to transmit from pc to stereo system
but I can find anything to do what I want.

I can't see how this is going to work. It's one thing to transmit signal
wirelessly, power is another thing altogether.

From your computer to a stereo system you're only talking about
milliwatts of RF power, if that. Any audio speaker is driven by whole
watts (look up the power output of your stereo system). If you want your
speaker to receive (say) a watt of RF power, you're gonna have to
broadcast some hundreds of watts, I would have thought, since the
speaker is only going to receive a small fraction of what is broadcast.

You'll need a substantial transmitter and a transmitting licence.

--
Tim

"That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed,
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted" -- Bill of Rights 1689

reminds me of a tale I heard years ago about some "inventor" who took
some microwave powered cordless speakers in to try and sell the idea I
think to KEF or Marshall ...anyway allegedly they were powered by
microwave transmissions along which the audio was somehow encoded too
- apparently he was the only one who would stay in the room when they
were turned on.....

JimK

On May 9, 4:55*pm, "Nick" wrote:
The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom whilst she has a shower or soak**.
The plan: to install a single, but stereo, speaker in the bathroom ceiling
which would be connected to existing stereo system. No controls or high
quality required, just a stereo speaker.
That's where the problems start.
18c house with solid walls.
Bathroom and stereo are both ground floor, separated by 2 single skin brick
walls and a hallway, total distance about 5m.

Possible solutions:
battery powered portable radio/cd. Herself not impressed.

Hardwire from hifi to speaker. Very difficult without going vertically to
loft, across loft and then down to bathroom. There is no way of running
cables via any route from stereo to bathroom otherwise, the way the hall and
stairs are built prohibits this. Cable run from hifi to speaker would be
about 25M and would cause problems in bedroom above stereo.
It would be possible to wire externally but this would not be easy given the
layout of the house etc and is hardly ideal.

Another hifi in bedroom above operated by remote from bathroom. A good
possibility but I have tried a couple of hifi's in this way and the remote
won't work through the ceiling.

Transmit audio wirelessly to speaker. I have googled this for hours and
cannot find a solution. Plenty of ways to transmit from pc to stereo system
but I can find anything to do what I want.
We don't have ipods or similar, just want a speaker (not Bercow) in the
bathroom.
Aside from the physical difficulties of laying wiring, the bathroom has just
been totally rebuilt and the entire upstairs was recarpetted within the last
6 months.
Any access for wiring etc.to the bathroom has to come from the airing
cupboard in the bedroom above.

Many thanks,
Nick.

** before anyone say it, bad planning on my part

As has been explained, the receiver needs either its own power or
wired connection to the audio signal. Can't get round the basic laws
of physics there.

I havent seen the exact layout, but it sounds like a typical ideal
appliaction for enamelled copper wire. This wire is - or can be - so
thin that it can be run all sorts of places without being noticed,
even in plain sight.

http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...elled_Coppe r


NT

On 9 May, 16:55, "Nick" wrote:

Transmit audio wirelessly to speaker.

Not really practical. Your hifi consists of a sound source (tuner /
MP3 / CD), power amplifier and then speakers. As the amplifier uses a
moderate amout of power, then you either have to supply mains to it,
or feed it batteries. There's no way to drive the speakers alone by
wireless, as they need that amplified signal and that's too much power
to send by wireless, unless you're Nikola Tesla. "Speakers that don't
need amplifiers" still have an amp, it's just hidden in the same box
(and thus needs a power supply to it).

You can broadcast the low power signal wirelessly, but there's not
much point as it doesn't solve the problem of the high power
connection.

On the whole, I'd go for a radio / MP3 player in the bathroom with
battery powered speakers. These cost tuppence ha'penny these days and
work pretty well. So long as it uses D cells, not AA, and you get some
NiMH rechargeables, then it's workable and has a good battery life.
It's not as if you need much volume in a bathroom.

If you want media streaming from a home media server, then a Nokia 770
is a simple cheap client device for this. Ours have survived bathroom
use.

On 10 May, 11:40, Andy Dingley wrote:
On 9 May, 16:55, "Nick" wrote:

Transmit audio wirelessly to speaker.

Not really practical. Your hifi consists of a sound source (tuner /
MP3 / CD), power amplifier and then speakers. As the amplifier uses a
moderate amout of power, then you either have to supply mains to it,
or feed it batteries. There's no way to drive the speakers alone by
wireless, as they need that amplified signal and that's too much power
to send by wireless, unless you're Nikola Tesla. "Speakers that don't
need amplifiers" still have an amp, it's just hidden in the same box
(and thus needs a power supply to it).

You can broadcast the low power signal wirelessly, but there's not
much point as it doesn't solve the problem of the high power
connection.

On the whole, I'd go for a radio / MP3 player in the bathroom with
battery powered speakers. These cost tuppence ha'penny these days and
work pretty well. So long as it uses D cells, not AA, and you get some
NiMH rechargeables, then it's workable and has a good battery life.
It's not as if you need much volume in a bathroom.

If you want media streaming from a home media server, then a Nokia 770
is a simple cheap client device for this. Ours have survived bathroom
use.

interesting - but what's the sound quality like?

Cheers
JimK

On 10 May, 13:53, JimK wrote:

If you want media streaming from a home media server, then a Nokia 770
is a simple cheap client device for this. Ours have survived bathroom
use.

interesting - but what's the sound quality like?

Depends on the speakers - I was doing this with some cheap battery-
boosted active speakers fed a signal from the headphone jack, so bass
would be pathetic (speaker size) but the Nokia's sound quality is
generally reasonable. As a handheld client for media streaming over
domestic WiFi, it's fine.

In article 1b4fdb3a-8dcb-44b4-b1d1-cc91e50d8c33
@l31g2000yqm.googlegroups.com, "NT" wrote:



As has been explained, the receiver needs either its own power or
wired connection to the audio signal. Can't get round the basic laws
of physics there.

Including Ohm's law, which hasn't been considered in the following :-)

I havent seen the exact layout, but it sounds like a typical ideal
appliaction for enamelled copper wire. This wire is - or can be - so
thin that it can be run all sorts of places without being noticed,
even in plain sight.

http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...elled_Coppe r

But speaker signals are typically low voltage high current. This
requires cables that are somewhat thicker than "thin" enamelled copper
wire, especially over a long distance. The voltage drop across even a
moderate length would kill any power appearing at the low resistance
speaker coil. Additionally, bare enamelled copper wire is not suitable
for applications where there is likely to be any mechanical rubbing of
the wires

The OP could look at installing a 100v line speaker system, but that
will require a suitable amplifier output to drive the 100v signal

--
John W
I you want to mail me, replace the obvious with co.uk twice

On May 10, 5:06*pm, John Weston wrote:
In article 1b4fdb3a-8dcb-44b4-b1d1-cc91e50d8c33
@l31g2000yqm.googlegroups.com, "NT" wrote:

As has been explained, the receiver needs either its own power or
wired connection to the audio signal. Can't get round the basic laws
of physics there.

Including Ohm's law, which hasn't been considered in the following :-)

I havent seen the exact layout, but it sounds like a typical ideal
appliaction for enamelled copper wire. This wire is - or can be - so
thin that it can be run all sorts of places without being noticed,
even in plain sight.

http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...iring#Enamelle....

But speaker signals are typically low voltage high current. This
requires cables that are somewhat thicker than "thin" enamelled copper
wire, especially over a long distance. The voltage drop across even a
moderate length would kill any power appearing at the low resistance
speaker coil.

0.35mm^2 copper wire is apx 0.14 ohm per metre. 20m of that is under 3
ohms, which is fine for an 8 ohm bathroom speaker.


*Additionally, bare enamelled copper wire is not suitable
for applications where there is likely to be any mechanical rubbing of
the wires

its fine for this app. The amount of rubbing it encounters in such use
is minimal. I've used enamelled copper like this for years.



The OP could look at installing a 100v line speaker system, but that
will require a suitable amplifier output to drive the 100v signal

any audio amplifier can drive a 100v line transformer. But there's not
much point in this case.


NT

NT wrote:
On May 10, 5:06 pm, John Weston wrote:
In article 1b4fdb3a-8dcb-44b4-b1d1-cc91e50d8c33
@l31g2000yqm.googlegroups.com, "NT" wrote:

As has been explained, the receiver needs either its own power or
wired connection to the audio signal. Can't get round the basic laws
of physics there.
Including Ohm's law, which hasn't been considered in the following :-)

I havent seen the exact layout, but it sounds like a typical ideal
appliaction for enamelled copper wire. This wire is - or can be - so
thin that it can be run all sorts of places without being noticed,
even in plain sight.
http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...iring#Enamelle...
But speaker signals are typically low voltage high current. This
requires cables that are somewhat thicker than "thin" enamelled copper
wire, especially over a long distance. The voltage drop across even a
moderate length would kill any power appearing at the low resistance
speaker coil.

0.35mm^2 copper wire is apx 0.14 ohm per metre. 20m of that is under 3
ohms, which is fine for an 8 ohm bathroom speaker.


If you dont mind a fairly nasty bass resonance I suppose it is, yes.

Far better to run '100V line' systems.

Additionally, bare enamelled copper wire is not suitable
for applications where there is likely to be any mechanical rubbing of
the wires

its fine for this app. The amount of rubbing it encounters in such use
is minimal. I've used enamelled copper like this for years.


Gawd save us!



The OP could look at installing a 100v line speaker system, but that
will require a suitable amplifier output to drive the 100v signal

any audio amplifier can drive a 100v line transformer. But there's not
much point in this case.



Well the fact that you don't understand that, says it all, really.


NT

On May 10, 8:51*pm, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
NT wrote:
On May 10, 5:06 pm, John Weston wrote:
In article 1b4fdb3a-8dcb-44b4-b1d1-cc91e50d8c33
@l31g2000yqm.googlegroups.com, "NT" wrote:

As has been explained, the receiver needs either its own power or
wired connection to the audio signal. Can't get round the basic laws
of physics there.
Including Ohm's law, which hasn't been considered in the following :-)

I havent seen the exact layout, but it sounds like a typical ideal
appliaction for enamelled copper wire. This wire is - or can be - so
thin that it can be run all sorts of places without being noticed,
even in plain sight.
http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...iring#Enamelle...
But speaker signals are typically low voltage high current. This
requires cables that are somewhat thicker than "thin" enamelled copper
wire, especially over a long distance. The voltage drop across even a
moderate length would kill any power appearing at the low resistance
speaker coil.

0.35mm^2 copper wire is apx 0.14 ohm per metre. 20m of that is under 3
ohms, which is fine for an 8 ohm bathroom speaker.

If you dont mind a fairly nasty bass resonance I suppose it is, yes.

I had a feeling the old bass myths would be wheeled out. In practice
the effect on bass response is small.


Far better to run '100V line' systems.

*Additionally, bare enamelled copper wire is not suitable
for applications where there is likely to be any mechanical rubbing of
the wires

its fine for this app. The amount of rubbing it encounters in such use
is minimal. I've used enamelled copper like this for years.

Gawd save us!

works perfectly satisfactorily

There are cases for going 100v line, but this isnt one of them.


NT

On Mon, 10 May 2010 17:59:03 -0700 (PDT), NT wrote:

I had a feeling the old bass myths would be wheeled out. In practice
the effect on bass response is small.

The aonly adjustment I have ever made to a HiFi that made any real
difference was swapping speaker cable from "72 strand" of probably
less than 1mm^2 to "1024 strand" of 2.5mm^2. There was a noticeable
improvement to the bass end. Mind you this was proper HiFi, 12" paper
cone bass drivers and 100W RMS per channel turned up to "a decent
level". B-)

I doubt that "thin wire" would be particuarly noticeable with a tiny
speaker and low power.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On May 12, 12:56*pm, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
On Mon, 10 May 2010 17:59:03 -0700 (PDT), NT wrote:
I had a feeling the old bass myths would be wheeled out. In practice
the effect on bass response is small.

The aonly adjustment I have ever made to a HiFi that made any real
difference was swapping speaker cable from "72 strand" of probably
less than 1mm^2 to "1024 strand" of 2.5mm^2. There was a noticeable
improvement to the bass end. Mind you this was proper HiFi, 12" paper
cone bass drivers and 100W RMS per channel turned up to "a decent
level". *B-)

I doubt that "thin wire" would be particuarly noticeable with a tiny
speaker and low power.


Yes, quite. There is a myth that modern speakers are heavily damped by
amplifiers, but in fact moving coil speakers have a coil resistance
that's in the ballpark of half their impedance, so only a little
electrical damping is possible when being driven by a voltage source,
as virtually all modern amps are. In reality what damping is present
in modern speakers comes mainly from air resistance, speaker
suspension and their being stuck in small boxes. And finally, complete
damping is undesirable, hence all consumer amps are voltage source
amps, not current source ones. These are why adding 3 ohms to a modern
8 ohm speaker makes minimal difference. With a small speaker in a
bathroom its just not an issue.


NT

"Dave Liquorice" wrote in message
ll.co.uk...


The aonly adjustment I have ever made to a HiFi that made any real
difference was swapping speaker cable from "72 strand" of probably
less than 1mm^2 to "1024 strand" of 2.5mm^2. There was a noticeable
improvement to the bass end. Mind you this was proper HiFi, 12" paper
cone bass drivers and 100W RMS per channel turned up to "a decent
level". B-)

Yes but 4mm twin and earth is even better for speakers if you can bend it to
fit.
I had some 10mm multi strand stuff as used in power distribution for
exchanges and that was even better.

Nick wrote:

The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom

How about a lightspeaker?

http://www.klipsch.com/na-en/product...aker-overview/

On May 13, 8:41*am, Andy Burns wrote:
Nick wrote:
The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom

How about a lightspeaker?

http://www.klipsch.com/na-en/product...aker-overview/

2.5" speaker, nasty


NT

On May 13, 12:08*pm, Tim Streater wrote:
In article
,

*NT wrote:
On May 13, 8:41*am, Andy Burns wrote:
Nick wrote:
The problem: my better half has decided it would be nice to listen to the
radio or cd in the bathroom

How about a lightspeaker?

http://www.klipsch.com/na-en/product...aker-overview/

2.5" speaker, nasty

Yes, acoustically it's gonna be rubbish, but it depends on the
individual as to whether that matters.

Funny thing is they could have fitted something much bigger in it,
LEDs dont mind vibration


NT