How would I wire a speaker to combine two signals?

Question

I was wondering how you would wire up a speaker, in order for it to produce two sound waves simultaneously. Would you be able to connect the speaker to two signal generators, and produce the signals from there?

Answer 1

Yes, of course. But one signal may interfere with the other at various frequencies. This is called phasing. If you have problems like this, try switching leads around from one of them. This may help.

Answer 2

No, that would short the two generators together and cause all sorts of distortion. Plus, signal generators usually don't have enough power to run a speaker.

Run the two generators into an adder, then run the output of the adder into a power amplifier connected to the speaker. The adder can be as simple as two 1000 ohm series resistors, one connected to each generator, and the other two ends connected to the amplifier. You may have to play around a bit to find the best values. 10k might be better in some cases.

Answer 3

you could use a dual coil speaker but the output would be the sum of the two signals.