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Originally Posted by Jakeman1086  EDIT: I just realized that .98 inches is quite small compared to the height of 12 inches. Will this result in viscous losses? QRDude gave this value to me when I checked "Auto minimize well width". |
This is still something of an issue for deeper panels.
Most commercial panels are N7's and thus have their well width set by the need for the period width to at least equal the design wavelength. I've not been able to find much in the way of solid info on well widths for higher order panels.
One inch is about the smallest practical size for building. Some sources say this is fine for viscous losses, but none state what depth this is good for.
There was an N43 built by RPG that had 1 inch wide wells, 16 inches deep, but no measurements were forthcoming, and I don't know if it was a commercial or research model. Another site mentioned a 15:1 ratio, but I suspect this is guesswork based on the same diffuser.
QRDude is written using 1 inch as a lower limit, but with the expectation that most panels will be around 6 - 8 inches deep. There is some debate as to whether you need to go much deeper than this in the typical studio environment.
I suspect that for such deeper panels, it would be prudent to make the wells a bit larger.
I currrently have an email in to Trevor Cox, one of the authors of "the bible" on the subject, asking for his opinion on exactly this issue. If need be, his recommendations will be incorporated into a new release of the calculator.