Early, it is my money and my time. I am not trying to convince anyone to do anything my way. I am interested as I stated earlier in what artifacts or anomalies I can expect by deviating from the norm. If I know what I might expect, I will look & listen for them.
But if all I see is folks saying this shouldn't be done because it may cause premature amp failure, or the loading of the drivers will cause some indeterminate audible anomaly, why should I not do what I want? The worst that could happen is I find why putting the amps on the back is a bad move. I then share that information, and idiots like me in the future will have concrete ideas as to what to expect should they try this. The best I can hope for is that it has little or no impact, and then it gives options to folks that read my posts.
Mike, I may be way off base here but at the wave lengths that we are talking about when dealing with < 100 Hz, having something that close blocking part of the opening would have little impact.
Sometime real soon I will pull the amps off, which I need to do to move them up to the middle anyway. When I do I will run an REW analysis with them off. I will then put the amps in the middle, and run the same analysis. Will this make everyone happy? Beware I am using the USB microphone from the Emotiva XMC-1 because my notebook does not have a microphone in jack. If someone has a calibration file for that microphone I would love to have it. I will be taking the measurements from my listening position about 12-13' from the speakers and will do 0-200 hz.
If anyone is in SE Florida and wants to join in the fun, PM me.