Let's talk Tweeters!

Gents,

I agree, it's impossible not to discuss brands entirely, especially when a technology is entirely proprietary like MBL seems to.

I would like to focus on the technology and trade-offs. The post by @prof reads identical to an MBL speaker review. I'm sure it is well intentioned, but I'd like to discourage them in this thread, other threads may of course be started by anyone.

As mentioned, here are my guiding principles:

Stay focused on tweeters and their manufacturers (when known)

Discuss the technology, materials, construction, and trade-offs

Discuss comparisons to other similar and dissimilar tweeters

We will sometimes have to mention specific speaker brands, it is inevitable, but if we make speaker reviews common in this thread it destroys its focus. I really want to avoid this thread becoming "Speakers with good tweeters"

Ultimately of course, this is a group effort, so the contributions are what make a good thread, I just hope we maintain the purpose and add in the spirit of discussing technology and value.

Best,

E

@prof
Maybe I missed it, but in your original posting there was nothing about the technology. I only saw subjective opinions.

Also, no reason why you can’t mention it in comparison, in fact I would like you to. :) Let’s talk materials, operating principles. How does the motor work? How does it measure? What about room tuning and placement?

Of course, it is also impossible to take a tweeter out of the context of an entire speaker. However, I really want us to discuss trade-offs, benefits, costs of the technology.

"Brand X makes the most realistic speakers I’ve ever heard" doesn’t enable that type of discussion, and there are plenty of those threads around.

Look forward to talking about how the MBL drivers work, and even how the tweet is different from their woofers, etc.


Best,

E

erik,

I made my comments in regards to the tweeters used in the speakers I mentioned, and how I perceived their effect.

Do I understand then that you are looking only for technical contributions?  Maybe this is more of a DIY speaker builder discussion thread?

ATC have built their own tweeter in the last five years. Previously they used Excel and before that Vifa and before that Audax (40+ years of pro audio) 

It took many years years to develop and they regard Excel tweeters as extremely good - so improving upon that was difficult.

The ATC dome tweeter looks much like any fabric dome tweeter however it has NO Ferrofluid and had to be made with extremely tight tolerances in order to dissipate heat (large ATC are intended to play at realistic levels of real instruments like a drum set). A dual spider was necessary to avoid rocking motion which is a challenge in all dome tweeters due to their small size and why the majority use Ferrofluid.

Ferrofluid is not bad but it does dry out with time and changes the response and eventual reliability.

ATC like doped fabric domes and pulp paper or constrained layer damping type approaches to cones or domes. This is because these materials are intrinsically damped and therefore do not "ring" or affect the timbre of the sound reproduced as much as rigid materials. (Of course break up can be issue with softer materials and therefore expensive motors and large voice coils are needed which makes the transducer units overall extremely costly) 

I am not sure if it will ever be made available to the general market and other speaker manufacturers like other ATC drivers.