This issue of Voice Coil opens with an overview by Vance Dickason of the latest speaker drivers presented at recent trade shows, including the High End Show in Munich. In Industry News & Developments, our readers will find information about the latest offerings from Scan-Speak, Lavoce Italiana, and Acustica Beyma.
This July issue of Voice Coil traditionally focuses on Adhesives, Coatings, and Treatments, and readers will find a Focus article on New Thin-Film Technologies for Coatings and Treatments, written by Mike Klasco (with support from Dave Lindberg), which provides a valuable overview of the latest solutions that are available in the market. Highlights include a new a state-of-the-art REACH-compliant CVD coating process from Oerlikon Surface Solutions (www.oerlikon.com), applicable on multiple substrates, such as aluminum, titanium, PEEK, and composites, and Nanovate, a metallurgical nano-coating technology based on electrodeposited nano crystalline structural metal from Integran (www.integran.com). The report also highlights Antiviral/Antimicrobial Coatings from Integran, Kastus Technologies, and Nanowatt, among others.
This update is complemented with the mandatory directory of Adhesives, Coatings, Sealants, High-Tech Thin Films, Converters, and Dispensing Equipment, compiled by Mike Klasco and Nora Wong (Menlo Scientific). The updated directory was expanded to include vendors of performance enhancing treatments for UV-resistance, hydrophobic (water), oleophobic (sweat), corrosion, detergents, and fungus to anti-microbial treatments. Our readers will find specific sections for Supplies and Dispensers.
In this month's Acoustic Patents column, James Croft returns with a fresh review of a "Low Profile Loudspeaker Device," which is effectively the first exploring of patents claimed and granted to Mattias and Timothy Scheek (The Netherlands), on behalf of Mayht Holding B.V. Our readers will recognize the name from the April 2022 announcement of the acquisition by Sonos of Mayht Holding BV, for "$100 million in existing cash on hand.” Croft was following the company with interest given the company's bold claims and promotional announcements and decided it was time to share his thoughts.
Having followed their work through a number of patent publications, Mayht's technology triggered Croft's curiosity, for its unconventional structural designs, appearing to represent fresh thinking. As Croft writes, "As I continued to follow the patent trail, combined with reading the promotional disclosures, the claims that the company was making were quite bold. Not only were the claims suggesting incremental advancements in one or two parameters, some claims were orders of magnitude improvements over the current state of the art in nearly every significant category." Read the first of his reviews.
Voice Coil July also features a rich dose of Test Bench characterizations by Vance Dickason. Starting with the recent 38WE/8582T00 15" Ellipticor woofer from Scan-Speak using the company's proven oval/elliptical design topology. Having already characterized a number of Scan-Speak Ellipticor drivers since 2018, Dickason notes that as with the 18WE and the 21WE Ellipticor woofers, the 38WE is a seriously feature rich transducer, starting with a nicely configured 10-spoke (five double spokes) cast-aluminum frame and a completely open area below the suspended spider mounting shelf for effective cooling of the motor and voice coil. The motor design for the Ellipticor 38WE is similar to the other Ellipticor woofer designs and is also a Symmetrical Drive (SD) AirCirc multi-magnet design with neodymium slugs even more spaced for improved convection cooling capability. FEA designed, the magnet motor uses an elliptical two-layer voice coil wound with round copper wire on a titanium former. For the cone assembly, Scan-Speak chose a rather stiff black-coated paper cone with a pleated coated cloth surround and a flat coated cloth spider. Like all the Ellipticor line-up, the 38WE has a magnetically attached black anodized aluminum trim ring that can obviously be custom anodized in a variety of colors.
The second driver characterized in Test Bench is from Norwegian high-end loudspeaker stalwart SEAS, this time with its W15CH001 5.25" Excel Midwoofer, which Dickason considers to be one the most highly inventive and innovative out-of-box Hexadym Motor design from SEAS. Even though this is not a new driver from the company, this Test Bench is a very special characterization, where Dickson details all that is unique in this midwoofer design and its historical motivations, helping to solve the problem of reflections off the motor system and frame of a woofer back into the cone. The problem that motivated SEAS' engineers to develop its patented Hexadym radially charged magnetic motor structure - US Patent 6,020,805 (filed in December 1998 and granted in December 2000). A fascinating exploration with complete measurements.
As usual, this July issue of Voice Coil concludes with the Industry Watch section. This edition of Voice Coil is available for download and already in the mail to print subscribers. Subscribers can go to - www.gotomyvcoil.com - to download this issue.
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