Starting with Industry News & Developments, Vance Dickason discusses the Total Sonics Total Cal AI Cloud-Based Measurement System, starting with the rebranding story of dbx-tv as Total Sonics, and the launch of itslatest automated in-home audio calibration application for televisions, soundbars, and speakers, which is now part of the Total Sonics suite of tools. Also highlighted are all the numerous new features included in the latest COMSOL Multiphysics release. COMSOL Version 6.2, and specifically its Acoustics Module, includes countless new options and tools of great interest for the loudspeaker industry.
The 2024 edition of our annual Loudspeaker Cone and Dome Manufacturers Directory, carefully compiled by Mike Klasco and Nora Wong, is one of the main features of the February 2024 issue. The scope of this directory incorporates both cone and diaphragm suppliers as well as relevant materials suppliers and component vendors, such as specialized treatments, additives, surrounds, spiders (dampers), tweeter, compression driver, and ribbon diaphragms. Browse this valuable directory of Cone, Diaphragm, and Related Materials Vendors, from North America, Northern China, South China, Thailand, India, and Europe.
And this issue progresses directly to the always-popular Test Bench characterizations by Vance Dickason of the latest speaker drivers made available to global speaker designers. This month, the first device to be characterized is from SEAS' high-end Excel line of transducers, the T29X001. This new SEAS tweeter is a wide surround format type, like the original Vifa DX/XT tweeters, and combines the latest Composite Sound metamodal thin-ply carbon diaphragm (TPCD) technology with the seriously outstanding SEAS Excel radially charged Hexadym motor structure. However, what makes this new SEAS Excel tweeter so special is the engineering of the new Metamodal TPCD diaphragm, making the Norwegian manufacturer effectively the first company in the market to offer the latest generation solution.
Martin Turesson, head of Composite Sound, originally wrote about the metamodal process as applied to diaphragm technology in the February 2022 issue of Voice Coil magazine, and in an article titled "TPCD Technology in Headphones: Engineering to Control Diaphragm Resonances" published in the January 2024 issue of audioXpress. This Test Bench characterization expands on the benefits of controlling resonant break-up modes when comparing the first-generation TPCD cones to the new metamodal TPCD cones. SEAS participated in the early stages of the TPCD metamodal process, and as a result has recently released the first two TPCD metamodal drivers in the industry - the SEAS Excel W16NX005 midbass woofer, and the subject of this explication, the new SEAS Excel T29X001 tweeter.
Features for the T29X001 include a 26mm TPCD metamodal diaphragm with a 5mm wide Sonomex cloth FEA-shaped surround, the patented SEAS Hexadym radially charged neodymium magnet system with a copper pole cap shorting ring, a non-magnetically conducting titanium voice coil former wound with high-temperature copper wire, a damped cast-aluminum rear cavity, and a 6mm thick cast-aluminum faceplate with a directivity-optimized short horn loading. The really important feature of the Hexadym motor structure is that the six radially charged magnets allow for a much larger pole vent than is normal for typical ferrite ring magnet or neo slug/ring motor structures and has significantly less acoustic reflection back into the dome, which seriously enhances the clarity of this device.
The next driver on Test Bench is Eighteen Sound's latest 8NTLS2000 8" high-power handling woofer, for professional audio applications. The 8NTLS2000 represents the latest Tetracoil technology from the brand, maximizing benefits in terms of thermal dissipation and Bl symmetry, making the 8NTLS2000 ideal for small volume subwoofers, high-quality line arrays, and compact multi-way systems. The feature set for the 8NTLS2000 is fairly substantial, starting with the proprietary cast-aluminum frame incorporating eight rectangular vent holes in the area below the spider mounting shelf for enhanced voice coil cooling. This series of cooling vents allows air to move past the voice coil and across the front side of the neodymium motor assembly. Additional cooling is provided by eight peripheral vents located on the top of the black cast-aluminum, motor assembly cup. The cone consists of a straight-edged coated (front only) paper cone and dust cap. Compliance is supplied by a NBR single-roll-type surround and from a cloth type 4.5" diameter elevated spider.
Details of the Eighteen Sound 8NTLS2000 motor design include a neodymium slug magnet structure with a black polished milled and shaped back plate/return cup. The neodymium magnet motor was FEA-designed using two 2" diameter two-layer inside outside interleave voice coils wound with round aluminum wire on a non-conducting glass fiber former for the dual-driver Tetracoil system. Considering all the various cooling features and the 2" Tetracoil inside/outside dual drive voice coils, the rated power handling for this transducer is 350W (700W continuous), making the 8NTLS2000 the highest power handling 8" in the Eighteen Sound line-up.
This issue of Voice Coil is complemented with the usual dose of Industry News, with updates from Klippel, Lavoce, and the Audio & Loudspeaker Technologies International (ALTI) Association.
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