Kevlar, Aerogel, Carbon Fibre, Paper - Which is the best ?

[Fanuc]

Hello,

I may be interested in buying some 6 1/2" drivers and some large bass drivers. In you honest opinion what cone material sounds the best from what you have heard or have had experience with? Assume the paramaters are the same pretty much except the matieral. Obviously the box design is important, there is no question about that.

Kevlar, Aerogel, Carbon Fibre, Paper ?

And obviously some may be better than other for bass or midrange duties. Plus there's them metal types (is it aluminium) i have seen for bass drivers.

What is best?

Opinions are invited.

Kevin

[Fanuc]

I have read that some british manufacturers of speakers use the same cone matieral for bass and bass/midrange or midrange drivers to keep tonal coherency/similiarity. If you know what i mean.

[DaveCan]

IMO <----- it's always gotta be paper Some of the highest regarded drivers from the good ol days and even now are made of paper, and/ or recipes containing paper etc.. Most live performances use paper, my Marshall used paper, my line6 uses paper.. Most live music has the audience hearing paper ,and the musicians themselves hearing from paper etc.. Not sure my Marshall would of sounded so great with 4-12'' Celestion's made of Kevlar or other etc, or my Line6 for that matter..

Dave

[nickmckinney]

For a 6.5" Kapok

[DaveCan]

Originally posted by nickmckinney
For a 6.5" Kapok

Never heard it, but that 6.5 would definitely be worth taking a look at ..

Dave

[cuibono]

A 2007 EAS paper by Marshal Buck showed how paper cones suffer from greater thermal compression compared to aluminum cones (I don't have it in front of me now to get all the details). My guess is each material has its ups and downs, and the best really depends on your application and willingness to explore all the details...

[gainphile]

I don't think there is a "blanket" answer. There will be good paper drivers and bad paper drivers. Same with aluminium, kevlar, etc.

Better to see zaph's or SL's test to find out what their distortion, burst response etc. are.

This is a good read on the material topic:
http://www.nutshellhifi.com/library/...r-design2.html

Some designers like SL does not seem to care what the materials are as long as the test proves them ok.

[Moondog55]

I tend to agree with Gainphile, each driver needs to be evaluated on merit, and its ability to meld with the rest of the drivers and produce a coherent whole.

General opinion seems to be that the Audax "Aerogel" line of drivers had the lower levels of inherent faults and were easy to work with, I have some Kevlar sub-woofers the sound simply awful if allowed to play above 80Hz, the best sounding drivers I own ( that is no obvious colouration of their own) are some treated paper cones from Tandy/Radio-Shack that are stiffer than Aerogel and lighter but unfortunately Unobtainium now

[Fanuc]

Thanks for the replies guys. Good link.

Originally posted by gainphile
I don't think there is a "blanket" answer. There will be good paper drivers and bad paper drivers. Same with aluminium, kevlar, etc.

Better to see zaph's or SL's test to find out what their distortion, burst response etc. are.

This is a good read on the material topic:
http://www.nutshellhifi.com/library/...r-design2.html

Some designers like SL does not seem to care what the materials are as long as the test proves them ok.

[jupiterjune]

Hello David-

There is no one right answer here. I really like metal coned drivers, but absolutely not in 6.5 inch in diameter. 3" max for metal cones.

Beyond that, I am really partial to mineral damped PP cones.

But I think it comes down to how well the driver is made and your personal tastes. Surely a well made paper driver is going to sound better than damped PP if there is some design flaw in the PP driver.

JJ