The Whole Truth About Beryllium Diaphragms

[DcibeL]

I think most people who buy Be or diamond diaphragm speakers are paying a huge price premium just so they can tell their friends that they have some very exotic Be or diamond speaker. It's too bad there have been some false claims made by manufacturers to make a few bucks because people do buy into Be just because it's Be.

Originally posted by soongsc
The fact is, as long as you have a strong breakup mode below 50KHz, you are most likely going to have harsh sound.

Fact? Soongsc, can you point me to some measurements or some data that could help prove your point? How can aluminum 1" tweeter with breakup at 25-30kHz have harsh sound? We don't hear the breakup, and for any harmonic distortion that propagates lower in frequency, the harmonic occurs at the breakup frequency which is above audible range. I don't see why the breakup must be above 50kHz, for me as long as it is above audible range there is no problem.

[rdf]

Originally posted by mowry
The file was written with MS WORD 2000 SP-3.

While OpenOffice has it built in, you might consider a PDF print driver such as CutePDF. The resultant file is (for most) read-only and also significantly smaller than DOC. Thx for the article too.

[gedlee]

Hey Steve

I read your paper, but it was not immediately apparent what the point was. That people in audio streeeeeetch the truth to the point of lies? Whats new about that?

[DcibeL]

Originally posted by gedlee
I read your paper, but it was not immediately apparent what the point was. That people in audio streeeeeetch the truth to the point of lies? Whats new about that?

Moreover, Steve worked for Bose, so he should know all about that!

I kid...

[mowry]

Originally posted by gedlee
Hey Steve

I read your paper, but it was not immediately apparent what the point was. That people in audio streeeeeetch the truth to the point of lies? Whats new about that?

Earl,

Well that's part of my point. Mike Klasco wrote about this problem in 2004. At that time, the analysis revealed zero berillium. In 2007, new analysis indicated 6075 mg/kg or 6075 parts per million. No matter how one dances with that, it's still Bogusium today.

[augerpro]

Originally posted by mowry
Guys,

Why not write to these folks at Usher Audio and ask them what's up?
Then you can better understand why they call em Dancers.

Why ask them if they aren't credible so far? I'm asking YOU what diaphragm you think they were using that is grey, yet sourced from SONIC, which uses 98% copper and is copper colored? I'm genuinely interested.

[mowry]

Here's the SONIC material test report, 6075 mg/kg or ppm Be or 0.6075% Be by mass. Titanium is 88.47%.

www.s-m-audio.com/grayfoil.pdf

[DcibeL]

While the company may have mislead us by stating the material is Be, Titanium can surely still make for a good diaphragm.

I remember saying this in another thread, may have even been a thread about Be, but it is not so much the material of the diaphragm that makes one speaker better than another, but how that material is implemented into the design. The result of all the components of a loudspeaker dictates it's performance. That said, paper cones are made of a hundred different things, and we are lucky to be told that it is anything other than "paper" by the manufacturer. I think we should be happy that the manufacturer's tell us anything about the materials used. We seem to be perfectly fine with knowing that a diaphragm is "paper", should we not be equally as happy to know that a diaphragm is "metal"?

[augerpro]

Originally posted by mowry
Here's the SONIC material test report, 6075 mg/kg or ppm Be or 0.6075% Be by mass. Titanium is 88.47%.

www.s-m-audio.com/grayfoil.pdf

Haha that's terrible. I suppose they figured the copper color was a dead giveaway so use Ti to get that gray color.

[ZilchLab]

Originally posted by DcibeL
I think we should be happy that the manufacturer's tell us anything about the materials used. We seem to be perfectly fine with knowing that a diaphragm is "paper", should we not be equally as happy to know that a diaphragm is "metal"?

I believe it's called "Fraud."

p.s.: I'll not be coming to your restaurant, ordering the Filet Mignon, and be satisfied with you serving meat and meat byproducts instead, even though dog food may be equally nutritious....