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Ribbon tweeters

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Category: General
Forum Name: Newbie Discussion
Forum Description: Newbie Discussion/Questions. Look less stupid here...
URL: https://forum.speakerplans.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=104459
Printed Date: 28 March 2024 at 10:46pm
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Topic: Ribbon tweeters
Posted By: Radius
Subject: Ribbon tweeters
Date Posted: 04 November 2019 at 3:27pm
Just a dumb question- I've seen a few ribbon tweeters are available, and they re meant to be less harsh than compression horns, yet I don't see anyone designing cabs for them...any reason why that is ?

Cheers !



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AKA the typo king...bear with me, my hands are big and the keyboard small....



Replies:
Posted By: csg
Date Posted: 04 November 2019 at 6:10pm
personally i find them much harsher sounding than a good comp driver on a good flare - very glassy sounding generally.

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“The fact is this is about identifying what we do best and finding more ways of doing less of it better”


Posted By: Elliot Thompson
Date Posted: 04 November 2019 at 8:47pm
The majority of Ribbon Tweeters are not very efficient and, offer a low impedance load. Many try to use Ribbons below 5 kHz which, only the large diaphragm models are capable of. Peavey is the only company I know that offers a Full range cabinet with a Ribbon Tweeter. It is however, their own proprietary design.   Raal is the only company to my knowledge that manufactures Ribbon tweeters that would fit our needs (high efficiency/high power). Raal focuses their designs to the Home Audio market however, their Ribbon Tweeters would fit right in the Pro Audio world if, you are willing to make the investment.


Best Regards,    


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Elliot Thompson


Posted By: Radius
Date Posted: 04 November 2019 at 9:57pm
Thanks for the great replies, I think I'll stick to tried and tested when the time comes 😂

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AKA the typo king...bear with me, my hands are big and the keyboard small....


Posted By: Conanski
Date Posted: 04 November 2019 at 11:32pm
Originally posted by Elliot Thompson Elliot Thompson wrote:

Peavey is the only company I know that offers a Full range cabinet with a Ribbon Tweeter. 


Peavey has ribbons in both a 2-way trap series(RBN) and a line array module(Versarray) and in both cases the drivers have a bit of a reputation for being somewhat fragile.


Posted By: Elliot Thompson
Date Posted: 05 November 2019 at 1:12am
Originally posted by Conanski Conanski wrote:

Originally posted by Elliot Thompson Elliot Thompson wrote:

Peavey is the only company I know that offers a Full range cabinet with a Ribbon Tweeter. 


Peavey has ribbons in both a 2-way trap series(RBN) and a line array module(Versarray) and in both cases the drivers have a bit of a reputation for being somewhat fragile.


I would imagine that is due to the user trying to force the Ribbon tweeter to play like a Compression driver. Moving from a Compression driver to a Ribbon Tweeter will play significant difference in the sound within the 1.5 kHz - 3 kHz region. A Ribbon will definitely struggle under those frequencies whereas, a Compression driver will excel.

 

Best Regards,



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Elliot Thompson


Posted By: bob4
Date Posted: 05 November 2019 at 8:00am
Stage Accompany in Holland has been manufacturing Touring grade systems with ribbln drivers for more than 25 years.......
Then there is also Alcons Audio, which is afaik also related to Stage Accompany. In Germany there is the Heil air motion ribbon transducer


Posted By: toastyghost
Date Posted: 05 November 2019 at 8:43am
Originally posted by bob4 bob4 wrote:

Stage Accompany in Holland has been manufacturing Touring grade systems with ribbln drivers for more than 25 years.......
Then there is also Alcons Audio, which is afaik also related to Stage Accompany. In Germany there is the Heil air motion ribbon transducer


And Mundorf for pro ribbons. And Beyma and others with AMT.


Posted By: Bams
Date Posted: 05 November 2019 at 10:57am
The story of alcons and stage accompany is rather interwined; SA teamed up with Philips in the mid-eighties and was sort of a powerhouse during the heyday of clubs in the benelux during 1985-1995. the company always struggled marketing the promises of the ribbon driver and used it to the maximum powerhandling and frequency, must clubs used a 5" ribbon playing down to 200hz or so.... 

the engineers took over went SA went bust (it did quite a few times incorporating the touring rig of Prince disappearing overnight at one point) and started Alcons. 

Alcons now uses ribbons up to 18" but they indeed sound "different" when compared to compression drivers, smoother and less "ballsy" so they frequently end up in concerthalls and cinema and a lot less times in clubs and venues; trying to emulate the sound of a compression driver using a ribbon mostly ends up badly; schreeching and all. due to the nature of the sound it also is percieved quiter, 
It really is an acquired taste.  I like both; for oldskool raving i prefer a good load of Floodlight, But a singer-songwriter in a pub which is miked properly using a decent ribbon rig is a delight. 


Posted By: Radius
Date Posted: 08 November 2019 at 11:42am
Thanks guys- very useful info !!!

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AKA the typo king...bear with me, my hands are big and the keyboard small....


Posted By: Bams
Date Posted: 08 November 2019 at 1:08pm
sorry for the Hijack... but speaking of SA...  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H9UnadGv6E" rel="nofollow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H9UnadGv6E

Concert of Vangelis in the harbour of Rotterdam using Clay paky Goldenscans on OSKA controllers and a huuuuuuuuuge amount of SA Blue boxes and sharks with friggin'lasers on their heads and 48 radiotransmitters instead of a multicore to FOH and on and on... well...."if we stack 48 speakers on top of eachother using 60/40 horns in the end it will couple and beam over 150m of water....." NOT...... 
During soundcheck Vangelis unleashed some harmonics wrecking 24 blue boxes in a mere second... not the best day for SA :) Due to all the troubles in the end it was 90% playback.... 

At that point Martin Point source systems were readily available but the european grants for the show were about engineering so every wheel was reinvented in a rather poor way. 
as a 12-year old boy i was glued onto the tv-screen for the performance nonetheless.... 


Posted By: Contour
Date Posted: 08 November 2019 at 3:52pm
I think SA in the end used a huge hidden stack of w-bins to get the bass part properly done. 



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