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A few years ago playing with my favorite Vitavox S2 driver I was asking myself how it might sound if instead of the Alnico magnet the electromagnets would be used. As many other driver of the period the Vitavox did not utilized the only one magnet type. There was at least 3-4 different Alnico composition and they all sounded quite different. Still, I was always wondering how Vitavox S2 might sound it gap would be magnetized with a field coil or with the combination of a permanent magnet and electromagnet. One of the objective of my was to deal with Vitavox S2 upper frequency idiosyncrasy (people who use the S2 within the better setups know what I am talking about) I hope that the electromagnets might change the certain ways the Vitavox S2 behaves at the very top as my experiments with electromagnets in past suggested me that from this perspective the electromagnet could be a fruitful direction

In my past I spent quite some time with Telefunkens, Supravox and Klangfilms electromagnet drivers and although I did not fide them interesting I always noted that they behave very different when they were stressed. The drivers responded with dynamics but they at the same time went to some kind of very interesting softness. The harder I drove them the softer they responded… very interesting… and when they entered into distortion the did it very gently and very not annoying… All the rest “glorified” characteristics of the electromagnets driver do not exist; at least I was not able to recognize them. What I mean that the better or worst characteristics do exist but they are the properties of the specific driver and have no explicit relation to the fact that the driver magnetized by a field coil.

It is virtually imposable to talk with audio people about field coils. When the audio morons hear a field coil driver they instantaneously dive into the intellectual coma and begin come up with absolutely ridicules explanations and justifications of what they are hearing… regardless of the reality of the actual sound. I have seen again and again how very ordinary or even completely faulty sound were admired and hyped juts because the listeners were told that the drivers used electromagnets. I remember that at CES 2003, when David Karmeli played his Klangfilm Bionor (demonstrating quite off the mark sound) the army of the cretins expanded that “those speakers sounded so wonderful because you can not beat the field coil”. The irony was that Karmeli’s Bionors did not even use the field coils. Ironicly, another friend on mine who do have the electromagnet version of the Klangfilm Bionor has very inferior sound to the Bionors with the permanents magnets…  The very same situation repaid itself agene and agene: people do not use the electromagnets consciousnessly do not approach the sound of the field coil drivers objectively and consciousnessly. Look at the inadequate sound that comes from the Shindo, Western Electric, Supravox and you get what I’m coming from.

Still, I do not think that there is anything wrong with the electromagnets. All those intellectual justifications that people use with electromagnets (more powerful magnetic force, higher resolution and so on) have hardly anything to do with sound. In fact those justifications in reality are always mistaken, I did checked them out… Based upon my experiments with electromagnets I have my own theory about them, the theory that is NOT backed up with any positive and tangible results so far. So, what I was thinking is to contribute one of my Vitavox S2 drivers for a conversion it to electromagnet. I have a good mechanic in my disposal and a guy who could wind the coil… so why not? I really do not know that results I might end up with and it would be a soft of a journey-project… The good part (the most important part in my view) that I will be starting from a driver that initially already has a very good diaphragm, phase-plug, compression model, outtake channels implementations and the very proven sound. I will be slowly posting about my progress and please if you have any thoughts about the electromagnet implementation that feel free to share them.

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