Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site
In the Forum: Horn-Loaded Speakers
In the Thread: Satisfying result: the RMAF Show + Cogent
Post Subject: A more cogent approach might be possiblePosted by Paul S on: 11/1/2006
The big RCA field coil is the best thing about the Cogent system. It has great "promise", based on what I heard. Although their methods of "developing" this driver seemed confused to me, they do have truly encyclopedic knowledge of it, from both technical and historic perspectives.
While I was there, they were trying a rather rough looking diaphragm of their own manufacture (or derivation) that looked pretty uneven and unnecessarily heavy to me, but likely it was pretty ridgid. Still, something about the driver worked quite well. I mentioned to Steve that I found the best part of that driver's range very good, indeed, and I wondered aloud how it would sound if tuned to just that narrow part of its range, perhaps without the horn. He said he had wondered that himself; but I imagine they must hear the recklessly-spewed opinions of at least 1/2 dozen people per day, as their house is like Grand Central Station.
One thing that often hurts this sort of "rennaissance" endeavor, as far as I am concerned, is that the folks most interested are usually "vintage" folks, generally content just finding, acquiring, trading and working with the "special" vintage stuff, happy to simply own, restore or produce variations, or perhaps they might settle on "something" as a "product" and just stay with it, having found a comfortable niche.
Which is all well and good, I suppose. But as far as audio evolution is concerned, I am not sure where I would start with a pair of those raw drivers. Based on what I heard I'm guessing they would probably wind up rather less efficient if manipulated and tuned for their best possible sound; or at least I would ask them to do considerably less than they were trying to do when I heard them.
If nothing else, Steve's and Rick's work has resulted in their position as ground zero for the equipment they are interested in. If you wanted a pair of those drivers you could probably save time by talking to them first.
I would be very interested to hear someone else's version of that driver.
Paul SRerurn to Romy the Cat's Site