John Atkinson wrote:

MINe 109 wrote:

In article ,
Howard Ferstler wrote:

MINe 109 wrote:

"Curvilinear"? Isn't that ML's way of trying to be more
Ferstler-approved by diddling the dispersion?

Actually, unless the diaphragm is changing size as it moves
back and forth, the curved shape will not allow for any
better dispersion than what we would get with a flat
diaphragm.

Poor deluded ML.

Note that Howard Ferstler took the other side of this argument
a few years back when he claimed that it was the _shape_ of the
Allison tweeter that led to its claimed wide dispersion.

I dunno. The motion of the diaphragm of a dome tweeter is per Geddes,
quite complex even chaotic. It is quite clearly *not* what you'd
expect from a dome-shaped piston.

I strongly suspect that the same is true of the diaphragms of most
electrostats and other planar speakers operating at mid-to-high
frequencies. They aren't pistons at those frequencies, nothing like
it.

Richard Pierce made essentially the same point about electrostats on
rec.audio.tech in the past few days.

If the diaphragm motion of a planar speaker is sufficiently chaotic,
you end up in NXT-land. These speakers sound vastly different from
traditional fractional-band FR measurements might suggest, because
their radiation pattern is so chaotic.