Just how big is that driver?



hi All,

I'm wondering just how to measure drivers physical dimensions. Are drivers measured only to the surrounds inner perimeter? Or, in other words, are they in fact measured to the overall extension of only the material making up the cone itself, and NOT the surround/supportive construct?

Or, in fact, is it�s actual dimensions, the whole overall exposed, structure, right out past the screws holding it to the baffle?

To my way of thinking, a cone or dome driver's size is just that part up to but not including the surround, if any, regardless the actual materials being used.
blindjim
Gawdbless

Is this a 'never mind the quality, feel the width' sort of question?

No.

I’m in fact wondering where the truth is for one, and why such disparity exists in this ‘plain to see’ facet of the audio industry.

One can argue much about claimed parameters of just about any audio component. Are tube watts indeed superior to solid state watts? What’s the true maximum output of a 300B tube? How was that SPL number arrived at? …. And likewise, impedances, and sensitivity?

But how on earth can any despairity, difference, in critical or even subjective terms, alter a simple ruled result? It’s misleading and undermines consumer confidences. IMO

On one hand, I feel the driver has to be considered the whole of the active sound producing unit. The cage, voice coil, surround, magnet, vibrating element or diaphragm… the whole enchilada… the part that fills the hole in the cabinet.

On the other though, with such often made references to the type of cone materials being used, paper, reinforced this & that’s, Kevlar, titainium, aluminum, coated such & such alloys; it’s only that portion moving the air itself. In short, the part we can actually see working.

Years ago, when one speaker maker said they used a six inch midrange driver, you could count on it being six inches across the paper cone itself. I see that no longer being so much the standard and simply wondered “how come dat is?”

I must have missed that memo.
Just a guess here, but, I wonder if some round up or down drivers made to metric proportions.
Exactly, and many drivers are made outside of the USA. So as long as US manufactures feel the need to simplify things for their US customers, there a chance that the integrity of specs might be compromised.

Unsound
Good point.

Truth in advertising is important too... "Whose truth" looks more and more like the real question.