What is your favorite material for loudspeakers?

I use veneer layers for curves.

Higher end Sonus speakers are more/less all curves. .. hence the heavy use of custom plies. According to Sumiko, by using these custom plies Sonus achieves higher rigidity/damping with low mass. G.

walls. A 3 layer composite of: 1/2 in hdf, 3/4 in hardwood ply, 1 inch mdf. Braced with seasoned hardwood.

Wilson benesch has some interesting information on their website wilso-bensch.com If you go to their newsroom and scroll down they show a list of materials and the speed which sound travels through them. Ideally you would want sound waves to travel quickly so the energy is not stored and released slowly. Their speakers are made with carbon fiber which dissipates the waves off the back of the driver much faster than other materials. In addition carbon fiber is very ridged so the cabinet itself does not move around and vibrate. If you play the violin or cello you should really look at the website of louis and clark. They make these instruments from carbon fiber. I believe they are very very good sounding. Most orchestras do not allow them because they want those instruments to have the wood look. As a dealer for wilson benesch I can vouch for benefits of that material, speed lack of coloration, and they disappear.

If you have a dealer near you take a listen.

I know about the WB designs but thank you for the post. I have used Carbon fiber I found it worse sounding in my designs than the Baltic plys etc. Its also costly hard to work with. So I leave it to companies like W.B. When Stradivarius are worse sounding than carbon fiber maybe I will revisit. Other composites are available for cabinet construction. I had better luck with those over CF. Hope your sale are going strong 2009 will be a hard time for retailers and audio manufacturers alike.