J.A. - such considerations were an integral part of our development projects and accumulated knowledge. Wire effects are subtle and complex, but far from trivial. Yes, I agree that part of Jim's genius was to pay close attention to everything and pay no attention to conventional wisdom such as "bigger coils are better".
Of probable interest here is the possibly little-known fact that we never performed competitive evaluation; there was never another-brand speaker in our lab or listening room. Jim considered such an idea as at best a use of time which we couldn't afford, and at worst a distraction from the work at hand, which was understanding and solving as much as possible from a first-principle approach. The same went for materials and cabinet concepts and construction schemes and production methods. We did original work.
Considerable feedback came from the press, dealers and customers. But such feedback was on the conversational level. The real work included Finite Element Analysis, fine-tuning the lab and its equipment, building a world-class listening room, implementing an anechoic environment on the roof-top, experimenting with leading-edge materials and the excruciating iterative process of developing complex electromagnetic / acoustic / electronic systems to get the job done. And, of course, pruning each model to fit our market niche of affordable high-performance musical tools.
Of probable interest here is the possibly little-known fact that we never performed competitive evaluation; there was never another-brand speaker in our lab or listening room. Jim considered such an idea as at best a use of time which we couldn't afford, and at worst a distraction from the work at hand, which was understanding and solving as much as possible from a first-principle approach. The same went for materials and cabinet concepts and construction schemes and production methods. We did original work.
Considerable feedback came from the press, dealers and customers. But such feedback was on the conversational level. The real work included Finite Element Analysis, fine-tuning the lab and its equipment, building a world-class listening room, implementing an anechoic environment on the roof-top, experimenting with leading-edge materials and the excruciating iterative process of developing complex electromagnetic / acoustic / electronic systems to get the job done. And, of course, pruning each model to fit our market niche of affordable high-performance musical tools.