Home audio drivers vs. car audio drivers

LOL @ Slappy correcting himself.

In the early '80s I used a lot of home speaker components in my car.

One of my favorites was a home ribbon tweeter I got at a local electronics shop. It was extended, but not bright, but it was a bit on the dry side.

I also enjoyed ADS and Boston Acoustics separate speakers from that era.

I remember when Nakamichi and KEF came out with car audio components my friends and I got excited because we thought some of the home audio tech, and quality would migrate to the car scene. But in general, I wasn't too impressed with their initial offerings.

My faovrite speaker combo was one I Frankensteined together along with a homemade three-way crossover. and all 8ohm drivers. It sounded much more musical than anything I bought off-the-shelf from car audio manufacturers.

This was especially true when it came to bass. I thought all the Rockford Fosgate and Pyle woofers I used 4 ohm or 8ohm were too punchy, and one-notey. That home woofer on the other hand was more natural.

I think car speakers would be tougher for an amp to control because of their 4ohm rating. They would draw more current from the amps and their damping factors would be half that of an 8ohm dirver. But in small space like a car, that may not matter as much.

Most mobile speakers target specific size and envirmental issues as in size,depth,flush fit,nominal 4ohm impeadence.
when you go to seperates the tweeters are ussually permanently grilled,neodymium magnets,and ferrofluid are most common.And to top it off most all designs expect use in free-air application.Also many off the better car tweeters tend to be focus dispersion so as not to splash highs off many unfriendly vehicle interiors as well as an increase in on axis sensitivity.Material choice is a comprimise for in car sunlight and moistures relentless
assualts.Pl++++++us!Most of the time thiele/small parameters from mobile manufacturers if available,can't be trusted.So what size cabinet vented/reflex or sealed acoustic suspension would you set out to build.
I have heard few rigs made for home from mobile sound gear
which yeilded loud and clean,yet always missed 3 dimensional
accurate sonic picture.IMHO

Gunbei: Most car stereo woofers have a high Qms, which results in a big impedance peak at resonance. This is what causes the bloated, indistinct bass that you hear from the "boom / tizz" vehicles. Lower impedances aren't a problem for a good amp, but as you mentioned, damping factor is reduced.

As a side note, damping factor is NOT the ability of the amplifier to control or load into the driver so much as it is the ratio of how much potential there is for the reflected EMF from the driver to modulate / distort the output of the amplifier. This is a very commonly misunderstood spec with even EE's, designers and manufacturers not knowing how to interpret it or what it really means.

The higher the damping factor, the less susceptable the amp is to being affected by the reactance of the speaker. The ability of the amp to efficiently transfer power into the driver / speaker system ( including cabling ) is what will determine how much "control" the amp has. Unfortunately, there is no spec for this that i'm aware of.

Take a look at this link pertaining to impedances, reactance, loading characteristics and power transfer in the AA Speaker Asylum archives. Pay special attention to the exchanges between myself and that of Dan Wiggins of Adire Audio and to a lesser extent the few responses between myself and Bobby Palkovic of Merlin. One of these two guys is a LOT smarter / more experienced than the other, but i'll leave that up to you to figure out which one it is after reading the exchanges there. While punching in T/S parameters into a computer program and then interpreting the data can provide a lot of useful information, it does not make one a knowledgable speaker designer. Sean
>

Thanks for the info Sean! Have a good one.

Sean, I can't figure it out. You say Dan Wiggins can't use a vented box that can outperform a sealed box but he shows how he can. Bobby is lowering bass below tuned freq. which you say increases distortion and he says he found a way around that.
Sounds like you don't think either one knows what they are doing / following the laws out physics.
To my ears Dunlavy's sounded much less dynamic than Virgo III's or B&W. And B&W publishes distortion under 1% with their vented boxes. Bass is very tight and picks up on the beat (toe tapping).