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Sound generators for breaking in speakers

#41
Marley's Ghost said:
Some of us buy new cabinets and have gigs lined up, so low volume playing over days/weeks is not an option. I've blown speakers in the past at gigs, and part of the reason may have been drivers that were not adequately broken in. So as always, YMMV. :rolleyes:
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Uh no
 
#43
billfitzmaurice said:
That's not the case. Cabs are designed around the T/S specs of the driver. Those specs are not realized with a driver that hasn't been broken in; I've measured 20% variations from spec with new drivers. Blowing a driver because it's not broken in would be very rare, but not impossible.
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Varies from company to company. Some match specs cold, some match better after warm up, some I agree are off as much as 20%. I've measured many. "hot" and cold. Unfortunately there is little standard.
No relation between break in and blowing a speaker. Thermal capability and X-maxx (whether exaggerated or not) are not changed by break in.
 
#49
dave_p said:
I have a feeling people who gig and practice a lot dont really worry about these things
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I've never broken in a cab in my life, and I've taken many a cab with brand new speakers to a gig. Put me down for the "not caring" department. Some speakers I've noticed it when they broke in, some I haven't. I can get a good sound with anything so I don't worry about it and let nature take its course.
 
#50
bryanspkr said:
When I say, parameters don't change much, I mean by breaking in.
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Yes, they do. That's the entire point of breaking them in. I do so with every driver that passes through my hands because if not broken in the speaker will not work as intended. By all rights it should be done at the driver factory, and if not there by the speaker manufacturer, but break-in takes time, time takes money, and so...:rollno:
I can get a good sound with anything so I don't worry about it and let nature take its course.
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There's nothing wrong with that approach either, that's what probably 99.9% of players do. But for wags who do not have a clue how drivers work to summarily dismiss the value of break in does nothing to help those interested in knowing the truth of the matter.
 
#51
The driver will eventually work as it will eventually work. It may sound different in the beginning, true, but I don't understand what you mean by "work as intended". In very high tolerance work you would want to either have extreme uniformity from the factory, or break in and match pairs. It depends how far you want to go. For these applications such as bass guitar, I don't really worry about it. And with todays materials and adhesives in these high power ( and not extremely close tolerance drivers ) no worry--if ever there was--about not breaking in before playing.

As always, just don't exceed thermal or mechanical limits. Something that is easier to do these days given all the hi power amps nowadays. Ever hear of "Blown Woofer Mondays"?
 
#53
JimmyM said:
I've never broken in a cab in my life, and I've taken many a cab with brand new speakers to a gig. Put me down for the "not caring" department. Some speakers I've noticed it when they broke in, some I haven't. I can get a good sound with anything so I don't worry about it and let nature take its course.
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Yeah, I'm in the "drive it like you stole it" mindset myself. I don't remember what my stuff sounded like new, but I do not remember it being much different.
 
#54
Jonathan1990 said:
Isn't there a chance of blowing the speaker, by letting it work for so many hours at high excursion?
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If you exceed the thermal or excursion limit (though some speakers cannot be blown mechanically). If you are breaking in a ported cab, make sure you use a sine wave below the tuning frequency, This will insure a high excursion without too much power. If in Free air, around the resonance frequency of the driver. The problem with leaving the cab unattended is that at probably about lets just say 5% efficiency, 95% of your power is converted to heat. And its continuous. No need to break in loud anyway. Actually, no need to specifically break it in.
Break in can take a very short time anyway. I would not even bother. just play on it.

Your not even building the cab anyway. You already bought it. It will "warm up" if it isn't already. Just play on it.
No need to worry.
 
#56
billfitzmaurice said:
Yes, they do. That's the entire point of breaking them in. I do so with every driver that passes through my hands because if not broken in the speaker will not work as intended. By all rights it should be done at the driver factory, and if not there by the speaker manufacturer, but break-in takes time, time takes money, and so...:rollno:


There is a difference between manufacturing inconsistencies in T.S. Parameters between same model drivers and the differences that happen in one driver after a break in period.
These are two different things.

The type of mechanical compliance changes (though some individual parameters may be as much as 5-10%) basically equal out as far as performance goes. Box resonance and compliance has a great influence on the overall result too.
Not to say there is no noticable difference. There IS such a thing as break in from an unused driver. And over long periods of time I think there can be more change. I'm sure you have come across extremely compliant very old or "pounded" drivers. Especially certain surround, cone an spider types. Actually, I always thought that my foam surround Lowthers always sounded better just before they died. But this is not really relevant to the original context.
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