High Performance Beryllium Dome Diaphragm Assembly for Large Format Compression Drivers

A High Performance Beryllium Dome Diaphragm Assembly for Large Format Compression Drivers

Abstract
The development, manufacture, and testing of a new large format compression driver diaphragm using a beryllium dome and new type of polymer surround is detailed that exhibits improved performance. This design promises to give long life and good reliability with little or no change in performance anticipated over the life of the diaphragm. Design exercises include material properties comparisons, finite element analysis, and modal simulations. A comprehensive set of tests of beryllium, aluminum, and titanium diaphragm compression drivers is described including frequency response, distortion, wavelet time domain analysis on a 2 inch plane wave tube and laser scans of modes. Substantial differences were measured in the performance categories, particularly in the frequency range above 4kHz.