Ribbon tweeters - Educate me please

[karatestu]

I know next to bugger all about ribbon tweeters. Some prefer them to dome tweeters others prefer domes.

Metallic ribbons are said to have a low impedance. There is no coil to make an amplifier friendly load. How is it done ?

[karatestu]

Well that was a forum killing post. No posts since.

Either nobody knows anything about them / has an opinion on them or they just can't be bothered to post it

Google is my friend

[Colin Wonfor]

Yellow Ribbons and a Oak tree maybe!!!!

[karatestu]

Yellow Ribbons and a Oak tree maybe!!!!

[artsenna]

Have not heard that song in a long long time. Now I have the tune in my head!!

[tweet_my_ribbon]

Many moons ago the ribbon tweeters in a pair of Elac CL310i (aluminium, small) loudspeakers were heaven to my ears. Especially with female vocal tracks. They had to be carefully partnered and placed to give the best sound.
RDs NVA cube 3 has a more even room filling approach and to my ears the mids and highs sound natural. Much more pleasing.
For over a decade the ribbon was making sweet music for me. Today the dome is king.
On how ribbon tweeters are made and produce sound I think it must be witch craft.

[Lurcher300b]

There is no coil to make an amplifier friendly load. How is it done

Real ribbons have a step down transformer built in to match the amp to the ribbon.

[karatestu]

Oooo. Thanks for that Nick. A transformer ? I take it they don't all use them by your use of the word "real".

My rummaging through the internet continues ..............

[karatestu]

Many moons ago the ribbon tweeters in a pair of Elac CL310i (aluminium, small) loudspeakers were heaven to my ears. Especially with female vocal tracks. They had to be carefully partnered and placed to give the best sound.
RDs NVA cube 3 has a more even room filling approach and to my ears the mids and highs sound natural. Much more pleasing.
For over a decade the ribbon was making sweet music for me. Today the dome is king.
On how ribbon tweeters are made and produce sound I think it must be witch craft.

Thanks for your post, Tweet. I have read that good ribbons can sound excellent. Not all drivers are born equal though. There must be good and bad examples of both. Visaton only make one ribbon and it is a lot more expensive than most of the domes.

Glad to hear you like the cubes so much. For some it is the pinnacle of musical speakers.

[keepitsimplestupid]

I use RAAL ribbons instead of the berylium dome tweeter on my ns1000m, better extension and smoother integration. They're actually the same impedance and sensitivity as the yam tweeters so were a straight shoe in, though I rebuilt the xo with air cores externally.

Ribbons vary hugely in quality.

The RAALs are superb as are the Mundorf AMT units if you fancy a different technology