How does a speaker work?
A speaker is essentially an air pump. I like to say the bigger the pump the bigger the sound!!! A driver is a device that reproduces sound. Drivers consist of woofers, subwoofers, tweeters, midranges, compression horns etc. A driver consists of a magnet assembly, a metal or composite basket/frame, coil and cone or dome. A driver has a coil of wire that is electrically attached to your amplifier. The coil is the electro magnet not the magnet itself. The magnet is usually made of ceramic but used to be made of Alnico (Aluminum, Nickel, Cobalt; expensive compared to ceramic) and is more often now made of neodymium (a lighter stronger material than ceramic). The magnet has a permanent magnetic polarity that does not change. When the coil of wire is placed inside the magnet assembly “pole piece” and an alternating signal is placed thru the coil it will cause the coil to oscillate as the coil will now attract and repel within the magnet assembly as the polarity changes on the coil.
At the risk of offending someone let me just say this: I dislike questions that have anything to do with sound waves, electromagnetic waves, light waves or particlesget the picture?as much as I dislike questions about water vapour. It must have something to do with air. Whoever sat around inventing stereo systems had an active imagination to say the least. Okay, down to business. First, it is important to understand how sound is produced. A big book dropped on a table creates vibrations in the air. Your eardrums pick up these vibrations and your brain interprets them as sound. A speaker creates sound by turning electrical signals into sound waves. It does this by vibrating quickly. (If you have a speaker without a cover over the front of itcovers are used to protect the fragile componentsyou can actually see it vibrating. Similarly, turn up a song with strong bass and you can actually feel the vibrations. Then put a balloon in front of the speaker and you can watch it vibrate).
An electric signal reproduced by an amplifier passes through the speaker wire in the form of an analog wave. This wave varies in terms of its frequency and its power, depending on the frequency being reproduced and the volume you have chosen. This signal enters the speaker via the binding posts and through the wiring inside the cabinet is sent to the voice coil. The signal travels through the voice coil, which is in close proximity to the magnet. As the signal’s amplitude and frequency change, the force on the voice coil undulates back and forth, in reaction to the magnet. The voice coil rapidly vibrates along the axis of the magnet structure, thereby vibrating the cone. As the cone vibrates, the air immediately around it is pressurized and these pressurized air molecules translate into the sounds we hear.
Related Questions
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