Photos by Csaba Villányi / Flashback photo, Styling by Zita Konnerth PROJECT_TITLE: Ivanka Concrete Sound TYPE_OF_WORK: Lifestyle goes High End: speaker system design and engineering DESIGNER_/_ARTIST: András Rudolf Ivanka, David Jankovits YEAR_/_DATE: 2008 PRODUCER_/_LABEL: IVANKA
The cabinet: Including the bass-reflex port the cabinet is entirely made of one single piece moulded concrete. Except for the removable bottom plate, there are no joints of panels. The wall thickness varies from 18mm to 30mm to ensure non-parallel walls on the inside thus minimising the effects of standing waves within the cabinet. A rigid bracing located at various places further strengthens the rigidity of the enclosure.
Concrete is a perfect material for loudspeaker cabinets. Its strength, rigidity and high density are all wanted properties to efficiently isolate unwanted sound from the backside of dynamic loudspeakers. Distorted sound is staining the music and reaches the listener. In addition, standing waves inside the cabinet cause vibrations that in reality moves the walls. Panel joints further induce movement in classical loudspeaker cabinets. With Ivanka Concrete Sound all the unwanted effects of the cabinet were eliminated, so that the drivers have got optimal working conditions.
The drivers: The 8 inch bass driver is taken from Peerless HDS Exclusive series. This loudspeaker features a Nomex diaphragm, aluminium phase plug and utilises copper to minimise distortion. The phase plug eliminates compression under the dust cap and serves as heat sink for the coil to reduce power compression. The aluminium phase plug and the aluminium shorting ring eliminate motor distortion in the driver. An injection moulded aluminium basket minimises resonances within the driver unit itself. The largest possible openings on the back ensure no compression interferes with the diaphragm. The surround is made from SBR rubber because of the wide operating temperature, low creep and long term reliability. The size of the cabinet and the bass reflex port was designed to work perfectly together with this unit.
The 4.5 inch high definition SEAS unit with a manually coated paper cone and a mechanically matching natural rubber surround result in a smooth and crystal clear midrange response. A 1 inch high temperature voice coil wound on an aluminium voice coil former ensures a very high power handling capacity. Extremely stiff and stable injection moulded metal basket keeps the critical components in perfect alignment. Large windows in the basket both above and below the spider reduce sound reflection, air flow noise and cavity resonance to a minimum. The midrange driver has optimised working conditions in a separate enclosure within the main enclosure. This minor box is moulded together with the rest of the cabinet so that no resonances can occur between these two boxes.
A 1 inch soft dome tweeter from the famous Scan-Speak has been selected for the highest frequency range. This driver highlights a non resonant chamber in the back region to ensure low compression and ferro-fluid to increase power handling. The on axis frequency response extends to 30 kHz ensuring that all of the highest harmonics are faithfully reproduced. Scan-Speak is famous for their dome tweeters giving silky smooth, yet dynamic, high frequency reproduction.
Frequency divider network: Split at 350 Hz with a 12dB/oct slope (2nd order). Impedance correction network for bass-driver. Only high quality polypropylene capacitors are used where it is required. Splitting at 350 Hz with 2nd order ensures that the bass driver doesn’t reproduce frequencies where the cone material breaks up. All the components are hand-wired to each other and directly to the drivers.
Technical specifications:
_3-way dynamic loudspeaker system.
_moulded concrete cabinet
_frequency range 29Hz-30kHz (bass reflex port open)
_divider network: @350Hz (2nd order) and @3800Hz (4th order)
_nominal impedance 8 ohm
_music power handling approx. 150W each
_sensitivity 89dB/2.83V/1m
Dimensions: 1000x250x320mm
Weigth: 70kg
Designed to give a wide spreading of the sound, but there exists the “sweet spot”.
You can come closer to the speakers and open your mind to the melody transmissions.
You can take them home too for 3300EUR.
