Andre_Db66 Posted April 11 Report Share Posted April 11 I have a question for the diehards here... Topic title was a system first used back in 1930. Can somebody tell me the difference between the AR system, claiming to be the inventor at the same time? I am a little confused as it seems that across the pond they were way ahead... Andre Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JKent Posted April 11 Report Share Posted April 11 Isn’t that what they put in Rolls Royces? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 12 Author Report Share Posted April 12 5 hours ago, JKent said: Isn’t that what they put in Rolls Royces? 🤣 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 12 Author Report Share Posted April 12 Which is not British anymore but in some weird way German... the war was fought for nothing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 12 Author Report Share Posted April 12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 14 Author Report Share Posted April 14 Foam inside like advent, very similiar sound like ar3a only as though a veil has been lifted. Deep bass, deep stage, high stage, characteristic laid back sound but very revealing and detailed. 3D almost like wearing headphones. I am afraid this is the strongest competition in my view to AR and Advent that i have in posession. LST, NLA, 3A come close but this is much more what speakers should sound like, as it makes all the above have to acknowledge their superiority. It can be debated this is my subjective opinion but look closely at the picture, i own LST, ar3a, also improved and NLA which are setup elsewhere. All of them wonderful speakers, but lacking the finesse and micro detail and being bass heavy doesnt make up for the lack of all that in mid/high range. Dont shoot me for applauding my latest acquisition on CSP, yes i know they dont belong here as they are british, but wasnt Cambridge UK before Cambridge USA? 😉 Anyway, still no one answered or enlightened me on the question of patenting or inventing the closed box concept naming it as in topic title or as AR refers to it... i remain curious about this infringement. No flame war intended btw. I am an enthusiast without prejudice and can enjoy any good sounding speaker. Brand is not important in this case and my main living room setup is and will remain 2 sets of ar3a accompanied by a set of LST all driven by 400 watt/channel yamaha amps. Do the math that is 1.2kW per side, in the middle an 18inch RCF sub @60hz driven bij a 1.6kW Crown K2. Believe me, regardless of the origin and age of the speakers, that rocks hard with disregard to material played, electronic, jazz, heavy metal or dub step. It is unfortunate that the Goodmans are not that powerful and i do not dare to crank them up that much. Yet they are marvellous at normal to louder level... not crazy loud. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dxho Posted April 15 Report Share Posted April 15 Wikipedia has details on AR and AR's patent. Wikipedia has further details on this patent in the article on Edgar Vilchur. Various manufacturers licensed the IP until Electrovoice refused to pay royalties and sued AR. They claimed prior art, though by whom is not mentioned. Anyway, AR lost and the patent was voided. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 16 Author Report Share Posted April 16 18 hours ago, dxho said: Wikipedia has details on AR and AR's patent. Wikipedia has further details on this patent in the article on Edgar Vilchur. Various manufacturers licensed the IP until Electrovoice refused to pay royalties and sued AR. They claimed prior art, though by whom is not mentioned. Anyway, AR lost and the patent was voided. Going to read about this... thnx. Unfortunately i can find very little about Goodmans in general and nothing about their air cushion suspension. So is also hard to determine if this knowledge was studied by E Vilchur and then perfected. What i do notice is that there is consequently fibreglass used in AR enclosures but H Kloss used foam exactly the same type and method as in the Goodmans. My Magnum K are from 65, H Kloss was not producing Advent yet i believe. Ideas were perhaps spread, studied or reused and improved in those days... a very common thing in asia still. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dxho Posted April 16 Report Share Posted April 16 The articles say Vilchur came up with the idea on his own and patented it by 1954. Not sure what you mean about fiberglass in AR enclosures. There was none of which I'm aware, at least through 1970 and probably much later. As far as I can tell, Kloss never used foam in (I assume you're referring to) speaker surrounds in KLH speakers. Also he licensed the acoustic suspension technology from AR, starting in 1957 when he created KLH. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JKent Posted April 17 Report Share Posted April 17 I believe Andre is talking about stuffing so yes, Vilchur used fiberglass and Kloss used foam blocks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 17 Author Report Share Posted April 17 4 hours ago, JKent said: I believe Andre is talking about stuffing so yes, Vilchur used fiberglass and Kloss used foam blocks. And Goodmans used the foam blocks too before H Kloss. So there seems to be copying involved... sadly i cannot find any documentation, so that was my point of this topic. I guess the knowledge on AR here is abundant but lacking the judgment on competition from other manufacturers. Wikipedia also doesnt mention Goodmans though it is evidential to me that suspensiion technique was used simultaneously. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
genek Posted April 17 Report Share Posted April 17 IIRC, the difference between Villchur's sealed system and those earlier versions was that the prior art was done to reduce distortion at low frequencies while Villchur's intent was to extend those low frequencies to produce lower bass at low distortion from smaller cabinets, by making the woofer much much compliant. The prior versions were like some of today's subwoofers, which have sealed cabinets but are not acoustic suspension. Villchur's later recollection about his patent was that he made the mistake of writing it without professional assistance and failed to include explanations of how his acoustic suspension differed from prior art that were clear enough for a lay person to understand, and as a result the patent was successfully challenged in the first round. He chose not to appeal because at the time AR was already doing well enough for him based on its revenues without outside licensing income and he thought he had better things to do with his time and energy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 17 Author Report Share Posted April 17 44 minutes ago, genek said: IIRC, the difference between Villchur's sealed system and those earlier versions was that the prior art was done to reduce distortion at low frequencies while Villchur's intent was to extend those low frequencies to produce lower bass at low distortion from smaller cabinets, by making the woofer much much compliant. The prior versions were like some of today's subwoofers, which have sealed cabinets but are not acoustic suspension. The magnum K brochure clearly states what you describe here. "The bass reproducer is a new 12" unit with a unique moving assembly. Air cushion is employed(first used by Goodmans in the 1930's) The result is minimal distortion right down to 20hz." They have a special kind of surround, which after all those years is still good, at least in my cabinets. Most speakers were made with folded cone material and hard to move, which is why for example old jbl/altec or philips can be used for open baffle perfectly. Perhaps i am stirring in a pot of q's which have no straight a's. I do understand the legal complications Vilchur ran into and the money being made off the product lines (and Kloss later on) giving good enough reason not to pursue, but i also have a feeling it seems somehow shady that the competition basically already had invented this theory, but failed to document and patent this alltogether... leaving it for grabs, just my 2 cents. British and Americans always had a competitive standoff on all sorts of things when it came to inventing stuff... I find in a A/B comparison between ar3a and magnum k that i cannot decide the winner. Perhaps the Magnum because in the end i find them more revealing, but it is a slight margin. Though if forced to choose and leave behind all i have with only one winner, it would be th K...ing 😁 If only there was someone in this forum who could objectively discuss this pov, having both pairs as well. I know the forum is primarily for restauration, and if it were not for you loyal folks, many, many AR and the likes would have ended up in the dumpster. I really appreciate that. However, i am trying to find out more about the roots of the product. In the end, its nice to study acoustics, invent speakers, but you have to make a living, so noone does that for a hobby. Being commercial about it is not abnormal and that brings forth greed for more. AR produced many speakers to stay competitive, so i am only saying this was there all along from the start. Anyway i am starting to rant... Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
genek Posted April 17 Report Share Posted April 17 Who invented something is almost always defined, at least in popular memory, by who managed to get to a patent office first. Competing patent applications often win or lose based on subtle differences in how they describe similar tech. Prior to 1880, the US Patent Office required an actual working model be provided with all applications, and it was possible to build someone else's idea before they could and patent it, which is why you see a lot of old movies depicting characters working on "secret inventions" behind closed doors instead of the way things are done in real life today (file as soon as you think you can describe your idea and then begin development under "patent pending"). Edgar Villchur's biggest invention is arguably not a speaker at all, but the multichannel compression that is incorporated into almost every hearing aid in the world. When he developed it, instead of applying for a patent he published his work openly, putting it into the public domain. When asked about that, he would usually say it was too important a development in hearing research to limit and he didn't want to be involved in another patent boondoggle, but I wonder if he again didn't feel he needed the money that a patent might bring him and just wanted to ensure that this time he would be certain of getting the credit for his invention by publishing first. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 17 Author Report Share Posted April 17 WDRC... i just read up on him on wikipedia. Nice to be able read about his achievements and he seems kind of like an einstein of acoustic tech. It is always wonderful to learn more about certain meaningful pioneers. I cannot pinpoint any specific people but here in Holland, Philips had a lot of meaningful inventions. Motion feedback for one. Almost no chamber for the woofer yet amazing bass. I have those speakers also and it is truely wonderful, the speaker barely fits the cabinet as it has been divided into 2 separate housings. The amplifier, accesible from the backside occupies more space than the woofer. In terms of distorion i would say that there is very little and it is precise. Also the pinnacle Philips AD1255 broadband speaker is magic. Very sought after these days and worth a bunch. CD players, disputably the best with their 1540 dual DAC chips and i could go on. True pioneers... wonderful! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
genek Posted April 18 Report Share Posted April 18 What was new and different about Vilchur's invention was that he applied WDRC to multiple channels based on volume and frequency, with different levels set according to the patient's hearing tests, so that wearers got more amplification for sound levels and frequencies they had more difficulty hearing and less for levels and frequencies they didn't need as much help with. Prior to that, hearing aids applied the same level of amplification for all volume levels and frequencies and most patients either didn't get enough boost where they needed it or too much (sometimes painfully too much) where they didn't. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted April 18 Author Report Share Posted April 18 Yes i read that, also that it became the industry standard and basis for modern day hearing aid. My deceased father had that problem. Not so much hearing loss in the high frequencies, but a specific band created a gap. It drove him crazy to be in a loud restaurant because the background noise would impede him from the ability to converse and the noise was intolerable. Now i think he should have done more tests probably, but i can imagine all this works very frustrating while trying to lead a normal everyday life... My wife had hearing loss her whole life and is now carrying aides costing a small fortune of 4500$. Goes to show how advanced that tech must be by now... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete B Posted May 4 Report Share Posted May 4 I made the mistake of starting a thread at Parts Express Tech Talk giving credit to Villchur: "Ed Villchur's Acoustic Suspension Invention" I should note that I made this mistake assuming that I could rely on information gotten from the Internet. https://techtalk.parts-express.com/forum/tech-talk-forum/65475-ed-villchur-s-acoustic-suspension-invention Then after actually looking up Olson's patent, made this correction: Correction: I called this "Ed Villchur's Acoustic Suspension Invention" and I've known for many years that Villchur's patent didn't hold up in court with the reason that I read on the internet being that Olson had previously patented the closed box speaker. I thought logically, why would Villchur bother if there were no differences, that Olson's was sealed but that the air was not the dominant compliance. I just read that his 1949 patent title was "Air Suspension Loudspeaker" #2,490,466, clearly the air spring is part of Olson's patent. This is from the patent: ----------------------------------------------- An object of the invention is to increase the power handling capacity of a small speaker, making *it comparable to one substantially larger in size in its output of undistorted acoustic energy and fidelity reproduction of desired low as well as high frequency sound waves. Another and more specific object of the invention is to provide an improved diaphragm suspension structure in a loudspeaker characterized by a reduction in the effect of the suspension impedance, thus lowering the natural resonant frequency of the speaker of a given size, without increasing the mass reactance of the moving parts. A further object of the invention is to provide an improved compliant suspension in a limited space for a piston-type*loud speaker diaphragm of small mass reactance whereby the diaphragm is free to vibrate at large amplitude over a substantially extended portion of the lower audio frequency range without amplitude distortion. A still further object of the invention is to improve the low frequency response of loudspeakers mounted in small housings as in small radio receivers. ----------------------------------------------- It seems that this patent clearly covers everything that Villchur claimed in his work done about 10 years later. It is odd that Olson's patent is written to cover small radios, this makes no sense since all the theory applies to larger speakers. Why didn't they design and market bookshelf speakers? Villchur applied it to bookshelf systems and essentially changed the world but I have to say, IMO, that he did not invent the concept. He certainly popularized "small" high performance loudspeakers. I do enjoy the history, but I'm not a historian so I'm not going to go into it in anymore detail, or dig any deeper. I welcome well researched additions to the history. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete B Posted May 8 Report Share Posted May 8 When I made the previous post at Tech Talk years ago I'm certain that I found Olson's patent: 1949 patent title was "Air Suspension Loudspeaker" #2,490,466 Now when I search for it, it doesn't show up, very strange. It is listed here, correctly, under the list of patents as "Air Suspension Loudspeaker" #2,490,466 but the link there also no longer goes to the correct patent. Very strange! https://usenclosure.com/Olsen/DR. OLSEN.html WHERE DID IT GO! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete B Posted May 9 Report Share Posted May 9 1949 patent "Air Suspension Loudspeaker" #2,490,466 is also correctly listed here on page 11 in the .pdf: https://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/olson-harry.pdf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete B Posted May 9 Report Share Posted May 9 Here's another reference to Olson's patent from 1962 where Electrovoice challenges Villchur's patent and provides the Olson patent as prior art. As I read this Villchur lost this case essentially invalidating his patent: https://casetext.com/case/ar-inc-v-electro-voice-incorporated Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andre_Db66 Posted May 9 Author Report Share Posted May 9 Ok so this shows that the patent was applied earlier. It still doesnt prove or show how come Goodmans used this under a different name with the same purpose in the 1930's. Intelectual property theft before a patent was acnowledged i believe has been very common in some very great inventions. Earlier was mentioned the secrecy of working on an invention and therefore preventing this theft. I am only completely in the dark about Goodmans, there is no documentation i can find anywhere. This discussion however does prove the inventors claim of AR of acoustic suspension to be false. The Goodmans brochure shows the system, be named differently, implemented commercially much earlier yet it was not patented. I will experiment on a set of AR6 with the same type of foam as in the Goodmans and Advent cabinets, as i find the fibre glass horrible stuff... I wonder what type of material was used in the 30's. BTW this type of foam is also applied in closed KEF speakers, so it is likely a myth to have to use that awful material for suspension purpose in AR cabinets. Here on CSP/AR, i only read about other specific acoustic material but foam isnt mentioned. @Pete B I read your topic and know your opinion of closed speakers vs ported and to great extent i have to agree. I own a set of First Watt F6 class A mono amps driving a set of KEF LS50 meta, which are very late tech, ported speakers with 5" bass drivers. The degree of stage and dimensionality is astonishing. Blind test i would swear i am listening to much bigger speakers. However, a set of Rogers LS3/5a closed cabinet speakers does the same, provided it uses room acoustics properly, it also returns 30hz audibly. Hence the approval of so many enthusiasts. My point being that first and foremost, placement in real life dictates performance and not anechoic measurement or anything like that (most listening rooms are acoustic nightmares, including my own). Human ear perception plays a great part in deciding if the sound is right or not. AR speakers sound right. But, so do many other brands... i will not start to name everything i have for this A/B comparison. It all remains subjective. Electrostatic technology for example, Quad esl63, surpasses AR in clarity by far, yet beams a lot, hence the sweet spot. The perfect speaker does not exist, one has to listen to the artist performance live for that... (the sound engineer can screw that up though)😁 Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
genek Posted May 9 Report Share Posted May 9 In a 2005 Stereophile interview, Vilchur maintained that he made the mistake of not hiring a patent expert to properly research prior art and that he could have defended his patent had he been better aware of previous filings. "There was no general claim for a system that had a speaker mechanism with a free-air resonance frequency substantially below its optimum operating resonance, and which therefore required a small enclosure. That's what an acoustic-suspension system is" https://www.stereophile.com/content/glorious-time-ars-edgar-villchur-and-roy-allison-villchur-part-2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete B Posted May 10 Report Share Posted May 10 Read the Olson patent (if you can find it) it calls for a high compliance suspension which would give the woofer a very low free air resonance that WOULD require a small enclosure to bring it back up to the correct operating range. Olson called it "Air Suspension Loudspeaker". In my opinion that story from Villchur made him feel better about what happened and sounds good for the public. https://techtalk.parts-express.com/forum/tech-talk-forum/65475-ed-villchur-s-acoustic-suspension-invention Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
genek Posted May 10 Report Share Posted May 10 A definite possibility. Especially since, despite losing the legal credit Vilchur continued to be widely lauded as its inventer. Do we know whether Olson ever made any money from his patent? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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