# Dayton's PM180 midwoofer



## supertweet (Dec 13, 2009)

Curious if there's been discussion on this driver.
Dayton Audio PM180-8 6-1/2" Wideband Midbass Neo Driver 295-343

Measured sensitivity w/ it's impedance is right on the verge according to general HLCD/midwoofer combo consensus, but otherwise the response looks workable, dimensions and airspace requirements too. Thoughts?


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## Eric Stevens (Dec 29, 2007)

If thats one way Xmax it would be great except for the extreme break up at the upper end of it's response. If p-p Xmax then it's just ok and I suspect this is the case.

Eric


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## Eric Stevens (Dec 29, 2007)

If thats one way Xmax it would be great except for the extreme break up at the upper end of it's response. If p-p Xmax then it's just ok and I suspect this is the case.

Eric


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## Patrick Bateman (Sep 11, 2006)

supertweet said:


> Curious if there's been discussion on this driver.
> Dayton Audio PM180-8 6-1/2" Wideband Midbass Neo Driver 295-343
> 
> Measured sensitivity w/ it's impedance is right on the verge according to general HLCD/midwoofer combo consensus, but otherwise the response looks workable, dimensions and airspace requirements too. Thoughts?


B&C 8NDL51 is probably my favorite single midbass that I've ever tried in my car, and the Dayton 8" point source drivers were an interesting alternative when they first appeared. But when I compared the specs, the B&C was superior, iirc. This was a few years back, and there's a long post I wrote comparing the two either on this forum or on audiopsychosis.com

Now that neodymium is so expensive, I'd probably opt for ferrite unless weight or depth justified neo.

Most of the time I just use arrays of small drivers though. A pair of 3" Dayton ND91s have more displacement than a 6" B&C 6PEV13. The 8NDL51 *will* beat 'em both though


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## thehatedguy (May 4, 2007)

Jeff Bagby on PE forum tested this driver. He said it was probably the lowest distortion driver from 300-2k that he has tested regardless of price. The 8 was tested in Voice Coil mag in September of this year. The FR of those drivers scares me...but supposed to be nice if tamed. Dunno about the bottom end on them.


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## Patrick Bateman (Sep 11, 2006)

thehatedguy said:


> Jeff Bagby on PE forum tested this driver. He said it was probably the lowest distortion driver from 300-2k that he has tested regardless of price. The 8 was tested in Voice Coil mag in September of this year. The FR of those drivers scares me...but supposed to be nice if tamed. Dunno about the bottom end on them.


That kinda makes sense. Generally distortion goes up with excursion. So there's a few ways to reduce distortion:

1) Use a bigger cone (bigger driver needs less excursion to produce the same SPL.)

2) Use a lighter cone (lighter cone gets louder with same power.)

3) Use a bigger motor (see above)

So when you combine a lightweight cone with a big motor and a relatively large size, distortion is L-O-W

Even boutique drivers like Seas Excel and Scanspeak have a hard time competing with that, because Scanspeak isn't going to sell an 8" driver with an FS of 60hz. (See item 2.)


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## thehatedguy (May 4, 2007)

That lumpy FR scares me...to me it screams bad linear distortion performance.


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