# Do tweeters have a 'break-in' period...?



## JimmyDee (Mar 8, 2014)

As the title asks...

I recently changed out my Focal tweeters, to a set of Scanspeak Illuminator D3004. I must say, the change is dramatic! No more 'shrill' at higher volume.
I'm running them active, with Focal Polyglass drivers. (thinking of upgrading the driver to Esotar E650)

Anyways, I was listening to them today, at rather high volume, admiring their clarity, and was wondering to myself; "hmmm... do these need to be broken in?"

I assume they can handle a decent amount of power, right out of the box, but I wonder if they will sound even better, after a bit of time? 
I recall my Focal drivers started to sound better, after about 20 hours of use.... not sure if the same applies to tweeters?


Jimmy


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## Alrojoca (Oct 5, 2012)

Usually yes, they tend to sound better after a few hours in most cases


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## squeak9798 (Apr 20, 2005)

They play far enough above Fs and with such minuscule excursion that I seriously doubt there is an audible difference after several hours of play. I'd need to see measurements demonstrating a difference of an audible level to believe it. If driver's with a true suspension and significantly more excursion playing much closer to Fs don't shift enough to cause an audible difference, then I doubt a tweeter does. The change is more likely to occur in the ear (and head) of the listener as they become accustomed to the sound.

No, they don't need a break in period. Just like any driver, play them low for a few seconds to verify they mechanically function properly...after that just play them like you normally would.


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## cajunner (Apr 13, 2007)

what is the break-in period supposed to do for you that regular music playing won't do?

is it that you simply cannot stand to listen to a harsh, new driver and after it breaks in, you're suddenly in possession of a driver that is everything it was bought to be?

seems a little ridiculous, to put a speaker in a room and powering it for 100 hours at high volume just because the speaker afterwards, may exhibit a slightly improved response in comparison to just out the box.


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## trumpet (Nov 14, 2010)

I'm not sure if it was a real "break-in" period for tweeters, but I tried a pair of aluminum dome tweeters once that were so quiet initially I wasn't sure they were working. After less than 30 minutes they quickly got up to normal levels of output. I was playing whatever music I regularly would listen to, which was probably a metal band.


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## PsyCLown (May 17, 2013)

I do not think "break in" on a tweeter would be noticeable to the human ear.

You say it was initially quiet, perhaps you just adapted to the sound being quieter?
This past weekend I woke up earlier than usual and was watching some series on my PC and had the volume quite low but due to the fact that the environment was quieter overall it was alright. Family woke up, I paused that episode and went to say hi, they left, I went back to my PC to continue the episode and I had to increase the volume as it seemed soo much quieter.

-shrugs-


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## JimmyDee (Mar 8, 2014)

squeak9798 said:


> They play far enough above Fs and with such minuscule excursion that I seriously doubt there is an audible difference after several hours of play.


This is pretty much the answer I expected...

Now, at the risk of hijacking my own thread, I'd ask the same question about midrange drivers. Do they have a break-in period? As mentioned in my initial post, I recall my Focal drivers sounded different (warmer) after about 20 hours of use. But this seems to be a point of controversy... do the speakers sound different, after a bit of time? Or is it just that our ear gets used to the sound of the driver?


Jimmy


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## BuickGN (May 29, 2009)

I can only speak from subjective experience and from a bad memory at that. My Dyn 102'tweeters didn't seem to change noticeably. The Esotar 110 tweeter started very forward or aggressive. Not harsh by any means but they were sharp. Over a few months they seemed to retain that same level of detail and snap but farther from the harsh end. It could very well be myself getting used to them. The only thing that makes me think what I heard is real is I started researching after I noticed a slight change and found others who said the same thing. 

I know suspension is pretty much a non factor but they obviously have to move to produce sound and maybe the silk domes with their coating change slightly. I don't know if a tweeter operates in a pistonic mode or if it's all in the dome or both but there's movement there either way so I would guess the potential is there for a slight change in sound. 

With that said, it would seem like temperature changes, especially for those with dash mounted tweeters that might hit 120F would have much more of an effect on the dome material than breakin but who knows.


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## minbari (Mar 3, 2011)

For a speaker to "break in" it would have to change in some way. as others have mentioned, a tweeter has so little xmax there is really nothing to break in or loosen up.


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## BuickGN (May 29, 2009)

minbari said:


> For a speaker to "break in" it would have to change in some way. as others have mentioned, a tweeter has so little xmax there is really nothing to break in or loosen up.


I was thinking of the dome itself. If I remember right, a tweeter has dome flex or modes, couldn't this "flexing" of the cone change it's properties or the properties of the coating in the case of silk dome?

Almost forgot, some tweeters do have a sort of suspension. Even though the movement would be minute, I would think that small changes in suspension would have a larger impact on the sound for a tweeter. I have no idea if I'm right or wrong, just guessing. I mostly assumed what I heard with the Dyn 110 tweeter was in my head but then I read several reviews saying the same thing which got me wondering.


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## Alrojoca (Oct 5, 2012)

Mmm, Okay, how about playing them at loud near max volume when new? no harm?

Even if no breaking period if needed, shouldn't we be careful the first few hours?


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## JimmyDee (Mar 8, 2014)

Alrojoca said:


> Mmm, Okay, how about playing them at loud near max volume when new? no harm?
> 
> Even if no breaking period if needed, shouldn't we be careful the first few hours?


I gotta be honest... I'm WAY past that... I turned my new tweeters up (full blast) within about 15 seconds of installing them!

My original question was more geared toward the 'sound', and would it change over time... 


Jimmy


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## Alrojoca (Oct 5, 2012)

jimmydee said:


> I gotta be honest... I'm WAY past that... I turned my new tweeters up (full blast) within about 15 seconds of installing them!
> 
> My original question was more geared toward the 'sound', and would it change over time...
> 
> ...


sorry I know this is your thread, I was not trying to answer your question, just asking a different one


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## PsyCLown (May 17, 2013)

I do not see how or why that would feeding a new driver more power (yet still within its limits) will cause any damage to it...

As long as the driver is performing within its limit it should not make any difference IMO.


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## BuickGN (May 29, 2009)

Same here. I've never gone easy on a new speaker. I can sort of see it if you have some very high excursion subwoofer where maybe the spider or surround needs to "stretch out" but even then I think a slight shift in parameters is all that would happen, not physical damage. Correct me if I'm wrong but there's no electrical sort of break-in and all you have is a spider and surround that actually stretch or bend.


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## YoungClayB (Feb 17, 2014)

Moving parts need to be broken in - blue jeans, pocket knives, and shell cordovan shoes. Speaker cones also move and I believe that the amount of throw is directly related to improvements associated with speaker break in. Woofers throw a lot. Tweeters don't throw much. I think that the break in period for tweeters is made up of a couple things: 1. Slight EQ adjustments made during the break in phase 2. Your ears growing accustomed to the sound signature of your new speakers.


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## cajunner (Apr 13, 2007)

metal dome tweeters have possible work-harden issues, I believe that compression diaphragms are more subject to fatigue modes, and if you extend this to new diaphragms, there should be a slight change from 'fresh stamp' to "broken-in" on those.

then you look at the glue in spiders, it's going to have micro-fractures that may not develop properly if you slam them without giving the spider time to create a uniform "skin" of glue fractures, think of it like kerfing a plywood panel. A panel that is first kerfed is not very flexible, and if you slam it into a curve it'll crack. Bending it slowly and carefully, letting the glues naturally separate in the fiber, and going back and forth, lets the material bend without breaking.


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## BuickGN (May 29, 2009)

YoungClayB said:


> Moving parts need to be broken in - blue jeans, pocket knives, and shell cordovan shoes. Speaker cones also move and I believe that the amount of throw is directly related to improvements associated with speaker break in. Woofers throw a lot. Tweeters don't throw much. I think that the break in period for tweeters is made up of a couple things: 1. Slight EQ adjustments made during the break in phase 2. Your ears growing accustomed to the sound signature of your new speakers.


Tweeters have less throw but it would make sense that a change in stiffness would have a much larger effect on a tweeter. Put your finger on a subwoofer while it's working and you probably wouldn't hear a change. Put it on a tweeter and it almost mutes it. So you'll get a much smaller change in stiffness of a tweeter but it might be more sensitive to those small changes.


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## 14642 (May 19, 2008)

This is silly. The suspension of a driver affects its low frequency performance. We should care a little bit about it for a woofer, since we use it at resonance--we don't really have a choice. For other driver with which we use high pass filters, those high pass filters ought to be chosen at a point above resonance because that's where distortion is highest. Tweeter crossover points should be chosen at about 2X resonance. At that point, the suspension has almost no effect on the response. Resonance is the point at which the control of the motion of the mass of the moving assembly shifts from compliance control (suspension) to motor control.

If you're paying a tweeter at a frequency low enough to break in the suspension, you're misusing it.


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## cajunner (Apr 13, 2007)

I'm not sure how this relates, but if you've ever heard a titanium dome tweeter that was fatigued, it's not that great.

This would be the extreme of "breaking in" as it's creating artifacts and "spitz" effects, that aren't there in a non-abused or over-used condition.

And, you might want to cross even higher than 2X resonance, as you can buy a ring radiator with 570 hz Fs, and you wouldn't want to listen to them at 1140 hz, as they are still in a higher distortion envelope at that low frequency.

what I feel, is that whatever changes come from break-in on tweeters, should be so subtle that an A-B comparison of fresh, to broken-in, should reveal very little difference. If you're getting a big change then something else is happening that shouldn't be, or the design of the tweeter is bad.

I can understand headphones changing their response, since they play through Fs and their suspension can loosen up as a normal part of operation, but tweeters probably shouldn't have those same kinds of changes, or improvement from a break-in period as opposed to just using them out of the box.


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## BuickGN (May 29, 2009)

Andy Wehmeyer said:


> This is silly. The suspension of a driver affects its low frequency performance. We should care a little bit about it for a woofer, since we use it at resonance--we don't really have a choice. For other driver with which we use high pass filters, those high pass filters ought to be chosen at a point above resonance because that's where distortion is highest. Tweeter crossover points should be chosen at about 2X resonance. At that point, the suspension has almost no effect on the response. Resonance is the point at which the control of the motion of the mass of the moving assembly shifts from compliance control (suspension) to motor control.
> 
> If you're paying a tweeter at a frequency low enough to break in the suspension, you're misusing it.


Andy, is it possible that the dome itself can change slightly over time? I would swear my tweeters mellowed out slightly after a few weeks of use but since I have no measurements it could very possibly be in my head. Just wondering if a slik dome itself can change (maybe the coating properties change with heat cycles or vibrations?) and as Cajunner mentioned, the "hardness" of a metal dome tweeter.


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## snaimpally (Mar 5, 2008)

Yes. You have discovered this fact as well. Good for you.


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## 14642 (May 19, 2008)

I'm not buying it. In my last car, I checked the curves three years after the initial tune for a SBN show and it was within a half a dB of the original curves I saved. I have NEVER experienced a tweeter that was properly used that changed appreciably after being used. 

In a woofer, the component that changes is the spider. The stiffness of the spider is controlled by a few things: the number and size of the rolls and the thickness of the resin that's used to coat it. The resin is hard and after it's moved back and forth the resin, which adds rigidity to the cloth breaks down and becomes slightly less stiff. For instrument speakers with linen surrounds, the same thing happens. For rubber surrounds? Nope. 

There are a couple of ways to make spiders. One is flat at the outside edge and the other is "cupped". The flat spider is way better than the cupped spider because the fold where the vertical side meets the landing which is glued to the basket is a hinge. That hinge is the weakest part of the spider and its compliance is different for forward and rearward travel. That area tends to break in more than the rest of the spider.

Tweeters don't have spiders. If the tweeter has a rubber surround, it doesn't break in. If the tweeter is a metal dome with a corrugated looking edge instead of a surround, that doesn't break in either. If the tweeter is a fabric dome with an integrated surround made of the same material, then the material isn't very stuff and there isn't going to be much break in--it's already like an old shoe. 

If you just like your system better after a few weeks, it's not because of tweeter break in. It's because you're used to how it sounds.


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## Linkmyboi007 (Apr 20, 2021)

playing


cajunner said:


> what is the break-in period supposed to do for you that regular music playing won't do?
> 
> is it that you simply cannot stand to listen to a harsh, new driver and after it breaks in, you're suddenly in possession of a driver that is everything it was bought to be?
> 
> seems a little ridiculous, to put a speaker in a room and powering it for 100 hours at high volume just because the speaker afterwards, may exhibit a slightly improved response in comparison to just out the box.


Playing music is what your supposed to do in speaker break in. A lot of people say it only affects low end which is wrong. A result of the speaker stretching is that it loosens up which also effects mid range and treble slightly. There is another term referred to as burn in as playing your speaker at rated power for a long time can make it smell a little but after awhile the smell will go away because the glue and coil will be effectively burnt in. This is what mainly happens to a tweeter because it hardly moves but after a really really long time it will eventually sound a bit more clear because it is broken in.


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## Linkmyboi007 (Apr 20, 2021)

Andy Wehmeyer said:


> I'm not buying it. In my last car, I checked the curves three years after the initial tune for a SBN show and it was within a half a dB of the original curves I saved. I have NEVER experienced a tweeter that was properly used that changed appreciably after being used.
> 
> In a woofer, the component that changes is the spider. The stiffness of the spider is controlled by a few things: the number and size of the rolls and the thickness of the resin that's used to coat it. The resin is hard and after it's moved back and forth the resin, which adds rigidity to the cloth breaks down and becomes slightly less stiff. For instrument speakers with linen surrounds, the same thing happens. For rubber surrounds? Nope.
> 
> ...


Ever blow up a ballon? You gotta stretch it out. Rubber surrounds get stretched just like linen and cloth. It just takes longer because fo the design


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## JCsAudio (Jun 16, 2014)

Linkmyboi007 said:


> Ever blow up a ballon? You gotta stretch it out. Rubber surrounds get stretched just like linen and cloth. It just takes longer because fo the design


I don't think you realize who you are quoting there, lol. Plus this thread is 7 years old.  

This reminds me of another thread where some people actually believe tweeters break in and change their sound or parameters.


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## diy.phil (May 23, 2011)

ha ha is he trying to dis Andy lol.

Yeah it's a really old thread.... everyone's speakers should be broken-in or broken by now and needs an upgrade...


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