The air motion transformer is a revolutionary creation in the musical world. Air motion transfer is mostly used in the audio driver or speaker, specifically in the tweeter, which allows you to get faster music signals.
So you will get fast transients audios from guitar, cymbals, and other musical instruments that create fast musical signals. In this article, you will learn more about this transformer.
What is an Air Motion Transformer?
Basically, an air motion transformer is a kind of electroacoustic transducer that was created in 1908-1994 by Dr. Oskar Heil, who was a physicist and scientist. The transduction principle of this transformer is totally different from the typical loudspeaker design, including electrostatically driven loudspeakers, planar magnetic, moving coil, and true ribbon loudspeakers.
Air motion transformer has a special ability to move the driver 4x faster than the usual driver so the driver can play transient’s audios better. That is why most premium tweeters are made with air motion transformers.
How Does an Air Motion Tweeter Work?
The air motion tweeter is an electromagnetic driver that creates single folds air movement based on Lorentz’s force. A printed aluminum circuit works as a diaphragm inside the strong magnetic field, from where it creates a sinusoidal waveform by (dark circle) through the positive (green circle) and negative (red circle) half-waves movement.
And the movement of the singular foils can be seen around the little circles. Along with the circles’ movement, the tweeter’s airflow is four times faster than the regular audio driver. On the other hand, this mechanism allows the tweeter to move each fold individually. So this is how an air motion tweeter work.
What are AMT Speakers and AMT Drivers?
AMT (Air Motion Transformer) speakers are those whose diaphragm is a pleated shape. By using a metal etched folded sheet of polyethylene terephthalate, the AMT speaker can move the air laterally in a perpendicular motion and squeezes together like a bellows.
On the other hand, AMT drivers are those air motion transformers which is used as a driver in the speakers and tweeters where they can reproduce sound down to 650 Hz. AMT driver can also be usable in the headphones, where it can extend down to 10 Hz and function as full-range headphones.
Air Motion Transformers vs Ribbon Tweeter
The ribbon tweeter is known for its next-level flexibility, and its lightness creates huge acceleration and brings a next-level response to the driver. In the ribbon tweeter, there will be a pure foil ribbon and a planar magnetic, so theoretically, the ribbon tweeter should be better, but it needs a much more powerful circuit as well as a powerful transformer.
On the other hand, AMt follows a very clever mechanism where the magnetic field around the folded diaphragm where the plates squeezed together like a bellow and move laterally to create airflow. So if you consider the price and performance, AMT will be the best, and if you are much concerned about the quality and high-end sound production, you can go for ribbon tweeter.
AMT vs Dome Tweeters: Which one is the best?
AMT and Dome Tweeter has different designs and working area. The Dome Twitter produces high frequencies, but it generally covers most of the audio spectrum. So it is not suitable for modern high-frequency sounds.
On the other hand, the AMT tweeters come with high-frequency driver, which is good enough and definitely better than traditional dome tweeters. Besides, the number of consumers of AMT is increasing daily, which is why it is a trendy item right now.
Final Worlds
So with the article, I hope you get the concept of air motion work and how it works as a tweeter, speaker, and driver, and which one you should prefer between AMT & ribbon tweeter. If you are still confused, you check some YouTube reviews, and I will suggest checking both of them practically before buying one.
