T+A TCI 1 RE Montagehinweise Seite 51

Damping factor
All loudspeaker membranes possess a
certain mass, which the amplifier must set
in motion in order to produce sound.
However, any mass which moves has
inertia, which tends to produce errors such
as excessive overshoots and subsequent
oscillation.
A vast amount of effort has been in-vested
in the design of your  speakers, in
terms of the driver chassis, cross-over
units and cabinet designs, in order to
minimise these unwanted effects.
However, the
speakers can also contribute to the
damping of the
movements.
An amplifier's ability to suppress unwanted
speaker movements
'damping factor'.
The greater this factor, the better the
amplifier is able to control the loud-
speaker connected to it. A damping factor
of 100, for ex-ample, reduces the original
disturbance by one hundred, i. e. to 1 % of
its value. Good amplifiers, built to the
standards of today's technology, exhibit
damping factors of more than 400.
To ensure that the power amplifier's
damping factor is actually effective at the
loudspeaker, i. e. is not unnecessarily
reduced, we recommend the use of high-
quality gold-plated terminal clamps and
high-quality, low-resistance speaker cable,
such as those found in the  range of
cables.
amplifier driving
membrane's
is termed
Overload and protection
circuits
The vast majority of loudspeaker faults are
a result of overload situations. There are
two main causes of this problem.
1. Overloading the loudspeaker
Overloading the speaker is actually less of
a problem, since a loudspeaker produces
clearly audible distortion when it reaches
the limit of its load capability. If this should
hap-pen, please reduce the volume to
protect your speakers from damage.
the
2. Overloading the amplifier (clip-ping)
The term clipping describes a situation in
own
which the signal peak is cut off, or clipped,
when the amplifier is over-loaded.
The distortion to the amplifier output signal
its
which occurs as a result of clipping is very
high in energy, but is usually of very high
frequency.
In some circumstances the distortion is
inaudible, but is still capable of wreking a
loudspeaker within a few seconds. As a
basic rule, an amplifier with a higher
output power will reach its clipping
threshold later. You are therefore less
likely to damage a loudspeaker by clip-
ping if you use a powerful amplifier.
There are many amplifiers which reduce
the danger of clipping by special circuitry
which produces what is sometimes termed
'soft clipping'.
However, the best protection against this
destructive problem is an amplifier fitted
with a clipping protection circuit, which
switches
immediately if clipping should occur. Such
an amplifier provides effective protection
for the loudspeakers without affecting the
quality of sound.
All  amplifiers are fitted with a
Protection circuit, which protects the
speakers from clipping in this effective
manner.
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off the speaker output