2008 Winter Symposium: Round Table & Panel Discussion: How to correlate acoustical measurements between the factory and the customer

Round Table
As always, our round table discussion was well attended and received positive feedback. In this session, 40 participants discussed the issue of “How to correlate acoustical measurements between the factory and the customer".  The session was introduced by Stu Lumsden, Polk Audio and moderated by Mike Oslac, Tymphany. It covered issues such as the lack of standardization in acoustical measurement equipment, equipment setup and staff training, and the critical importance of  acoustical measurements. As often happens in these sessions, the discussion was interesting, but raised as many questions as it answered. Some of the issues raised were further discussed in the panel discussion.

The notes made by the discussion groups can be viewed here:

Group 1 Notes
Group 2 Notes
Group 3 Notes
Group 4 Notes

Panel Discussion

The Panel Discussion topic: “Are You Shipping Defective Loudspeakers to Your Customers (or Are You Rejecting Good Loudspeakers)?” was moderated by Steve Temme, and followed on nicely from the Round Table, followed on from the round table, addressing several of the issues raised.

The panelists were:

Bob True, Chief Technology Officer and Chief Quality Officer, Tymphany Corporation, USA.
Wolfgang Klippel, Klippel GmbH and University of Technology, Dresden, Germany

Chin Fa Cheng, Senior Acoustics Engineer - Shinhint Industries Ltd, Hong Kong

Scott Orth, Systems Engineer and Test and Measurement Guru, - Polk Audio, USA

Vance Dickason, Consultant - Vance Dickason Consulting, USA

Laurie Fincham, Director of Engineering - THX, USA

Eric Chu, Customer Service Manager - EAV Audio, China

The panel discussed issues as varied as test fixtures and test boxes, Golden unit criteria, statistics, speed vs. accuracy and the issues of importance to different functions within the company and how to reconcile them.

ALMA member Rob Baum of Menlo Scientific has written an in-depth article on the panel discussion which will be published in an upcoming issue of VoiceCoil magazine - look out for it!

More from the ALMA 2008 Symposium: