how long break in time for PMC?

[Rea]

Hi-
just orderd 2 new woofer(5") components for my LB1's.
how many hours should the break in time should be and at what volume(im just gonna leave em on day and night i guess.

should it be with stops or as one go?

thanks!

[dementedchord]

personally i think this is bullshit... there's really nothing to break in... the coil is suspended in the gap so there's no "connection" to break in there.. the only thing that bears any tension is the surround and the spider... and they are built to perform consistantly over time...

[firby]

When I have replaced woofers in other speakers they took a week to loosen up a little. I think that it is just the surround or whatever. I heard as did the guy I was working with. I wouldn't worry about breaking them in however the difference was pretty small. I don't think that it will affect your mix enough to be a problem.

[gainreduction]

FWIW I spoke to a Genelec rep about this and he said breaking in studio monitors is a myth. They are built to perform consistantly over time, from second one in use for years to come.

[Bob Ross]

Originally Posted by gainreduction

FWIW I spoke to a Genelec rep about this and he said breaking in studio monitors is a myth.

+1

See this thread:
Breaking in new JBLs

I realize it's pompous to quote myself, but it saves having to re-type my conviction all over again. Cut&pasted from that thread, I wrote:

"Suppose for the sake of arguement that all it took to make a speaker sound better -- any speaker, regardless of who manufactured it -- would be to "break it in."

And further suppose that all it took to "break in" a speaker would be to run pink noise -- or, what the heck, full-range music -- through that speaker for 24 or 48 or 72 hours.

In other words: suppose "break in" is a real phenomenon in mechanical transducers.

Now suppose *you* are the manufacturer of that speaker. And your objective is to sell as many speakers as possible. At a profit.

Which tactic do you think will allow you to best achieve that?
A - designing and building a speaker and then "breaking it in" as part of the Quality Control process, so that *if* in fact "break in" is a real phenomenon in mechanical transducers, you've covered all your bases PLUS you've weeded out any defective units before they go out the door; or
B - designing and building a speaker and then hoping that the end user follows your request to "break it in", otherwise it won't sound as good as it allegedly should?

Tactic A takes a bit more time (the aforementioned 24 or 48 or 72 hours), slightly more money (gotta pay for the electricity to run the signal generator & power amps), and ensures that your product is as representative of your best efforts as possible. Tactic B takes a little less time, costs marginally less money, and takes the final quality of your product out of the manufacturer's hands and puts it into the consumers'.

What manufacturer in their right mind would take that risk (the risk of Tactic B) or thinks so little of their product, just to save a week's worth of their AC bill & get their product to market one week earlier?"