Thank you Gentlemen, I appreciate all your nice words and support!
Some old TechTalk members probably remember my first "pencil holder" ribbon (I still sometimes stumble into its parts here and there--maybe I have to put it back together if anything, just for sentimental reasons). That one was big and crude and was made way before Lundahl was even making ribbon transformers (IIRC, I used MC transformer) and it was still before a big boom of Chinese ribbons hitting the market. Now I can clearly see how disastrous that mic was--I had no idea what I was doing. Nevertheless, it still sounded just fine...
It's been a long learning curve since, and I'd like to thank many of you (especially PRR, Mihal (XVLK), Stewart (Zebra50), Roddy, Rossi, and many others) for all great help, suggestions, or just talking about ribbons and participating in ribbons threads (esp. in the epic thread of ribbon dissection), or simply for words like: "Ribbons are awesome" 8).
Indeed, the MF65 is not the "me too" one. Somehow I feel the whole microphone making industry got stuck in yet another RCA44, Neumann U47, or AKG C12 clones (I guess, it is important not to confuse with "historical recreation"), so the whole idea behind the MF65 was to make something completely new, original, unique, and innovative in both, sound and design.
The biggest challenge in any ribbon microphone design is to find a good balance/compromise between bottom response/good output on one hand, and top frequency response on another. It took me about 8 years to solve it. I guess, that's what Matt (recordinghacks) meant by "they combine vintage and modern voicings"--they have a good low end response on one hand, and very extended top end (along with a good sensitivity), on another.
As for technical details, the mic has the shortest front to back path ever seen in ribbon microphones. For efficiency of the design, the motor is actually made as an extension of the main body to the point there is no separation between both, and entire structure has 6 (out of which 2 are custom made) magnets to maintain good efficiency.
The main problem with such an approach is that only precision machining could work, so it took about a year just to find a shop to undertake the project (I wanted to go local and I am sure, by now the guys just hate me :-X). In this microphone you won't find any cheap stamped parts (even ribbon clamps) or parts outsourced from cheap labor countries. Everything is machined on the State of Art 7 axis CNC machinery here in Utah. The body is cut out of a solid (!) piece of steel and top and bottom caps are 'screw on' design with such a perfect fit that all the lines integrate smoothly, with no visible steps. All the parts are hand polished with brushed appearance and then chrome plated.
I still cannot decide what type of corrugation I am going to use--the regular zig-zag, or piston one. Each has its own distinct sonics, so I might just make two versions and offer the customers to chose... For consistency of ribbon tuning there is a mechanism or ribbon fine adjustment.
Other details are, the microphone will have acoustically transparent grill (it cannot be seen on the pictures, yet). The toroidal transformer is custom designed and tuned specifically for this model and is made in house.
But I guess, all that matters is the sound, so here are a couple files:
Sincerely yours on Samick piano in Non Stop Music studio in Salt Lake City. The hall is pretty small, but has high ceilings. I placed the mics as Blumlein about 6' high and 3' out of piano. No any EQ or processing.
Somewhere over the Rainbow:
http://samaraudiodesign.com/RibbonA.wav
Matt Smith on acoustic guitar at Nick Galieti 5-1 studio. Again, no EQ or any other processing:
http://www.samaraudiodesign.com/SamarRibbonAcoustic.wav
I will be sending the mics to an independent facility to get all the plots, graphs, and data some time this week and will post once it is ready.
Best, M
