I had an interesting phone conversation with John Iverson about a week before he disappeared.
My Electron Kinetics Eagle 2 had a wonky on/off switch, so I called John. Apparently the FBI had recently confiscated his loudspeaker and all of his design notes. He was quite upset. My recollection is that he had filed a patent application and in response the FBI showed up. He told me they had accused him of stealing secrets from the Stategic Defense Initiative ("Star Wars") missile defense program. This was my first and only conversation with John and to say that he was colorful and animated and enthusiastic would be a huge understatement.
The Eagle 2 would drive a .55 (point five five) ohm load all day long. That was the impedance of a Strathearn "ribbon" (actually a planar magnetic) sans transformer, which was how it sounded the best.
BruceD, you wrote "RIP old Mate". I hope you don't mind me asking - has his passing been confirmed?
Ah Duke, My apologies for just picking up on your posting-
Yes I worked with him for a few months when he was in Orange County Factory
--we had the Force field Speaker (Neural Density Bombarder official moniker
)
I slept in the same damn room as that mini Chernobyl!--I'm still kicking on tho --so far so good
!
I've heard that speaker through stages of development and always gave my opinion when John asked.
Frankly even now in 020--I've heard nothing Nix/Nada that comes close to what that Unit did produce sonically--the few that have heard it will I'm sure endorse this fact--apart from it did NOT play "loud" but spaced the music with a soundstage that eclipsed "loudness" as from a
normal speaker-- all I'll say it's Music presentation was the purest playback form I've ever experienced--IMHO.
Here's simple trick John got his listeners to perform--try it with todays speakers--
Play a track reasonable full volume-place your cupped hands tightly over your ears and see if you experience a loss of output-dulling /softness of volume/etc--yes?
---with the FF's no loss of volume with the cupped hands --the sound is still apparent to the level with NO hands but its inside your head-can I explain it no--do I have the answers no!--maybe a member here with knowledge of Human Brain acoustical reaction /etc/etc can answer--I cannot even to his day.
That said there is too much to explain in this posting on the Speaker--another time maybe.
He had the Electro A75's and also two Box speakers in production as well--my main Job was goo coating on their Cones!
The Eagles were after I'd left.
I had two specially made A75's which I used into stacked Dayton Wrights XG8's driving the primary of the Transformers direct-- .25 ohm!
Yes at that time Ray his father was sleeping in the factory --he was ill with cancer and died not long after I heard
--the cause was always deemed to be from the secretive AWACs Air Shield program he was involved with --he was lovely man but never spoke
about his work on that to me.
John was a flawed genius-- ego driven and a very intense complex individual--we had some crazy times together --he was always asking what others thought of him and his ideas were radical on some fronts.
His father and he had a prototype design for a Subsonic Bass Wave Generator that could knock over Skyscrapers--I've seen the Paper on that-
they were preparing for the Defence Dept ---don't know what happened there after Ray passed on.
Thats what the FBI maybe were after--I do know John could not leave the US without official permission and he always said to me he was being watched.
Anyway Duke --glad you caught up with the man--re his demise --well who knows frankly the truth--I'd say possibly he has left us for the great lab in the Sky.
Hope you don't mind the rant!--Oh yes always liked your Show demos--w'eve chatted and kudos to you and you speakers!
BruceD
