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The Ribbon Microphone
tents - how a ribbon works - mechanical - ribbon material - ribbon corrugation - magnets - holding the ribbon - electrical - resistance measurement - transformer & preamp - results - further things to try - other resources how a ribbon worksa ribbon mic motor (the term for the bit that picks up sound) consists of a gossamer-thin strip of corrugated aluminum slung loosely between two powerful magnets (or, equivalently, ferrous pole pieces). when sound reaches the motor, the ribbon bends along the corrugations — which moves it across the magnetic field it's sitting in, generating a small potential across the ribbon which runs off to the preamp.
aside from some background hum, unavoidable since the ribbon-to-return-wire loop has nonzero area and i can't magnetically shield it myself, this device sounds (subjectively) like a studio mic. a ribbon mic motor (the term for the bit that picks up sound) consists of a gossamer-thin strip of corrugated aluminum slung loosely between two powerful magnets (or, equivalently, ferrous pole pieces). my preamp consisted of a lundahl ll2913 1:31 transformer from geistnote and a simple differential stage afterwards, using a capacitance multiplier with a big power transistor to clean up any remaining supply noise, for a total voltage gain of around 65 dB.
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