People often ask about the origins of the Fixed Suspension Transducer (FST), the Bowers & Wilkins drive unit technology that features on many of our best-regarded loudspeakers. The truth is, it was half inspiration, half insulation.
Loudspeaker engineers have long cursed the drive unit’s roll surround’s behaviour. To allow enough compliance to work at low frequencies [...]

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After Bowers & Wilkins worked to a tight schedule to complete the elephant subwoofer on time,
it was ready to be shipped to Nairobi courtesy of Kenya Airways. Dr Graeme Shannon arrived
in Nairobi two days prior to the loudspeaker to get set up and collect the fieldwork vehicle, which would be used both to transport the [...]

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Posted by Dr Karen McComb.
Graeme Shannon and I had the privilege of being at B&W while the final touches were put to our newly designed subwoofer, and it was tested and made ready for shipping to Kenya.  It was fantastic to be there seeing it all take shape, watching it being put through tests in [...]

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A unique challenge was presented to Bowers & Wilkins recently when we were asked to custom build two loudspeakers capable of reproducing the very low frequencies associated with the ‘contact rumbles’ of female
African elephants.

This unusual request came to Gary Geaves from Dr Karen McComb who is based in the Psychology Department, University of Sussex. Karen [...]

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It sounded like a very glamorous photo shoot. Meet at 10.00 AM in West London. A magazine is shooting the Jaguar XF with its Bowers & Wilkins in-car audio system alongside a pair of our flagship Nautilus loudspeakers.
Nobody mention it was in an un-used underground car park, and I had to help carry a pair [...]

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I am one of the newest members of the Bowers and Wilkins R&D Team, and have worked here for two and half years. All the loudspeaker systems we produce are designed at the R&D establishment in Steyning. As a development engineer I am responsible for the development and design of loudspeaker systems.
To produce great sounding [...]

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Recently we’ve been looking into the subject of acoustic holography. With this technique, a set of acoustic measurements made in one area of an acoustic field can be used to derive values elsewhere. For example, by measuring pressure with a rectangular array of microphones in front of a loudspeaker, the pressure on the surface of [...]

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In Steyning we currently have a number of live research projects running. One that is currently under review is in the area of Plasma Physics. Some of you may remember, though this is a big ask, B&W’s second speaker the P2, which employed a ‘plasma tweeter’. Over the years we have returned to speakers [...]

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As a way of launching the new Insider Blog I thought it might interest readers to hear a little about the R&D team based at Steyning. As many of you know, ‘loudspeaker science’ spans many different areas from electronics to psychology.

To truly grapple - and grapple is the right word as there are [...]

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