Thanks for being patient as I gathered up some information regarding panel pricing & answers to questions about materials. All roads on my quest for knowledge led me to Rob Zimmerman. For those that haven't had the pleasure of meeting Rob, he's been working at MartinLogan for 21 years, led the production team building stat panels, and has been one of the main procurers of raw materials used in each stat panel model over the years. To say it quite simply, his word is the authority when it comes to all things regarding the materials and procedures MartinLogan uses for electrostatic panel production.
Currently Rob is our Operations Manager, and among his many duties he oversees service panel production here in Lawrence, and is a stickler for maintaining the precise, original standards for building all legacy panels. He often randomly pops his head in the service room to double/triple test panels before they go out.
I asked Rob last week to look over the questions and concerns raised in this thread, and below are his very detailed responses (thanks Rob!).
~Justin
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Regarding the price increase on service parts across the board
All MartinLogan products are designed and tested from the ground up with the highest quality materials and parts available. Each and every component that goes into the making of a MartinLogan speaker is critical to the performance of our products. Alternative suppliers, less expensive raw materials and less reliable component parts are almost always available. However, compromising quality to save money has never been an option that we have considered as viable.
For over fifteen years, MartinLogan has experienced annual price increases from all of our suppliers
without passing along those increases to our customers for service parts. We can no longer absorb these additional costs and continue to provide the level of service that we have come to be known for in the industry. Our strong commitment to our customers requires that we must, to the best of our ability, continue to maintain the quality level of all of our current manufacturing and replacement parts.
Important Facts Regarding MartinLogan Custom Perforated Metal
The raw material required is of an uncommon and expensive formulation
- This is due to our need to achieve the correct malleability characteristics in order to be able to hand form the stats into the perfect curve.
- We must achieve the proper dielectric relationship between all of the components (tape, diaphragm and metal) in each stat panel, which is different between models, this is especially true with legacy panels as we learned and improved over the years.
Machine setup time and inspection process
- In order for our supplier to produce perforated metal to the exacting quality standards we require, the machine setup time is lengthy and expensive. The additional processes involved require a highly skilled machine operator to insure minimal rework and defects.
- MartinLogan closely inspects uncoated metal to insure consistency of hole pattern alignment, overall shear size and border width. All of these factors must remain consistent from batch to batch or the metal is rendered useless.
ML perforated metal manufacturing processes
The manufacturer of perforated metal designed
specifically for MartinLogan stat panels requires several non-traditional (and therefore expensive) processes to meet our unusually high quality standards. Here are a few:
- Tightly controlled feed rates (feed rates insure consistent hole alignment).
- Specific shearing guidelines (shearing is critical to insure size and hole alignment consistency from piece to piece).
- Additional leveling and rolling steps (MartinLogan stat metal is required to be flatter than the typically accepted industry standards for perforated metal).
Shelf life of raw perforated metal
- All metal oxidizes over time. We require our supplier to coat our perforated metal with liberal amounts of the most rust-inhibiting substance known which prolongs the shelf life of the “raw” metal until we need to proceed with the powder coating/insulating processes. The rust inhibitor is an expensive coating but is required in order to insure oxidation-free raw material at the time of powder coating. However, even with a rust-inhibitor, after a certain amount of time passes the raw metal will oxidize beyond acceptable limits and be unusable.
Important Facts Regarding MartinLogan Custom Tape/Adhesive Materials
Adhesives and adhesive carriers are designed into the performance of each stat panel and cannot be substituted between models without affecting the performance
- Each particular type of adhesive (and its related carrier material) has its own dielectric properties, which affect stat panel performance dramatically and varies between models, especially in legacy products.
- The sheer strength if each type of adhesive is taken into account in the design phase of each stat panel and can not be "substituted" with different adhesives.
- The thickness, width and coverage of adhesives all play a critical role in the output of the stat panel.
Electronic components are crafted based on the performance characteristics of our adhesives
- Each MartinLogan speaker model’s particular electronic crossover and individual power supply is designed (from inception) based upon how a particular adhesive affects and interacts with the perforated metal and diaphragm components contained within the stat panel.
- The adhesives we use have changed over the years, but because of the above factor, MartinLogan must use the precise original adhesive and adhesive carrier to insure consistent performance throughout the life of the speaker.
Manufacturing and Slitting of Custom MartinLogan Adhesives
- The adhesives and related adhesive carrier materials that MartinLogan chooses are of the highest quality and are therefore quite expensive to manufacture. To describe it only as "tape" is highly inaccurate.
- Adhesive manufacturers require minimum purchases in order to most effectively utilize their base materials (typically either master rolls or master sheets).
- MartinLogan’s tight width and thickness tolerances require high-grade base material that cannot always be slit/cut without several additional (and therefore expensive) steps in the process to insure consistency.
Shelf Life of Adhesives and Adhesive Carriers
- When purchasing adhesives at quantities sufficient to the manufacturing needs of current products, shelf life is not an issue since inventory is replenished regularly. When a product becomes officially discontinued, usage drops significantly. Shelf life is then an issue as certain adhesives (which are not all the same) may reach a point where their properties and characteristics are unacceptable for new manufacturing.
- MartinLogan’s adhesive suppliers (as mentioned above) continue to require minimum purchase quantities. This means that MartinLogan must discard some of our older adhesives from time to time and reorder newly manufactured material, which has the proper performance characteristics.
Regarding refurbishing panels
The concept of refurbishing panels isn't a new one, and something we've tested in the past, but it's simply something that does not provide consistent results. The tolerances and specifications we use are exact, and pulling, prying or bending the stat panel metal even slightly calls into question future reliability and consistency with the performance that a refurbished panel might have. Because the adhesives we use essentially create a permanent bond, using releasing agents, sharp knives, scrappers, or any other method to release that bond simply yields results not acceptable to our very high quality standards, especially when it comes to the most important part of the speaker, the electrostatic panel.
Other Important notes about stat adhesives and metal
Overall, products designed using specific adhesives and adhesive carriers must maintain that component make up during the life of the product. Any change in adhesives and/or adhesive carriers will require a complete redesign of the product from the ground up.
Where the stat metal is concerned, all of the aforementioned material specifications and process requirements exceed most acceptable industry standards. This drives up the cost of MartinLogan’s perforated metal considerably. Our suppliers demand a premium for implementation of each of these higher specifications and processes in manufacturing, and while these costs have risen consistently over the past 15 years, we've done our best to absorb those costs.
Also, MartinLogan’s costs go up exponentially when we are forced to order in smaller quantities (after a product is discontinued), and the raw metal materials we use for current panels has changed
considerably from past generations of panels. When volume declines on our purchase orders to our metal and adhesive suppliers for these legacy products, we can always expect to see a price increase. It is not uncommon to experience a price increase of twenty to fifty times what we would normally pay for the same components purchased at higher quantities. In fact, in some cases, our suppliers will simply not provide price quotes for the smaller quantities that we require.
Final thoughts
Our commitment to providing outstanding customer service isn't something we take lightly, and while not everyone will agree with decisions we make, I hope this sheds some light on some of the complexity involved when making these difficult decisions.
All the best,
Rob Zimmerman
