Astatic Biscuit
g’day Greg,
I’m interested in your thoughts about mic shells, particularly the Astatic ’biscUit’ Shells, and suitable elements for them.
i Have one which assembled by Roger ‘kingtone’ Nelson, by which I mean Roger installed the connections and element and windscreen.
im not thrilled with it, but maybe I just made a poor selection of element for this shelL.
in your experience, does the biscuit shell have A particular impact on the sound?
seems to me this black CR which has a nice but ‘lighter’ sound in the 520 shell, has lost some of its balance in this Biscuit.
im wondering if the biscuit might be better suited generally to a crystal?
on a related topic, I had a jt30 fitted with a hiZ CM which I thought was lacking in the low end responsE. When I removed the CR from my 520 (to put in the biscuit) I swapped this element from the JT into the 520 (thinking I’d sell the 520 as a working unit). I was surprised to find I liked the sound of the 520 now, much more than I had liked that element in the JT.
does that sound consistent with reality to you? Could the 520 shell allow the element to develop a bigger low end response compared to a JT30?
I see what you mean! Thanks for the heads up
Dave, would it be possible to share Greg's response in the forum? I have a biscuit mic and I would be interested in the answer to your query.
Hi, Dave
Sorry for the late reply- I missed the email notification that there was a new post here.
Dynamic elements, like the CM and CR, depend on the space behind them to act as an "air spring". It is part of their design and I've found if that volume is either too large or too small it can definitely impact the tone. The Biscuit is very shallow as you know, and I've always felt it robbed a little mojo from a good black CR.
Note that this also suggests a good gasket really does make a difference. If sound pressure can leak too easily from the front to the rear of a dynamic element, tone suffers.
Crystal elments are entirely different animals. They're sealed in the rear so the voume of space doesn't seem to affect their tone.
As for the 520 vs JT30 - I've never heard much of a difference between them for the same element, but I have never gone looking for it either.
Dave, you might want to send that direct to Greg at greg@blowsmeaway.com
He doesn't seem to have posted here at Blues Harmonica for some time. He does get back quickly from his Blowsmeaway email, though.