WE HAVE been itching to find out how JVC’s engineers in Japan hit on the idea of soaking birch wood in sake to make it pliant enough to use as a loudspeaker cone (Â鶹´«Ã½, 24 January, p 20). So we were delighted when a colleague had the chance of meeting the inventor, Satoshi Imamura, at a technical seminar in Prague, Czech Republic.
Imamura played music through his wood-cone speakers, and our colleague says it certainly sounded good. Imamura then revealed that whisky would not work to soften the wood because it is the amino acids in the rice…
