Technical question re; horizontal placement

Question for all you Martin Logan aficionado's: Can a Martin Logan speaker - specifically a Theos, be operated with success in a horizontal position? In other words, must they be vertical?

Not really. Would it make sound? Sure. Would it be pleasing? It certainly wouldn't be optimal.

1. It has a down firing passive radiator that should be pointing at the floor.
2. The membrane is curved 30 degrees and is supposed to be vertical to create spacial imagining between the two channels.
3. On it's side it would interact with the back wall and ceiling in a way that would be hard to balance since you need to get the rear firing sound waves resolving in a pleasing way with the forward firing sound waves.

Electrostatic speakers are much more sensitive to placement than typical box speakers are. This sounds like an interesting experiment but a bad idea.

Thank you RCHeliGuy! The reason for my query is that I wondered if a Theos, horizontally, would make a decent centre channel speaker between two Odysseys? It is also a economically driven question in that a dealer has a single Theos for sale that would probably come in at around 500 dollars. Part two of the question would be - can you separate the woofer from the ribbon / transducer part of the speaker so the woofer could still be oriented the way it is meant to with the ribbon component / transducer on top of that only horizontally.

MusicKat said:

Question for all you Martin Logan aficionado's: Can a Martin Logan speaker - specifically a Theos, be operated with success in a horizontal position? In other words, must they be vertical?

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It's been done. Just ask Robin.... ;^)


http://www.martinloganowners.com/fo...stem-57-(Ascent-i-Theater-i-Descent-Script-i)


Robin's was the most extraordinary ML setup I've ever seen.
Please note that she now has a much more "normal" looking arrangement.
Cheers,

Excellent! Thanks Victor - does anyone have any input on separating the transducer from the woofer?

MusicKat said:

Excellent! Thanks Victor - does anyone have any input on separating the transducer from the woofer?

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Just ask JonFo.

Thanks Bernard! how do I find JonFo on here? I am new to this.

Reply directly from Martin Logan: "Technically, laying the Theos on its side won’t hurt anything, but due to the dispersion characteristics of the panel, this speaker is meant to be positioned vertically. I would not recommend this as a center channel, it will not give you the performance you are looking for. There are many better options out there."