Why are oval baskets considered bad?

[nutxo]

I used to be into car audio to an extent that most people here would find incredible. We shunned oval shaped speakers. People said they distorted sound and a plethora of other reasons I cant remember . The a few reputable sources debunked many of the myths surrounding them.

Now it pretty much seems the same again. Oval speakers are ignored except for OEM replacement and possibly rear fill. Whats the deal?

[Bfowler]

i guess my $.02 on the subject is, when i'm building custom baffles, a oval is a hell of alot harder to cut out then using my circle jig on my router.

i dont really have a beef with em, just most componet sets dont come in oval, and most of my applications wont fit them.

also (and i think this is where the myth starts) it seems hard for the cone to have linear movment at the peaks when the ends of the oval are travaling farther from the distance of the basket. the surround would have to pull/bend the cone to create a equal movment.

[Ivanfbi]

voice coils are circle, not oval, that's my reasoning

[lashlee]

The voice coil shape has nothing to do with the shape of the cone. Bfowler said all the things I heard when I used to sell back in the late 90's. I know now the Boston and ID both have some sort of midbass/sub that is an oval, there could some changes in attitudes about oval speakers.

[marko]

kef have made some stunning 6x9's, uni-q, oval race track midbass, infinity also made some great 6x9's back in the day, it's not the speakers at fault, it's the application and people behind them installing them on flimsy back shelfs..