Throughout the history of audio there have been many talented and skilled people working quietly to advance the art and science of audio engineering.
Away from the spotlight, these people have made significant contributions to the industry.
This section will feature some of these more low-profile achievers.
Content is currently pending for …
Graeme Huon – Huon Labs
Michail Barabasz – Plessey/Rola Loudspeakers & Lorantz Audio
Each of these people has experienced the development of an industry as it has evolved. Their observations offer a model for what to expect as a novice begins a career the industry, and a description of what it takes to succeed.
Each of these stories is unique, but there are similarities and significant differences. Taken together, they begin to build a picture of an industry as it has evolved from the 1950s until now.
Graeme Huon (Huon Labs)
Graeme describes in his own words growing up in post Second World War Melbourne and Sydney, his early disjointed education, professional training at university, and his journey into work.
His life journey covered several disciplines and career segments. These career changes included: teaching in what became TAFE; working as an engineer in telecommunications; and later in his own consulting and manufacturing businesses in the broad fields of audio and acoustics. He worked with many who influenced his career, including Cherry, Campbrell, Lampard, and Thiel
Graeme describes the process of product and business development. He worked with valves to the latest digital technology, in industries related to audio and acoustics throughout a very long career.
Graeme’s story offers a unique perspective of the audio industry as it changed over more than fifty years.
Michail Barabasz (Plessey/Rola Loudspeakers & Lorantz Audio)
Michail begins by describing his family’s arrival in Australia as migrants after the Second World War, and his experience of growing up in a foreign country.
An ability to adapt to meet new challenges is characteristic of Michail’s experience, studying first Electrical Engineering and then his preferred Electronics Engineering before beginning work at Plessey at a time of rapid electronic development. From early experience building data terminal consoles and amplifiers, he took a position as the “loudspeaker engineer” at Plessey. This experience covered all aspects from design to large-scale production of loudspeakes in the largest manufacturer in Australia of loudspeakers for use in cars.
When Plessey closed their loudspeaker division, Michail started his own loudspeaker manufacturing business, which continues to today. This business is the only business in Australia to manufacture loudspeaker drivers from voice coils, magnets, and cones, to complete speaker systems. Michail describes in some detail the problems involved in design, manufacture and marketing his loudspeaker products, and the solutions that he has found for these problems.
Michail offers a unique window into how the loudspeaker manufacturing in Australia has changed over fifty years, what it takes to manufacture loudspeaker components, and to survive in this part of the audio industry.