What makes speakers fail?

Transducers can fail due to excessive mechanical stress or excessive thermal stress.

One form of mechanical stress would be a mic stand through the speaker cone. JBL has overcome this failure mode by using heavy gauge steel grills on all live sound models. But there are more subtle ways in which a transducer can fail mechanically. The mechanical design of JBL Professional transducers has benefited from decades of experience and the best engineers in the industry. As a result, mechanical failure of a contemporary JBL speaker is a rare event.
The speaker surround and spider, known collectively as the “suspension”, must be
flexible in order to accommodate the excursion of the cone or diaphragm. At the same time, they have to keep the cone or diaphragm from tipping or becoming “de-centered”. Suspensions can fail due to environmental factors such as exposure to heat, UV rays, or humidity. It is also possible for the adhesives that attach the suspension to the cone and the speaker basket to fail or to be improperly applied at the time of manufacture. The separation of tinsel leads is also a common failure. Conducting the electrical signal from the speaker terminals to the voice coil is the job of the tinsel leads. The leads must be light, flexible, and immune from breakage due to fatigue. At the same time, the leads need to be able to carry the full rated current load of the speaker.

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