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First Time Crossover Build

Very nice job, Jay. A Dado blade and a sanding block will make those kinds of woodworking jobs a little easier.

When you mitre your box corners (I assume you'll be mitering the box?), a light pass on a large disc sander with a fixed 45 degree fence will help alignment. I haven't found a saw yet that makes a perfect corner for small work. A light touch on the sander will do, sometimes I even turn it by hand and don't even engage the motor. You just want to make the face smooth, and make any minor corrections needed for a perfect angle. Dry fit all along the way.

(For the record, I custom frame. Mitered corners are a dear, frustrating friend of mine. Measuring into that little rabbet you cut is pretty fun, too. :D )
 
Well, everything fit! :banana: I'll get to start wiring tomorrow. Lexan is a little different to work with, but I learned a lot of cool stuff, like every time you blow on something, spit comes out of your mouth no matter what. For mounting the caps, I cut the crimp parts off of a bunch of red sta-cons, and crimped them on the leads underneath. I tried to get a pic, but my camera sucks. They are nice and snug though. Oh yeh, a question :D when you wire the inductors does it matter which is in or out? In other words do I want the signal going in the outer wrap, or into the center first? Is there anything else to watch out for on the wiring? Thanks as allways, Jay

Edit-The inductors are Erse Super Qs The 3 mh has a DCR of .178 and the 1.5mh has a DCR of .126. PE carries them and they are made in the USA :thmbsp:

Edit#2- Hey Ozmoid, you ever put up any crown molding? I've tried twice and switched to regular molding both times. I gotta big stack of it allready enamled if anyone wants it. :D
 
Very cool, Jay. I see, since you have it all mounted in one box, you used a stereo L-pad to control both, rather than separate L-pads... and that makes sense with a separate crossover box as you are doing.

Makes no difference which way you wired these caps or inductors, there is no "polarity" with them.
 
WOW! Jay, that's incredible! What a cool project!

Oh, and on the component mounting, with them not living in the cabinets with the drivers, seems there would be much less concern about things rattling. I like how you did it. It's a nice clean look.

Take care,

Ed
 
jaymanaa said:
I learned a lot of cool stuff, like every time you blow on something, spit comes out of your mouth
Click to expand...
:lmao:
do I want the signal going in the outer wrap, or into the center first?
Click to expand...
You must have been reading about amps. The issue is RFI and in a low impedance, high level circuit like a crossover (that is connected via a non twisted pair of cables, anyway), it hardly seems worth the concern.

:thmbsp: on the layout.
BTW, nice caps :D
 
jaymanaa said:
...but I learned a lot of cool stuff, like every time you blow on something, spit comes out of your mouth no matter what.
Click to expand...
HeHeHe :lmao: Yeah, fun ain't it :D We go through a case of canned air in no time.

Nice looking job on the box Jay, that is very cool. "Big Audio Gear" indeed.

jaymanaa said:
Hey Ozmoid, you ever put up any crown molding? I've tried twice and switched to regular molding both times. I gotta big stack of it allready enamled if anyone wants it. :D
Click to expand...
YIKES!! Double-Mitered corners in 3-D!!!!! (And sadly, yes I have put up crown moulding... and NO, I don't need any. Thanks for asking! :thmbsp: )
 
Well, I got started on the wiring. I'm running a copper bus for the negs. down each side. Other that that, just plain old copper wire. I was gonna de-oxygenate it and cryogenically treat it, but I'm in a hurry to try this thing out. :D I hope to finish it up Sat. morning so I can clean up the man cave Sat. afternoon-evening. I'm hopefully getting a visit from an AK'er Sunday evening to check out some tube gear he found on the curb. :banana: No one else who owns a stereo has ever heard any of my stuff, so it will be nice to get another opinion. I'm probably biased (pun intended). Once again, I'm sorry for the poor picture quality, Jay
 
Jay, that is looking SHARP! I really like the copper under the lexan - is there anything you can treat it with to help stop oxidation? Keeping it bright and shiny would be nice! :thmbsp:
 
The only way to keep the copper from oxidizing would be as on musicial instruments. The wire and soldering would all have to be thoroughly cleaned, no flux, no oily fingerprints, etc. Then it would have to be coated with a clear lacquer. Obviously there is no way to do that with it next to the Lexan.

Now here's an idea... put something black in the bottom of the box... a piece of black slate Formica (or other type of counter top laminate). With a small artists brush paint all the wiring flat black under the Lexan. The wiring would just "disappear" under the components, which would just "float" over the Lexan.

Paul
 
:scratch2: Flat black, cool idea. Well, I got one channel wired and decided to do a side by side test with the old Klipsch Type Es. In keeping with my tradition of NEVER running ANYTHING for the first time without a clip-lead, I had one wiring mistake and had to do an on the fly correction. :D The bass is noticeably deeper, and the L-pad is everything :thmbsp: I really had to crank the 511 way down (about 9 o'clock). There is the slightest touch of graineness, but I'm attributing this to break in on the caps. I may experiment with the 6.8uf cap to try and get a bit higher freq. Or I may just add another HF horn or tweet? :scratch2: All in all, I am very pleased, especially with the "way down in the cellar" bass. You can really feel it in your body, even at moderate to low volume, which was what I was looking for (good deep bass at low volumes). Here are a couple pics of some very hap-hazard testing. I should be able to finish the other channel tomorrow, and hook everything up right, to do some serious testing (maybe even some tube rolling as I'm sure this will change things). Thanks for the help everyone, esp. you Paul. I wouldn't have this cool speaker set-up without your generous help, Jay
 
In the interest of interjecting a little humor into this thread. I'm posting a pic of my kitchen table (I have two amps in pieces on my workbench so I was forced upstairs). I didn't realize it was this messy untill my wife hollered down that dinner was ready, but she didn't know where we were gonna eat it. :D Boy does she love me :no: BTW- After only about an hour of playtime, most of the grain is gone. :thmbsp:
 
Well, it looks as if everything was organised when it was put there :) and that soldering iron resting on the ashtray, the sign of a true DIYer :thmbsp:
 
As a matter of fact, it was very organized :yes: I somehow get into a frenzy when I inhale rosin smoke :thmbsp:
 
Holy cow Jay. That's really coming together. What part of Kansas are you in? I'd love to hear those speakers sometime. I'm wondering if I could work in a visit on some trip back east.

Keep up the good work, and can't wait for a full report on the sound!
 
kitschen table

Wow, Jay! My wife would never let me get away with having a project like that spread out on the kitchen table! I'd only try that if she was out of town for a few days. That's what I call loving tolerance!

Awesome looking crossover project.

Doug
 
Jay,
Fast Eddie doesnt have a bad Idea there. I am in KC and understand you are in KS, maybe 25 to 30 mins away from where I am located
(as we had discussed before), perhaps between a few of us we could arrange a "listen in" amongst a few sometime, somewhere between us all.

Russellc
 
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