Show us your DIY speaker projects!

[baco99]

Hi all,

I build my speakers about 15 years ago and I actually just sold them.
This were the Visaton VIB Extra II:

About 110cm high and weight about 25 kg a piece. I have enjoyed them very much, although the were a bit pushy, I mean very much on the foreground.
Besides that, they really need space.
I have an old, mostly wooden house now and they just don't fit anymore (and my wife also thinks in terms of size they don't fit).

very interesting design. what's the theory behind it?

 

[mgrabow]

I though the speakers by "RAY2001" and "FINEX" were very very professional... Nice job........

 

[mgrabow]

Hope my last two pairs stand up...

 

[bastek]

Great. Except the drivers are not flush mounted. Other than that - perfect!

 

[Elfasto]

Love the cabinets. Those are beautiful. Very jealous here.

 

[mgrabow]

I agree on the flush mounting... I did that on the ones I am building now... Those other two pairs were used drivers and I did not want to spend the extra time on something that i was not going to either keep or that I was not going to unload for a few bucks... Perfect flush mounting can be trickey.... Just dry fit my drivers and the extra work paid off...

 

[donfranquito]

Here's a simple one!

I wired a pair of old Foster horn tweeters that I salvaged from Zenith speakers into my Wharfedale W-60's, using a 3.3 uf capacitor. Sounds terrific!

 

[tylerdurden]

WOW some absolutely wonderfull work here. I only hope my projects will turn out as well. Would a refinish/rebuild job on an old set of Sansui sp-70 speakers constitute a DIY project to be posted here? I havent taken the plunge on my first ground up project yet, as I am still learning. Great work guys!

 

[DanH]

My MJ King OB speakers

My MJ King design OB speakers. I listen with the front baffle 32 inches from the back wall and I get plenty of bass. I am enjoying them very much. They were well worth the effort.

 

[stangbat]

I built the ZDT3 designed by John Krutke (Zaph Audio) back in April. They exceeded any and all expectations I had. The Aura NT1 tweeter is not available right now and Mr. Krutke is redesigning the tweeter filter for the Dayton ND20 as a replacement. So the design is not available at the moment if you go looking for it.

I built grills to try and keep the kiddos from poking at the shiny tweeter. If you can't see it, you won't mess with it, right? They are of course removed for serious listening.

 

[baco99]

gorgeous!!!

 

[Dan ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ]

Stunning work guys! :yes:

 

[tylerdurden]

Those are very VERY nice. Great job Stang. I have been looking at John's design's for my first build. Good to hear he is redesigning them. Is the Aura nt1 going to be available or is it disscontinued?
Once again great job. I can only hope mine turn out as nice. I bet they sound wonderfull!!
Bobby

 

[stangbat]

Is the Aura nt1 going to be available or is it disscontinued?
Bobby

Thanks for the praise everyone.

Supposedly the NT1 isn't discontinued. But it has been unavailable for at least 6 weeks. The ND20 that will replace it looks to be a very good tweeter, and it is physically the same size to no changes other than the redesigned tweeter filter is necessary. At least that is what Krutke was saying a few weeks ago.

I'm actually going to pick up a few ND20s when the new design comes out. That way I'll have them around if I ever want to build a center channel, or in case one of my tweeters gets damaged by little fingers.

 

[mgrabow]

Very nice on the ZDT3. Perfect fit and finish on the baffle. Its tough to get such a perfect fit when flush mounting the drivers.

 

[Zilch]

Crossovers for a forum pal's floor monitors:

 

[Face]

Tannoy Crossover.

 

[mgrabow]

Zilch, Nice job on the crossovers.... Even though you do not se them, the fact that they look great shows pride in ones work...

 

[Zilch]

Zilch, Nice job on the crossovers.... Even though you do not se them, the fact that they look great shows pride in ones work...

Thank you.

I'm better with a soldering iron than a SawZall, apparently.... :

 

[Jim Shearer]

I wanted to build a small sub to match my FE108eSigma Metronomes. Not a big, thumping HT sub, just a nice, musical sub. The Mets go down to 40 Hz, which is OK for some types of music, but they can’t quite put the kick in a kick drum.

I remembered seeing the Triska sub in a Parts Express catalogue and thought that would be just about right. I decided to change the design slightly, as I don’t like to build with MDF (I’m solidly on the plywood camp,) and the perfectly square, painted design wouldn’t look very good next to the nice birch Mets. Also, the design didn’t seem to have any internal bracing, so I enlarged the vertical dimension to allow for the volume added by a vertical driver brace and several additional pieces. The first photo shows the finished box w/o the driver, passive radiators or plate amp. The birch veneered top and bottom ‘over hang’ the box and should look nice w/ the (yet to be built) grills which will cover the driver and PRs. You can see some of the brace work through the diver cut-out.

The second photo shows the sub all buttoned up (but w/o the grills) in place w/ the Mets. The shiny chrome screws will be replaced w/ black oxide screws, but I didn’t want to wait for them to arrive before beginning listening tests. I haven’t finished tweeking the mass added to the PRs, but the initial tests w/ 48.6 gr. (washers plus screw) are promising. (Yes, I do know the mass to tenths of a gram; the balance near to hand happened to be a 5 place Metler.) Output is good to the mid 30’s (Hz) and still useful at 30 Hz.

When doing the initial frequency tests, I was surprised to hear the door on my equipment cabinet rattling. The volume that this sub can generate may not satisfy a hardcore rocker, but its quite sufficient for music as I play it. The kick drums indeed have ‘kick’ and the low frequencies on Temple Caves from Mickey Hart’s Planet Drum CD are there--things that are missing when the Mets are used w/o sub.

Unfortunately, at this point I haven’t gotten the smooth integration of this sub w/ the Mets that I have w/ my Polk and vintage Visonic (w/ added PE plate amp) subs. My room has an 80 Hz resonance, and the way the plate amp on this new sub has its filters, even set down at its lowest, I get a ‘bump’ in the low 60 Hz range. The control on the plate amp says minimum is 40 Hz, but the specs in the data sheet and on the PE website say 60 Hz. Based on my tests, I’m thinking that the data sheet is right: the lowest setting is 60 Hz, so the sub is coming in at a point where the Mets are still going strong. The data sheet for the plate amp doesn’t say what, if any, filter may be applied to the speaker level inputs (which I use.) On my other subs, the speaker level inputs are ‘shaped’ by a 6 dB 120 Hz filter. I’m certain that this greatly facilitates integration of the subs w/ the main speakers.

I do like this little sub, but I don’t think I’ll be using it w/ the Mets. I probably will change my plans for my next speaker build. I had intended to build a pair of FE126e bipole Mets. Now I’m thinking that a pair of FE127e Fonkens will be a better choice. This sub should nicely compliment the Fonkens, which have a low end limit around 100 Hz. Then the question will be: do I want to make another Triska to have stereo subs?