Build Your Own?

I built the NaOs by John Kreskovsky. So I can't take any credit for John's wonderful design. I also can't take credit for the cabinet work, as I had those built, too. However, I did all the electronics work, driver installation, active crossover, testing, etc.

Alot of fun, and I've got a pair of speakers that would probably sell for way, way more than what I put into them.

Quite a few great DIY designs out there, but realize some like to "roll their own".

That may be true but there is more to speaker design than just crunching the numbers. I would start with a fairly conventional design from someone like Madisound. I have heard some truly horrible sounding speakers built by individuals knowledgeable in Physics and Math, the theory may have been correct but the result was not.

I built my 1st DIY when I has 12 years old, my son built his 1st unique design at 4 1/2 only help I gave him has soldering wires to drivers, seems hes in the know;) Glad I have someone to take over KCS when Im gone...His loudspeaker used a pair of Fostex fe126e in cardboard tubes he added wool dampening, used the right port size without any help, heck I didnt know he was building them till mostly finished. He wraped the outside of both tubes with large amounts of brown packing tape this killed the cardboards tone allowing his little speaker pair to sound very good for what it was. 1 of my audio friends wanted a pair so we used veneer instead of paper tape on tube he still uses them daily. So I would say if a 4 1/2 year old can do it maybe you can too.

Built the Linkwitz Lab Orion. That experience prompted me to dare designing and building my own active system for HT. No doubt, the plethora of information available at one's finger tips helped to make it possible. True, crunchin' numbers is only the beginning, but a thorough study of theory and a relentless questioning of convention is the way to a successful design that out performs commercial products.

If my goal was to create a great sounding speaker at first try, I would pick a proven design. There are many great designs out there for free or low cost. Madisound is an excellent resource, as is Parts Express. You might want to read their forums. If you want to make a hobby of building speakers, I'd suggest you pickup a copy of Vance Dickason’s “The Loudspeaker Design Cookbook”, and go from there.