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Rolling your own

How hard is it to build your own speakers and have them sound great. I dont want to make to simple the fact of building expensive speakers but It looks like some off the shelf drivers and crossovers and go to, is it Poland? to have a few hundred cabinets built and finished to your specs.

What about copying current hi end speaker designs, and the drivers, and the way their cabinets are built. Some of the best playing guitars I have ever played were custom built.
Can you study this craft then do it your self or can you make a 15k mistake? What do you do if you want to sell them.

Really peaking my interest currently is maybe a copy of the legacy focus with some atc drivers? With a copy of the dunlavy tower woofers, or my ultimate, a copy of the German Physiks Gaudi with 4 ddd bending wave drivers, six mid metal driver speakers and 4 super sub woofers? The parts not including cabinets (if you didnt buy the gp subs) about 15k do you need special crossovers for the ddd's I burnt mine up but the new crossover is suppose to take care of that. Could you use pro audio crossovers that are active and adjustable?

The only home built speakers I heard are usually horns which are ok but not what I want.

The type of music I listen to mostly modern alternative,classic rock, Ill keep my electrostats for the old smokey jazz thing. But some times I want a concert in the hole ( the room is undergrond) so i want the db inthe 110-120 range.

My room is 20 x 25 and have different ss amps and 4 big 250w tube monoblocks. I live in the middle of no where and no one else around the area has this vice.

Thanks

Kelton
kelton
hifiguy
15 posts
 
Start with a kit, as crossover design is VERY tricky and will make or break the success of your project. The crossover is really what makes a "good" speaker "great". Without an expertly designed crossover, you'll most likely end up with mid-fi quality speakers, even if you use great drivers and parts. Most world class speaker development is 5% designing and building and 95% listening and tweaking the crossover until it is "right". Really, save yourself the time, headaches, and expense and use someone else's expertise - buy a great kit.

The best kits I've seen out there, where you are not merely building 2 way bookshelf "toys" are:

BESL Speakers - www.bamberglab.com
NorthCreek - www.northcreekmusic.com (already mentioned)
and
Zalytron's selection of projects

Good luck!
karl_desch's avatar
karl_desch
426 posts
 
I just about weeped with joy when I looked at the 8 guage woofer inducter coils on the external crossovers for the North Creek Rhythm Signature kit. Pretty.
tweekerman
473 posts
 
Brother Karl you will continue to weep tears of joy when you take a look at the awesome FOCAL 13KX or 15KX sub. the enchanting beauty haunts my sleep! Hifiguy you're right i'm going kit complete. but my kit may include tweeters that are $700pr. and i so may try to save on cabinets and use my old philips475 solid built for the MTM 6 in. 12x12x22 think it'll work? can save $700 on monitor cabinets and they want $1000 for tower?
tweekerman
473 posts
 
nobody cares to look any further than the ads in their audio mags...in this country advertising is a mezmerizing force that blinds...or in this case makes people deaf...have a nice day
twl
3,251 posts
 
Yes, I've made a lot. My advice is to start simple. You need to get on the learning curve. If you build a complex design and it doesn't sound right, you have no idea what to do to fix it. The usual starting point is a 2-way monitor. This will get your feet wet with box theory, driver matching, and crossover design/construction. I recommend 12db(second order) crossovers for their relatively easy circuit and more phase coherent slope(you have to reverse polarity on the tweeter). Cross the tweeter in above 2500Hz to keep as much phase shift out of the critical midrange area as possible. Depending on the LF driver size, you may get a narrowed dispersion field around the crossover freq. Check the beaming freq.(dispersion field collapse) of the diameter of your driver. 6" is ok for around 2000- 2500Hz. For crossovers, you must use bipolar capacitors. Air core inductors are preferable to iron core. External crossovers are preferable to internal. Learn how the changes you make affect the sound of the speaker, so that you will know how to tweak the sound of future projects. Learn to read response and impedance curves. Understand the db scale. And most of all, learn how to make tradeoffs because nothing is perfect. You can save alot of money and get a great result, or you can get a piece of crap. The fun part is that you can adjust, tune, and tweak, until you get it right. Good luck!
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