DIY Speakers - Are they worth the effort

[sunilmani]

@Sunilmani - George had asked you your budget. Without knowing that i doubt if anything can be suggested. You can use the PM route if you wish. You can build a FS for as low as 10K and there can be any limit to the upper end.

Are you sure? Keith's profile shows that he is in Mumbai.

http://www.hifivision.com/members/keith_correa.html

My bad. The DIY speaker he is talking about needs to be sourced from US which i cannot.

 

[navin advani]

I've been quite clear about building kits designed by highly experienced professionals (Joe D'Appolito, Phil Bamberg, Mike McCall) who have the credentials and experience, as opposed to trying to invent the wheel. I've used the best drivers available-Scanspeaks, Ravens, Focals, that money can buy, and some of them have been commercial offerings that have been reviewed. Please note, these don't come cheap, and Anil's views definitely are on the button...In contrast to the above, I feel for those FMs who, lacking testing gear and experience as well as access to good quality drivers and crossover components want to "roll their own". I dont want to discourage people, so I keep my opinions to myself.

George, do you have any of your builds documented?

Sadly I did most of my audio stuff before the internet or digital cameras came along so almost none of my DIY efforts are documented.

My last experience with DIY.

In 2011-12 my wife was remodelling our pigeon-hole. Well she near well tore the whole place down. Anyway I figured she is not going to want my DIY monstrosities in the "new remodelled" apartment. So I reviewed a few models in my price range - KEF Q900, Focal Chorus 836, B&W CM8, Paradigm Studio 100, PSB, Monitor Audio, ...all the usual suspects. Not one satisfied. So I bit my lip and upped my budget and considered a few more models like KEF's R900, Heco's Celan 902 , Canton's Chrono SL590, Sonus Faber Luito, ...I lost track of all the models but still nothing.

It was not till I got to a price range of $5000 (Revel F208) for a pair of towers that I found something that I liked and no way was I going to pay that much for speakers even if my wife permitted it. So back to DIY I went; with a twist. I turned to designs from Troels, Zaph, Jeff B, Tony Gee etc. but many of these had parts that I could not get hold of am importing from many different sources meant paying separate transport and duties for each shipment.

So I turned to Jim of Salk Audio and Lou of Daedalus Audio but neither were able to supply a kit. I finally settled with Rick at Selah primarily because he allowed me to just import a cabinet-less kit and build the boxes here (in India). The rest has been shared before.

 

[goldyrathore]

Navin,

Have you tried any Constant Directivity builds? Our pro audio market has all the parts available for an Econowave style build. Drivers, waveguides, amps etc are all available locally. If minidsp is imported (for crossover and waveguide EQ) then builds similar to kits sold by diysoundgroup become feasible.
I feel the price/performance ratio of such a build will place it far higher than other branded stuff available locally.

 

[GeorgeO]

Hi Naveen

Greetings and good to see you posting here after a longish break.

Yes I have documented three builds on this forum-the others were built before that. The first is a Fostex MLTL(Bob Brines ) design, the second is a Scanspeak MTM floor stander from Phil Bamberg and the third is an Altec 2 way using vintage drivers, which is almost done.

Cheers

 

[Srinath_seshadri]

Thats very nice. Thanks for sharing. I believe, I over damped my speakers. Time to check and remove some stuff.

Thanks.

If you look at old speakers from the 60's and 70's you typically find the walls of the cabinet packed with insulation. Like in those altec cabinets I put the pics of - the walls have a good 3-4 inches thick insulation. The rest of the cabinet is relatively un encumbered.
The speakers form the 90's have the stuff everywhere. Like that kappa 7.
I've even seen cabinets where the walls had a properly formed and glued Poly urethane foam layer, and the cabinet was wide open.
I think getting it nicely on the wall is the best, and leaving the middle open.
Cool.
Srinath.

 

[yugaaa]

When I was in school I used to be a regular at ritchie street , and it used to be almost everyday .
I used to use my "pocket money " and savings from whatever I could from running errands for my mother and buy components . I used to cycle and I remember buying components for even .25 paise .

I learnt a lot of electronics , like tweaking amplifiers , assembling them , speakers etc . I was so interested and this continued for a very long time I remember right until I passed out of college and almost 10 years went by . I used to dream of circuits in my sleep and then came the internet and had a chance to read up more on the subject .

Now fast forward to the present day , I run a business consulting on software .
The itch to diy is still there , but I did realise a few things and very important things .

First , a hobby is just a hobby . You cannot make money out of it . Especially the audio business .
I feel bad for wasting time and money because I could have at least had a good time with the chicks rather than be pre-occupied with reading mags like elektor or tweaking an amp .
Once , you start earning it is better to concentrate on making more money rather than concentrate on the hobby as more money = good product off the shelf .
lastly with limited component supplies in india , realising your dream DIY also needs a lot of money

 

[Srinath_seshadri]

He he I also used to be a regular at ritchie street, along wiht GP road and that part past casino theater with all the motorcycle junkyards.
Including in my last visit to India in 2003 - I bought a big bag of LED's that I never figured how to use till maybe 2 years ago. I cant find that bag now. I only burnt like 3 not knowing to use it.

I also have a bunch of glow in the dark stickers and several other stickers from my 2003 trip to GP road.

Cool.
Srinath.

 

[yugaaa]

He he I also used to be a regular at ritchie street, along wiht GP road and that part past casino theater with all the motorcycle junkyards.
Including in my last visit to India in 2003 - I bought a big bag of LED's that I never figured how to use till maybe 2 years ago. I cant find that bag now. I only burnt like 3 not knowing to use it.

I also have a bunch of glow in the dark stickers and several other stickers from my 2003 trip to GP road.

Cool.
Srinath.

In those days casino used to run with B-grade movies and we used to watch those movies with helmets on for the fear of being seen by someone known . The tickets used to be Rs 2.75 . The motorcycle junkyard is pudupet and that was another place where i could spend a whole day without getting bored .

 

[navin advani]

Navin, Have you tried any Constant Directivity builds? .

Not really, my build have all been home audio not PRO audio.

 

[goldyrathore]

Not really, my build have all been home audio not PRO audio.

I meant constant directivity for home use. The Econowaves, Synergy horns, CBT arrays are all constant directivity used in homes too.

 

[goldyrathore]

Constant Directivity builds ??? What are these?

Loosely speaking a constant directivity speaker will have similar on axis and off axis response. The typical multi way speaker for homes (the ones with dome tweeters) does not have same frequency response on axis and off axis. This means that its frequency response CANNOT be corrected in any direction without changing/degrading its response in other directions. A constant directivity design fixes this. Thus the reflections in the room are all having the same spectral content and hence speaker sounds better in room, needing almost no room treatment

See Econowave, Synergy horn or speakers from gedlee.com

 

[viki_v2]

In those days casino used to run with B-grade movies and we used to watch those movies with helmets on for the fear of being seen by someone known . The tickets used to be Rs 2.75 . The motorcycle junkyard is pudupet and that was another place where i could spend a whole day without getting bored .

LOL:lol: Movies with helmet

 

[Srinath_seshadri]

In those days casino used to run with B-grade movies and we used to watch those movies with helmets on for the fear of being seen by someone known . The tickets used to be Rs 2.75 . The motorcycle junkyard is pudupet and that was another place where i could spend a whole day without getting bored .

LOL.
I have watched some decent movies there - Raiders of the lost Ark, airport 77, An officer and a gentleman, Beverly hills cop, Pretty woman and a few more. We actually liked that theater. The theater we hated was Pilot. Pilot will sell tickets in black when they see the line was long.
Rs 2.75 ??? that must have been before my time. It was Rs 2.90 standard. Rs 5 for balcony. My friend lived opposite to that theater through school.

Pudupet was another place I used to go a lot. Between going there and my mechanic, I learned more than I did in engineering school.

Cool.
Srinath.