Building custom headphones...

[Nathan Raymond]

I've always wanted to build my own headphones, and was curious if anyone here has any experience or tips. What I thought could be good is this driver:

https://www.tymphany.com/transducers/hpd-50n25pr00-32/
http://www.loudspeakerdatabase.com/Peerless/HPD-50N25PR00-32

I haven't found too many DIY kits that I like aesthetically or design-wise except for this, which I just ordered:

https://earphonediylabs.com/shop/ea...rofessional-over-ear-open-back-shell-diy-kit/

What options would I have for tweaking the sound besides earpads? Just change out the drivers? Is there a way to estimate what a driver will sound like in a headphone before trying it? I'm assuming there will be a way I can physically test out the drivers in the shells without gluing anything in place first, in case the combo just doesn't work out.

 

[maverickronin]

What options would I have for tweaking the sound besides earpads?

With those Grado style cups there aren't as many things you can do but you can adjust damping on the front and back of the driver or change out the wood inserts.

I'm assuming there will be a way I can physically test out the drivers in the shells without gluing anything in place first, in case the combo just doesn't work out.

You could probably find some sort of removable adhesive. Maybe something like neutral cure silicone.

 

[Vini darko]

I'm using the 40mm version of that driver from peerless. Very enjoyable sound for rock , blues and metal. Pretty good with classical too. Not great with edm as no real bass extension and not much headstage.
My tip would be buy a bunch of the 50mm drivers and find the closest matched ones.
My diy semi open cans with hpd 40mm.

 

[Vini darko]

For sticking drivers into shells use bluetack. Bluetack , tape and foam can be used for tuning. Also worth experimenting with different materials in front of the driver like silk, cotten, velor, mesh.

 

[Nathan Raymond]

I'm using the 40mm version of that driver from peerless. Very enjoyable sound for rock , blues and metal. Pretty good with classical too. Not great with edm as no real bass extension and not much headstage.
My tip would be buy a bunch of the 50mm drivers and find the closest matched ones.
My diy semi open cans with hpd 40mm.

Cool! Glad to hear you've gotten good results from the 40mm. My hope is that the 50mm will give me better bass response. Good point about driver matching. I had no idea how many to order, decided to try the lottery approach and just order two for now... any idea what my chances of getting a reasonably matched pair from Digi-Key will be? I figure I can always order more if they turn out to be a bad match.

I was just planning to do tuning and sound checks with frequency sweeps and test tracks. Would I benefit a lot from something like the miniDSP EARS?

 

[Vini darko]

Cool! Glad to hear you've gotten good results from the 40mm. My hope is that the 50mm will give me better bass response. Good point about driver matching. I had no idea how many to order, decided to try the lottery approach and just order two for now... any idea what my chances of getting a reasonably matched pair from Digi-Key will be? I figure I can always order more if they turn out to be a bad match.

I was just planning to do tuning and sound checks with frequency sweeps and test tracks. Would I benefit a lot from something like the miniDSP EARS?

Wish I'd ordered 4 or so rather than two as they are a bit different on the multimeter. It's not terrible but doesn't help with imaging.
Admission time : I tune my headphones and speakers by ear .
Yes having measuring equipment would be useful as a double check against perception and bias. However accuracy of headphone measuring systems are questionable. So it's a bit of a crap shoot. Fun though

 

[RayDunzl]

I was just planning to do tuning and sound checks with frequency sweeps and test tracks. Would I benefit a lot from something like the miniDSP EARS?

Maybe.

It could be useful for before/after measures if making modifications.

@amirm has (had) the EARS unit, but I'm not sure he liked it.

 

[Wolf]

I've been using the Peerless HPD-50mm units, sourced from Digikey, myself for awhile now. I used the cheap Stellar Labs 35-5960 cans from Newark. Add wool batting or whatever your choice for damping, and cover 3 of the 6 tuned exits in each cup with electrical tape to tune lower and clean up the bass.

They are a touch polite on top, but that makes for easy listening. Everyone that has tried these has liked them.

Let me know if you want more information,
Wolf

 

[MDZPNMD]

I've been building custom headphones for many years now and I would encourage you to not use Grado style cups like the ones you linked.
If you use a more common design like Vini you can have way more influence on the tonal balance etc..

I would also encourage you to use electrical tape around your drivers to fit them into the cups like Nhoord recommends for their drivers. It is by far the best method I found so far unless you need to close big gaps between the cups and drivers. Only then I would use bluetack or some epoxy putty like Green Stuff.

I also encourage you to get multiple different drivers because different drivers will sound very different in the same setup, the same applies to pad. Some pads like some memory foam pleather pads boost bass by a lot but also reduce treble, sheepskin pads on the other hand tend to do the opposite to some extend. The biggest impact on sound though has the design of the air flow, meaning what you put in front and behind the drivers and especially what material you use on the plate that connects the pads and driver case. Sorry if my description is a bit aweful.
Also regarding a measurement rig, you can build a cheap one from a mic and 2 yoga blocks. I'll link you my imgur gallery so you can see.
A good source for drivers is aliexpress, they seem to be overpriced though.

Edit: You can also google diy headphone measurement rig on google images, there are easy ways to use a table, a mic and a piece of foam to make a measurement rig. The absolute measurements don't matter as long as you have a point of reference. I use HD650s measurements on my rig as a baseline to compare any other heaphones to.

One more thing, you can easily build well working headphones with only a saw, a drill and a flat and round file.

Imgur gallery

I hope that helps, keep us updated about your progress.

 

[Nathan Raymond]

I've been using the Peerless HPD-50mm units, sourced from Digikey, myself for awhile now. I used the cheap Stellar Labs 35-5960 cans from Newark. Add wool batting or whatever your choice for damping, and cover 3 of the 6 tuned exits in each cup with electrical tape to tune lower and clean up the bass.

They are a touch polite on top, but that makes for easy listening. Everyone that has tried these has liked them.

Let me know if you want more information,
Wolf

Thanks for the tips. With the wool batting, do you attach it to the back of the driver, or do you just put it in the cups of the headphones behind the driver? What thickness and diameter (relative to the driver size) of wool batting do you use?

When you mention covering the the tuned exits, do you mean the ones in a headphone cup around the front of the driver, or do you mean the ones behind the driver? On a related note, what role do the covered exits around the front of a driver perform exactly? Is there some interaction with the earpad? I've experimented with changing the number of covered exits in the back of a driver with the earlier version of the Takstar Pro 82, which you can see pictured halfway down this page:

https://diyaudioheaven.wordpress.com/headphones/measurements/takstar-pro-82/

Stock version of the earlier driver has three of four exits covered by something that is like adhesive Tyvek. I removed that, and used "LightDims" light blocking LED stickers (which were a convenient size and durable material) to cover two of the four exits which I felt improved the balance of the lows to highs in that version of the headphone with the variable cup port set to the most closed position.

Glad to hear the Peerless drivers are polite up top. My experience with a lot of open-back headphones is that the high end can be a bit much, especially since the low end tends to roll off with little to no sub-bass in most open backs (and I enjoy sub-bass in headphones). My experiences with Grado headphones is that the high frequencies tend to be too hot, and I'm cautiously hopeful that could be partly due to the cup design, which could complement a driver with polite high frequency response.

 

[Nathan Raymond]

I've been building custom headphones for many years now and I would encourage you to not use Grado style cups like the ones you linked.
If you use a more common design like Vini you can have way more influence on the tonal balance etc..

I would also encourage you to use electrical tape around your drivers to fit them into the cups like Nhoord recommends for their drivers. It is by far the best method I found so far unless you need to close big gaps between the cups and drivers. Only then I would use bluetack or some epoxy putty like Green Stuff.

I also encourage you to get multiple different drivers because different drivers will sound very different in the same setup, the same applies to pad. Some pads like some memory foam pleather pads boost bass by a lot but also reduce treble, sheepskin pads on the other hand tend to do the opposite to some extend. The biggest impact on sound though has the design of the air flow, meaning what you put in front and behind the drivers and especially what material you use on the plate that connects the pads and driver case. Sorry if my description is a bit aweful.
Also regarding a measurement rig, you can build a cheap one from a mic and 2 yoga blocks. I'll link you my imgur gallery so you can see.
A good source for drivers is aliexpress, they seem to be overpriced though.

Edit: You can also google diy headphone measurement rig on google images, there are easy ways to use a table, a mic and a piece of foam to make a measurement rig. The absolute measurements don't matter as long as you have a point of reference. I use HD650s measurements on my rig as a baseline to compare any other heaphones to.

One more thing, you can easily build well working headphones with only a saw, a drill and a flat and round file.

Imgur gallery

I hope that helps, keep us updated about your progress.

Thanks for the advice! I realize the Grado style cups are risky because they don't give me a lot of options/flexibility in tuning. I'm open to suggestions for other 50mm drivers to try, and I'll avoid gluing in the drivers until I'm pretty confident I have a good combo, so anyone with ideas for something that could be good other than the Peerless let me know. The cups and headband have arrived, and the Peerless drivers from Digikey too, though one of the drivers is damaged from before it was shipped since it was expertly packed and the packaging was fully intact. I'm working with Digikey support to get it replaced. The headphone cups did not come with jacks or internal wiring, so I've ordered some 2.5mm sockets which will hopefully fit, and some MPS E-310 OFC wire.

I own about 60 headphones right now and about 30 different earpads (seriously need to downsize the collection), so I have lots of experience tuning with pads and foam in front of the driver. Not much experience with Grado pads, so I bought these new cups with the S, L and G type pads, which will give me some options. There's plenty of empty space behind the driver in the cups, so I can experiment with things there. I'm open to suggestions for material ideas and dimensions (and any suggestions on where to buy materials).

 

[Wolf]

Can you

Thanks for the tips. With the wool batting, do you attach it to the back of the driver, or do you just put it in the cups of the headphones behind the driver? What thickness and diameter (relative to the driver size) of wool batting do you use?

When you mention covering the the tuned exits, do you mean the ones in a headphone cup around the front of the driver, or do you mean the ones behind the driver? On a related note, what role do the covered exits around the front of a driver perform exactly? Is there some interaction with the earpad? I've experimented with changing the number of covered exits in the back of a driver with the earlier version of the Takstar Pro 82, which you can see pictured halfway down this page:

https://diyaudioheaven.wordpress.com/headphones/measurements/takstar-pro-82/

Stock version of the earlier driver has three of four exits covered by something that is like adhesive Tyvek. I removed that, and used "LightDims" light blocking LED stickers (which were a convenient size and durable material) to cover two of the four exits which I felt improved the balance of the lows to highs in that version of the headphone with the variable cup port set to the most closed position.

Glad to hear the Peerless drivers are polite up top. My experience with a lot of open-back headphones is that the high end can be a bit much, especially since the low end tends to roll off with little to no sub-bass in most open backs (and I enjoy sub-bass in headphones). My experiences with Grado headphones is that the high frequencies tend to be too hot, and I'm cautiously hopeful that could be partly due to the cup design, which could complement a driver with polite high frequency response.

You can't use too thick of batting, as the driver plate won't reinstall into the cups. I used about a 4" square, about 0.5" thick when uncompressed. You may have to trim the corners to get it to fit. Loosely inside the cup as far as placement goes. The Newark frame's cups are about 4" in diameter.

I did use E6000 to glue in the drivers. It *can* come loose with a bit of effort if absolutely required, but holds rather well otherwise. On the Newark frames, there is a thick sticker over the driver on the listener side. It's shaped like a quadrant of a donut, and I removed it completely as it murked up the midrange.

The exits on the outside of the cup by the headband entrance are semi-open flow resistors. They allow the bass to be more like that of a sealed cab with damping added. Leave those alone as they do not affect the bass tuning as heard. There are covered vents on the driver to aid in damping too- leave these alone as well.
The 6 holes between the ear and cup cavity are what tune the driver + cavity to the proper frequency. They are also technically 'behind' the driver, just placed in the mounting plate like that of a front-ported speaker, usually around the driver element. This is not unlike that of a vented box for speakers. If you tune too high, the bass gets bloated before rolloff and loses low-end extension. If you tune lower by sealing off some of the holes with electrical tape, the rolloff will start at a lower frequency, and the magnitude will go down. It works further too; if you cover too many, the tuning will be too low and the magnitude will be reduced further to where the bass seems to lose impact and/or output. I covered 3 of the 6 vent-holes (3/8" dia.?) to cut the tuning frequency in half. I chose to cover the 3 plate holes that are to the rear of the skull. This leaves the tuning holes to emit bass from the front-most 3 holes. I can imagine this will aid in soundscape image for the listener.
My Sony MDR-700DJ cans only had 2 vent holes, and they were toward the lower front. I used this as an example for my trials.

I thought to also line the cups in a thin felt, but have not tried this yet. You want to try and eliminate the cups' sound altogether.

Any other questions I can answer?

 

[Nick Nicolaides]

Custom Grado SR80 mod. Still WIP (braided copper headphone cable and foam pads arriving in 10 days).

Headphone cable was damaged and part of the foam had melted onto the headphone casing.

Foam cups were mishapen and starting to disintegrate.

I repurposed a headphone to RCA cable as a temporary replacement. Opened the plastic casing with a hairdryer and extracted the drivers carefully using a Stanley Knife. I used a small amount of blue tac to keep the drivers in place (again temporary until proper headphone cable arrives). Gimbals are Tiger Rengas Wood from Indonesia.

The Grado headband had split so I added a little foam and stiched it back up. Then added more foam and repurposed an old vintage Rank International Headband. I polished the leather and had to cut and restitch part of the leather to fit the headband.

I then used the outside foam rings from an Audio Technica AG1 (11cm I think), two hairbands and an old (clean) ski sock and made these earpads (just a little sewing at 12 O Clock to keep it in place. It was intended as a temporary solution but it is super comfortable and creates wonderful isolation around the ears.

I think the wood really softened the treble (compared to the original Grado's). A really lovely sound and super comfortable!
Will post again once the cable arrives!