End Game DIY Loudspeakers

[kiwifi]

Assuming that you have the practical woodworking skills and tools, IMHO it is relatively easy to build a sealed subwoofer that exeeds the performance of what is commercially available at any price. Why? Because you have the opportunity to over-build a (large) cabinet to such an extent that it would never make commercial sense to manufacture it. And it is easy to add DSP and external amplification.

Most commercial sub's are too small and are designed to minimize the construction costs, while still looking good (shiny) from the outside. For a DIY subwoofer, it's not so much the materials (if you stick to MDF) but the labour costs, that would make it prohibitive to manufacture. It takes time to build a large, sonically inert cabinet. However, if you are going to start counting your own time, then I think that you have missed the point of DIY and all bets are off!

Multi-way mains are 10x harder to get right than any subwoofer. I would leave that to the professionals. Although replacing the passive crossover in an existing multi-way speaker, with DSP and separate (external) amps, is certainly possible with the tools that we have available to us today.

 

[Waxx]

I had this question once from a potential customer, but at that time (and even today) i don't think i have the skills and knowledge to start from scratch with such a project. At the end the guy build on my advice and some others a known kit, the Humble Hifi Calpamos with a Dayton UM18-22 based subwoofers, and with active crossovers (BSS Omnidrive) and Hypex NCore amps. And he is very happy with it, and did not feel any need to upgrade the 10 years or so since he has that setup. It's a big system, but it needed to fill a big room. You could do something similar, but with modern dsp's (as that Omnidrive is old and surpassed, at that time it was top of the line). But with that budget, beating the quality of some of the top of the line systems from Neumann, Genelec or so will be hard to impossible. So if you want a sure shot, check the big systems of those brands and see what fits your need.

 

[Steve Dallas]

I have never posted about this, because I cannot find the thumb drive that contains all the data and photos, so I have nothing to share in that regard, but...

I went down this road a few years ago, although my budget for end-game is much different than the OP's. I wanted to build a pair of bookshelves for my office, then use that knowledge to apply to a pair of towers for my media room for critical listening. After much research around high end drivers, I chose a Hiquphon tweeter and Revelator 6.5" woofer and went to work.

I modeled the cabinet and port in Boxsim, then used the published FR plots for the drivers to model directivity in VituixCAD. From there, I built a prototype cabinet, damped it, mounted the drivers and took hundreds of individual measurements for further modeling in VCAD. Once I was satisfied with driver locations, damping approach, and a DSP crossover, I got busy fine tuning the crossover and working on time alignment.

Hardware was a MiniDSP 2x4HD and a DIY 4 channel Ice Power amp. It sounded great. (It was not until later I realized I had made an active version of Paul Carmody's Carrera DIY speaker, although our woofer model and box/port dimensions were different. And then the ASR Directiva project came along and did something similar and probably better.)

Then I took it into my office to compare to the R3s. It sounded very favorable, but if I was honest with myself, I had to admit that no audiophile press adjectives nor adverbs emanated from them to make them better than the R3s. They were very comparable at the MLP, other than my speakers having a wider horizontal dispersion pattern. My speakers may have exhibited lower distortion, but I do not push the speakers hard enough in that room for it to matter.

Undeterred, I took them into my media room to compare to the F206s. To make it more of a fair fight, I crossed each one with a sub. Once again, they were very comparable, other than the F206s having wider dispersion yet. In-room frequency response was different, of course, but could be made to match with EQ. I could make my speakers measure better with DSP, but they did not necessarily sound any more enjoyable nor bring me those critical audiophile press resolving revelations. As I switched back and forth over the course of a month, I had to admit there was no reason to spend any more time nor money to pursue the effort further. It was a stalemate.

The upshot is I succeeded in designing and building something that measured and sounded as good as mid-market mainstream speakers. I suppose I could be proud of that?

Hard cost was roughly $1000 for the drivers, $60 for hardware, $200 for damping, $100 for MDF, $250 for MiniDSP, $1000 for DIY amp parts, $100 for turntable setup, $130 for DATS, $200 for misc parts and tools = ~$3000. Soft costs included dozens of hours of labor. And that was for raw MDF finish. I paid $1600 for my R3s and ~$3000 for my F206s.

I taught my son furniture building techniques as an adolescent, and he is as good with wood finishing as I am (probably better,) so I gave the speakers to him to finish and keep for himself to have something his father built. And I went no further with the project.

What I learned from the experience:
1. DIY is for people who enjoy the process
3. DIY is not for saving money unless:
a. You can make better speakers for the equivalent cost of commercial speakers, which is something I believe I failed to do
b. You intend to make multiple pairs to maximize tooling and material costs
4. You need more in skills and tools than you think going in
5. Building "end game" speakers on your first try is a bit optimistic

 

[benanders]

@srrxr71 I’ve no horse in this race and it’s not thread topic-related, was only catching up on this thread (as I favor DIY…), but please note:

Yeah they are but really kind of fighting me at every step. The replacements show the same issue. Which means it’s the drivers.
…

Sorted on your end, then. Genelec needs to pick up the reins and address this immediately: here’s why…

I made the point that if I were using these to produce content or some mission critical task their service would be woefully inadequate.

Unnecessary point. Totally irrelevant what you’re doing with the speakers if not warranty-violating. It’s all equally woefully inadequate on Genelec’s part, unless their non-studio sales have a different warranty. Do you think they have a different policy of how they use $18k non-studio sales income?

Very disappointing.

Wrong keyword. It is unacceptable. This being a world where the worst of things still befall undeserving people each day, fellas making a living by selling $18k speakers and dragging feet to diagnose and fix new woofers are just that: unacceptable. It’s a powerful hanger in business, and a term I rely on if someone fails to realize transactions are two-sided. People have been grabbed by their ears for a lot less. Sorry couldn’t help the pun - didn’t wanna sound too heavy-handed!

 

[srrxr71]

@srrxr71 I’ve no horse in this race and it’s not thread topic-related, was only catching up on this thread (as I favor DIY…), but please note:

Sorted on your end, then. Genelec needs to pick up the reins and address this immediately: here’s why…

Unnecessary point. Totally irrelevant what you’re doing with the speakers if not warranty-violating. It’s all equally woefully inadequate on Genelec’s part, unless their non-studio sales have a different warranty. Do you think they have a different policy of how they use $18k non-studio sales income?

Wrong keyword. It is unacceptable. This being a world where the worst of things still befall undeserving people each day, fellas making a living by selling $18k speakers and dragging feet to diagnose and fix new woofers are just that: unacceptable. It’s a powerful hanger in business, and a term I rely on if someone fails to realize transactions are two-sided. People have been grabbed by their ears for a lot less. Sorry couldn’t help the pun - didn’t wanna sound too heavy-handed!

Well I made the peace with them. I wish they were a little more concerned and transparent about their process.

So they are communicating better with me now. Also they have offered a refund if I want it.

I have decided to work with them to test them here and see if it not some room issue making that side have to work harder.

I think just offering the refund calmed me down a lot.

 

[Gringoaudio1]

I have never posted about this, because I cannot find the thumb drive that contains all the data and photos, so I have nothing to share in that regard, but...

I went down this road a few years ago, although my budget for end-game is much different than the OP's. I wanted to build a pair of bookshelves for my office, then use that knowledge to apply to a pair of towers for my media room for critical listening. After much research around high end drivers, I chose a Hiquphon tweeter and Revelator 6.5" woofer and went to work.

I modeled the cabinet and port in Boxsim, then used the published FR plots for the drivers to model directivity in VituixCAD. From there, I built a prototype cabinet, damped it, mounted the drivers and took hundreds of individual measurements for further modeling in VCAD. Once I was satisfied with driver locations, damping approach, and a DSP crossover, I got busy fine tuning the crossover and working on time alignment.

Hardware was a MiniDSP 2x4HD and a DIY 4 channel Ice Power amp. It sounded great. (It was not until later I realized I had made an active version of Paul Carmody's Carrera DIY speaker, although our woofer model and box/port dimensions were different. And then the ASR Directiva project came along and did something similar and probably better.)

Then I took it into my office to compare to the R3s. It sounded very favorable, but if I was honest with myself, I had to admit that no audiophile press adjectives nor adverbs emanated from them to make them better than the R3s. They were very comparable at the MLP, other than my speakers having a wider horizontal dispersion pattern. My speakers may have exhibited lower distortion, but I do not push the speakers hard enough in that room for it to matter.

Undeterred, I took them into my media room to compare to the F206s. To make it more of a fair fight, I crossed each one with a sub. Once again, they were very comparable, other than the F206s having wider dispersion yet. In-room frequency response was different, of course, but could be made to match with EQ. I could make my speakers measure better with DSP, but they did not necessarily sound any more enjoyable nor bring me those critical audiophile press resolving revelations. As I switched back and forth over the course of a month, I had to admit there was no reason to spend any more time nor money to pursue the effort further. It was a stalemate.

The upshot is I succeeded in designing and building something that measured and sounded as good as mid-market mainstream speakers. I suppose I could be proud of that?

Hard cost was roughly $1000 for the drivers, $60 for hardware, $200 for damping, $100 for MDF, $250 for MiniDSP, $1000 for DIY amp parts, $100 for turntable setup, $130 for DATS, $200 for misc parts and tools = ~$3000. Soft costs included dozens of hours of labor. And that was for raw MDF finish. I paid $1600 for my R3s and ~$3000 for my F206s.

I taught my son furniture building techniques as an adolescent, and he is as good with wood finishing as I am (probably better,) so I gave the speakers to him to finish and keep for himself to have something his father built. And I went no further with the project.

What I learned from the experience:
1. DIY is for people who enjoy the process
3. DIY is not for saving money unless:
a. You can make better speakers for the equivalent cost of commercial speakers, which is something I believe I failed to do
b. You intend to make multiple pairs to maximize tooling and material costs
4. You need more in skills and tools than you think going in
5. Building "end game" speakers on your first try is a bit optimistic

Fabulous story. I feel similar though I really like my DIY bookshelves with scanspeak Revelator drivers a lot. Can’t say how they compare to commercial factory made bookshelves. But I just want to listen to music and stop fiddling now! Have towers that are nice but they have a different room filling impact than bookshelves so can’t really compare the two. But my gut feeling is that the DIYs sound better. And with EQ via Equalizer APO I’m sure they sound better for two channel music than my Sonus Faber Venere 3.0 (more heavily EQed to even compete)!

 

[FrantzM]

Totally.

My first DIY speaker was the infinite baffle subwoofer I built into my attic to use with my home theater setup. You simply can't buy bass performance like an IB sub offers commercially, at any price. I'd wax lyrical but this forum prefers objective so here's a response graph:

This is pre-DSP, from the listening position, 80 hz sub crossover. The sub comfortably hits infrasonic. The whole room is actually pressurized at high SPLs, as it would be in a bass head's car.

Naturally since nobody can easily sell you an IB sub, most haven't heard of it, and the principal forum is called, appropriately, Cult of the Infinitely Baffled.

Hi

Could you tell us a bit more about your IB construction. IB could be a solution for many, these aren't well known enough. I am a big IB fan. Can't build one myself because of logistics (mostly neighbors issues ).
Perhaps a new thread?

Peace.

 

[Raxumit]

Hi

Could you tell us a bit more about your IB construction. IB could be a solution for many, these aren't well known enough. I am a big IB fan. Can't build one myself because of logistics (mostly neighbors issues ).
Perhaps a new thread?

Peace.

It wouldn't be hard to talk me into that thread. Briefly, to whet appetites, it's an overkill setup, four 15" drivers on opposed manifold into a 12 x 13 foot room. Behringer Europower EP2500 driving it (2 drivers per channel, amp is capable of 1200 W per channel @ 2Ω 0.1% THD). Trying to keep this on-topic, it's definitely end-game for a sub for such a small room.

In the meantime, there are a ton of build threads on the Cult forum. You have to register to view, but it's worth the effort, some of the builds are flat out insane.

https://ibsubwoofers.proboards.com/

 

[tktran303]

What I learned from the experience:
1. DIY is for people who enjoy the process
3. DIY is not for saving money unless:
a. You can make better speakers for the equivalent cost of commercial speakers, which is something I believe I failed to do
b. You intend to make multiple pairs to maximize tooling and material costs
4. You need more in skills and tools than you think going in
5. Building "end game" speakers on your first try is a bit optimistic

On your first try, you expected to beat the designer and engineers at KEF or Revel, and the CNC machines and $1-2/hour of Made in China (or Indonesia, where labour is even cheaper) by using parts that you bought at retail prices? Even if you used your own (free) labour?

Supposed I dedicated a year to building my own piano. Quit my job and dedicated a 9-5, 5 days a week to it?
And it's going to better than 300kg Yamaha piano I can buy off the shelf for $10,000?

Who can beat a Apple Homepod, or Sonos speaker, on their first try?

DIY is
1) for people who are more interested in learning how things work
2a) DIY is for people who interested in designing or building or creating with their hands
2b) tend to be creators as well as consumers
3) For people who were engineers in a previous life, and can't leave things well enough alone..


Creating something "End-game"... on the first try is the illusional, because
A) There is no end game...
B) You learned and grew by what you failed to do, not from what you achieved!

I think you should pat yourself on your shoulder that you got even close; you know, to be able to compare your creation to a KEF R3 or Revel F206. And um and ah that it's comparable,. and didn't go straight into the trashcan.

I'm off to write my hit song in one try...

Do it yourself - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[audiofooled]

DIY is for people who understand that to fail is merely something to do before you try again and that success is a byproduct of what you need to become during the creative process. Satisfaction is something you feel when what you created is equal to how much you've learned. This requires a lot of patience...

 

[D!sco]

Yeah, I can't help but feel like finishing my sets of speakers is actually the first step in a long process of refining, tuning, placement and reconsideration of each element. Finding out why individual components and practices work is just as important to me as a DIY'er as that it works.

 

[Waxx]

For me building own loudspeakers is mainly building them like i want them. It's also a journey that learns you a lot about the science behind it, and certainly helps me also when i buy gear because of that knowledge. But your first build won't be end game, you will probally never build them as good as the technical top of the line speakres, and it certainly won't be cheaper as you need to learn the craft on the way, and will build a lot before you get there. And diy building is not cheap. My actual project for a friend has a budget (including amps and dsp) of 4K€, and they are not what you would call end game speakers...

So if you want "end game speakers", buy them. If you want to make your own speakers, go ahead, but they will not be end game speakers (or at least the chance it is, is very very very small). But it's fun and very informative and you can make good speakers if you study it right, and take time to check all parameters and so.

 

[audiofooled]

Yeah, I can't help but feel like finishing my sets of speakers is actually the first step in a long process of refining, tuning, placement and reconsideration of each element. Finding out why individual components and practices work is just as important to me as a DIY'er as that it works.

“I have not failed 10,000 times—I've successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.” - Thomas Edison

 

[Jonazkur]

These Are My endgame diy speakers For now they use seas tweeters in a waveguide and peerless ne180w woofers.

 

[kma100]

@srrxr71 - curious how your W371A journey is coming along!

 

[mathman]

I think this is worth watching for everyone who is interested in DIY speakers.
Acoustic engineer designing a speaker from start to finish:

 

[Gringoaudio1]

This guy is amazing. That being said he is casting pearls before swine. All that thought to design subs to play the bass heavy shit his moronic clients will likely play. Get off my lawn! ‍

 

[ChargedCapacitor]

This guy is amazing. That being said he is casting pearls before swine. All that thought to design subs to play the bass heavy shit his moronic clients will likely play. Get off my lawn! ‍

It's more or less an effort on conservation of materials and cost. If you know your bass deficiency, you can design a single driver solution and not spend extra money on more drivers / amp outputs. That being said, I'm sure he has lots of "moar bass" clients.

 

[D!sco]

I want him to design a home theater sub already. 12-18" driver, average three person couch & 75" TV setup. He'd do great.

 

[Steve Dallas]

On your first try, you expected to beat the designer and engineers at KEF or Revel, and the CNC machines and $1-2/hour of Made in China (or Indonesia, where labour is even cheaper) by using parts that you bought at retail prices? Even if you used your own (free) labour?

Supposed I dedicated a year to building my own piano. Quit my job and dedicated a 9-5, 5 days a week to it?
And it's going to better than 300kg Yamaha piano I can buy off the shelf for $10,000?

Who can beat a Apple Homepod, or Sonos speaker, on their first try?

DIY is
1) for people who are more interested in learning how things work
2a) DIY is for people who interested in designing or building or creating with their hands
2b) tend to be creators as well as consumers
3) For people who were engineers in a previous life, and can't leave things well enough alone..


Creating something "End-game"... on the first try is the illusional, because
A) There is no end game...
B) You learned and grew by what you failed to do, not from what you achieved!

I think you should pat yourself on your shoulder that you got even close; you know, to be able to compare your creation to a KEF R3 or Revel F206. And um and ah that it's comparable,. and didn't go straight into the trashcan.

I'm off to write my hit song in one try...

Do it yourself - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Who said it was MY first try?