jonwb,
"-The Alphas sure are tall, aren't they?"
hehe... Brian's right, it's the weight far more than height. They just don't look nearly as heavy as they are, but I guess 'cuz they're like 2 cabinets in one being double thick 3/4" MDF.
"1. Did you solder your connections to the speakers or use crimp-on terminals (and why)?"
Solder. When you solder you're getting a direct and large connection of speaker wire touching the driver terminals. You can kinda get that w/ crimp-on terms. but mostly it's the metal of the term. touching the driver terms. I just don't like it. Might be no big deal though, but if you're doing something like this, even I wouldn't cut a corner like that.
You might want to use them to wire everything up to be sure it works, and then cut them off and solder a perm. connection.
Maybe Danny can chime in with a real answer though?
"2. When you routered your recess for the tweeters, did you just make it the length called out on the plans or did you have to tweek it a little?"
Dang, I forget? I think I sort of went by the plans and then also measured the actual drivers to be sure I was exact.
I remeber there were some things on the plans that I emailed Danny about 'cuz they were wrong or measurments missing. Not a big deal though and Danny got me the answers. I'd hope he'd updated the things I pointed out, but no idea.
"3. Any stuffing in the tweeter cavity?"
Yeah, I glued in 1/2" open cell foam, and also polyfil above and below the neos which is just space in the Neo's sub-cabinet not really doing anything. Danny I'm sure can say what he prefers, but the only point is to kill the back wave. The drivers can play in open air so the fill isn't there to control them at all.
"4. What type of fasteners did you use to attach the drivers to the enclosures?"
Danny sent screws. For the woofers they have nice torx head screws and the woofer frame is countersunk around the screw holes so they don't stick out. Looks really nice.
For the Neos and rear ports I used the smaller phillips head screws he sent. Everything's black so they look good too. Normally I wouldn't like Phillips heads and rather have Torx or Hex heads on speakers but it works on the Neos IMO. I think I had enough Torx screws though that I coulda used them on the Neos too, but not sure. They don't get countersunk so I liked the smaller phillips head ones.
Don't worry about the heads sticking out though, 'cuz the neo sticks out in front of that, but you already have the kit right, so you can see what I mean looking at the Neo 8 driver?
"5. Did you paint the silver rivets on the Neo8's?"
Yes. I did it after they were all done though. I don't know why. I shoulda done it before I was done. The silver rivets in a big long line does look cool though so you might NOT want to paint them. I think that's why I didn't till I was done. I wanted to see how it looked. For my room painted black looks better to me.
Dr. Photo,
"-Since I'm considering this project (inspired by your results!)-"
Thanks! I was inspired by Danny's assertion that this was his best speaker beyond the Diluceos -among many other reasons.
You'll be in for a much bigger change than me I think. For the better also though I believe.
"-I'm really interested in seeing more detailed constuction pics."
Ooooh... that's a hard one. I posted what I took. 'cept for more 'finished' pics which my buddy promised to send already. I 'hope' I'll get 'em soon since I want to see them myself!
If it was my own digital cam I woulda taken a lot more pics, but since it was just my buddy's and him coming over every once in a while I just got 'stage by stage' quick progress shots. Really I went so fast he would've had to come over every day to get all the details of the work.
"-In particular, I'm a bit confused about the shape of divider that forms the tweeter compartment...based on the plan."
There's a sheet of MDF that runs from the inside back to inside face. Then you glue a 2nd layer of MDF behind the face for the woofers, but not behind the Neo section. There you run a long thin strip between the divider and the inner side wall, but about 3' back.
You don't really need to know how far back 'cuz in the plans you'll see that the side wall 2nd inner layer on the Neo side doesn't go all the way from the back to the face. It stops a few inches from the face, and that thin strip blocking off the neo's just rests on that inner sidewall edge.
Damn, that was confusing, and I did it already! Sorry if that didn't help?
"-BTW: did you 'round off' the front baffle edges?"
Yeah. I used a 1/2" roundover bit. Couldn't get a 3/4" roundover but Danny said it's just for looks (I made sure beforehand) and there's no diffraction effect from having less of a roundover.
I'm thinking it's probably the same for a razor sharp edge too, but I'd ask Danny to be sure, since that's even more extreme.
You might find that a lot harder to veneer and get that perfect edge than just being able to roll the veneer around the edge, but sounds like you're not going to veneer it?
"On the veneer isssue....I might go with an auto type paint finish. I think these would look really sharp in Porche metallic silver/clearcoat."
Wow. That'd be wild! Not my thing, but hey, they're yours. They should be a one of a kind right?
I'd think that painted look would be better w/ a rounded edge though.
Hope you'll always have a lot of silver in your HT room. If there was nothing else silver you might later come to find them not matching your room? Something to think about long term maybe?
I'm sure they'd be killer in piano gloss black too since the drivers are all black, but matte black so they'd still stand out and be very striking, but I personally love real wood more than any other finish.
Someone needs to do these in Piano black! And maybe leave the rivets silver, but all black would look more refined I think.
Dark cherry's the best wood color IMO (like Danny's), but just doesn't match my room so I didn't really have a choice of color. I like the light wood too. It makes a bolder statement w/ the black drivers moreso than dark cherry I think.
