[EthanH]

As the thread title suggests, I'm a complete noob when it comes to diy speaker building. That said, I'm about to make a move regarding speakers, and have been giving some serious thought into doing the diy thing. 

Of course, I'd like to get some feedback regarding some designs I've been considering, although it is troubling to me that there seems to be so few comparisons of diy designs to popular commercial speakers; it's almost as if people that purchase commercial speakers never listen to diy designs, and vice versa.  So, if I could hear some feedback about popular diy designs from people that have heard a Troels or Zaph kit I'd be interested.

Thanks

[Bob in St. Louis]

"PartsExpress.com" has several DIY versions. A few of them are VERY cool.
Having a price range (for the total project) may help those attempting to help you. 

Bob

[EthanH]

"PartsExpress.com" has several DIY versions. A few of them are VERY cool.
Having a price range (for the total project) may help those attempting to help you. 

Bob

Ah yes, the budget - a very important parameter, indeed!  I'm looking to spend under a thousand dollars, preferably not more than $700.  Audio is an extravagance for me, and in this economy especially I'm hoping to really get the biggest bang for the buck possible.  Some ideas I've been floating around include Troels' Seas mini monitor design:http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/W15.htm either with the excel or nextel woofer. I've also thought about the all metal seas monitor on zaph audio, in addition to a few other designs.  I'm not married to seas or anything, but I have heard the excel drivers in one of Tyler Acoustics' models and liked the combination of detail and smoothness (although I'm sure alot of the voicing comes from crossover design rather than driver selection).

I'd be coming from Totem Arros, so my main goal is to get the same level of transparency and maintain the big soundstage but gain a little "heft" or "impact" or whatever you want to call it.  Oh yeah, I think I'm going to end up using the "diyspeakercabinets.com" guy since I currently live in an apartment, so I have to keep the enclosure size around one cubic foot or smaller.  Oh yeah, I don't have space for massive OBs, but if I did I'd obviously be all over that.

[Bob in St. Louis]

> HERE < are the projects I was refering to earlier.
(Didn't have time to find the link during my first post).

Good luck! But most of all, have fun.

Bob

[sendler]

The Usher kit with finished cabinets gets great reviews and would be a 1 afternoon build now that they pre assemble the crossover. Buy a couple extra binding posts and leave the crossovers external on the back for tweaks and also because crossovers look cool. Why bury them away where they are never seen again. Plus, leaving them external keeps the option of playing with a DCX2496 later if you want to try that. Search the Tech Talk archives for comparisons against commercial designs.Comparisons are few because once you DIY, it would take $2-3000.00 in a commercial design to match the parts quality and sonics of the $600 kit.
.
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=302-951&ctab=5#Tabs
.

[Dean100]

 http://www.htguide.com/forum/showthread.php4?t=28655

Try the above link to many more DIY speaker projects. Also, what are you going to use these for mainly? Music? What SPL levels? The more info that you provide, the more suggestions that you will receive.

[EthanH]

Thanks for the link.  I'm going to be exclusively using the speakers for music, and I live in an apartment so SPL levels will not be ear-splitting - I often listen at low to moderate levels, but I have no SPL meter so I cannot give exact numbers.  As I said in my earlier posts, transparency is important to me but I would like a very smooth sound with some "heft" to it and a big soundstage, if possible.  The Arros were transparent and had the big soundstage, but they didn't have enough impact to keep me satisfied and they could get edgy with a lot of recordings.  I have two amps, one tube with 35 watts and one SS with 160 watts, so that shouldn't be a problem there.

Two designs that currently interest me are Zaph's L18 monitor, mainly because I have heard good things about it, especially it's bass performance, and it seems well documented and easy to put together.  Plus, I know the drivers are used in models from Totem and Joseph Audio, so I'm assuming they have the potential to sound good.  I've never heard the L18 though, so I don't know what to expect there; I've heard the magnesium W18 before and loved it, so who knows?

The other design that has caught me eye is Troels Gravesen's 5 inch seas mini-monitor using the w15cy and the 22taf/g tweeter.  This would be a more pricey build with many more crossover components, but the thought of the excel midrange combined with a 3/4" dome's dispersion characteristics is appealing to me.  The problem here would be that I'd be nervous that I'd have even less bass than I had with Arros since it's only a 5" driver in a 10 or so liter cabinet.  Plus it's pricey. 

Thanks for all the suggestions and feedback - it's always welcome!

[BrassEar]

Go OB if you can.

A plywood or MDF baffle of approx. 16 inches wide by 40 inches tall.

1 Alpha 15A with with a simple 1 mh coil.
1 good compression driver (B&C DE250 is excellent)
1 Lpad and one cap xover.
Grill cloth.

Nirvana for a song.  Use a waveguide on the compression driver for even higher end sound.

[EthanH]

I'm interested in OB and will probably go that direction in a few years, but for now WAF is an issue and OBs are verboten.  Thanks for the suggestion though.

[ecramer]

Selah Audios 3.5f may be what your looking for. The Morel mids are butter smooth