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Building speakers enables me to combine two favorite hobbies, woodworking and audio. So far, my efforts have been
confined to building the designs of other people. I've recently acquired some speaker design software and have started
learning to do it myself. Here are a couple of my projects.
Speaker City Scan7 Monitor (click here)
A High Quality Speaker for My Jeep Wrangler
Lou C's Topaz Monitor I was looking for a small monitor speaker to use on my computer as I eventually want to experiment with digitizing some
of my LP's to CD. Lou C's monitor fit the bill nicely. Built with inexpensive speakers available from Parts Express, they are ideal for this application. Driver integration is excellent, the crossover is well thought out and designed,
and they perform very well in this nearfield application. You see them pictured here just after completion and before being
veneered
My first attempt at DIY speaker design is the small "subwoofer" to go along with Lou C's monitors on my computer. It's neither
fair to call this a "design" nor a "subwoofer. I simply put the T/S parameters into WinISD and built the suggested box. The box is 0.75 cu ft and uses a 35W plate amp that I got from Apex Jr.
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| Lou C's Topaz Monitor and My DIY Computer "Sub" |
The woofer is an 8-inch DVC paper cone woofer that I got from Parts Express for only $8.00. It's stiff enough to be used
in the downfiring position. It's 3dB cutoff is about 45Hz which is ideal for my application since the room in which I have
my computer is 10 feet square and I didin't want to add too much bass to this square room. The sub adds just another octave
to the monitor speakers. The factory set crossover frequency of the amp is 150 Hz but as soon as I'm able to trace out the
circuit, I'm going to experiment with changing the crossover frequency of the amp. All in all, given that the entire sub only
cost me $50.00, it's a nice combo for use with my compter.
Here's a screen shot from WinISD showing the design parameters of the sub. Click on The Image for a Larger View.
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