M8a MKIV ver 2

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  • Andrew Pratt
    Moderator Emeritus
    • Aug 2000
    • 16507

    M8a MKIV ver 2

    As some of you know I went ahead several months ago and built four of Jon's M8a speakers. I opted to go sealed since I had two large tempest subs to cover the low end. Anyway I was very impressed with them for the most part but I couldn't get them to blend over to the subs as well as I'd wanted and since I was looking for a new project to keep me out of trouble I decided to rebuild two of them into the ported version. With a little help from our esteemed guru's I set to work last weekend and built some new box's and since I was home with the flu today I installed the XO's and drivers and fired them up. I've been listening to them for about an hour now listening to how they sound with a port instead of sealed and running with the sub set to off in 2 channel mode. To be honest I wasn't sure how much of an improvement it would be but they're incredible! I was very happy with their soundstage before but now I think its even better and of course without the sub to interfere with the bass that's significantly better too. I'm now wondering if I had too much stuffing or maybe to little in the sealed box to explain some of the sound differences but regardless I'm one happy M8a owner 8) They're still just raw MDF at the moment but it shouldn't be to bad finishing them up from here. I'll try and borrow a digital camera in the next few days but basically the new speakers are simply two sheets of 3/4 MDF that I had cut lenghts wats to either 14.5", 10.5" or 13" for the various sides as well as a bunch of smaller peices to act as tops, seperators and bottom plates. The only snafu I ran into is since I was ripping the sheets sideways I figured the 48" width was perfect for what I needed....any it woul have been had both sheets been 48" wide :evil: Yup you guessed it I happened to grab one that was 49" and one that was 48" so I needed to do a little triming on the wider sheet. Luckily the way I had laid out the panels most of them were cut on the 48" sheet and only some of the side cheeks were on the wider sheet so they weren't as critical




  • ThomasW
    Moderator Emeritus
    • Aug 2000
    • 10934

    #2
    Glad you like the results Andrew. The M8a driver puts out a surprising amount of LFE for an 8" unit.

    BTW I've never seen 48" wide MDF




    theAudioWorx
    Klone-Audio

    IB subwoofer FAQ page


    "Complicated equipment and light reflectors and various other items of hardware are enough, to my mind, to prevent the birdie from coming out." ...... Henri Cartier-Bresson

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    • Andrew Pratt
      Moderator Emeritus
      • Aug 2000
      • 16507

      #3
      As I promised here's some prelim pictures of the speakers as I continuing to finish them.

      I decided to do something similar to sonus Faber with the leather on the front, top and back with wooden sides. At the fabric store I found two thin faux leather fabics that I like one was basic black leather and the other was a ostrich pattern that I quite liked so that's what I choose to use.




      Here's 3" flared vent that I have on the rear of the speakers.



      Here's the grill frame I cut out. Its 1/2 MDF that I cut down to size then used the router to round the top and bottom into an oval shape then made to circle cut outs in the centre for the driver and tweeter. I then rounded over the top edge with a 1/4 round bit and painted it flat black. I also inserted four magnets that I'll use to keep the grill in place. The next step is to attatch the grill cloth to the frame. I got a few ideas on how to do that but it will depend on if I can find the right router bit to cut out a thin groove in which I can stuff the fabric and the thin rubber "pipe" they use on window screens.



      here's a shot of the nekkid MDF box's prior to applying the leather front. As you can see I've recessed the driver cutouts.





      Here's the side view showing the position of the flared port and the input cup on the bottom. I haven't attached the side peices yet since I haven't painted them at this point...in fact one still needs to be sanded down.



      Here's the front view with the Vifa tweeter installed. When the hi-Vi driver is pushed in it should snug up the leather around the tweeter nicely.





      Comment

      • David Meek
        Moderator Emeritus
        • Aug 2000
        • 8938

        #4
        I like this Andrew! The faux leather will be a nice touch. I'm very interested to see how (if any) that changes the sound of the M8A's.




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        • Andrew Pratt
          Moderator Emeritus
          • Aug 2000
          • 16507

          #5
          I plan to add the felt around the tweeter directly to the grill frame so I imagine there will be a slight difference between running them with and without the grills on.




          Comment

          • Hank
            Super Senior Member
            • Jul 2002
            • 1345

            #6
            Andrew, nice creativity at work there! Man, I wish there was a way to avoid the felt thing - IMO, chunks of felt ruin otherwise beautiful cabinets.

            Comment

            • Andrew Pratt
              Moderator Emeritus
              • Aug 2000
              • 16507

              #7
              Hank you won't see the felt at all since it will be built into the removeable grill...so when I remove the grill you will only see the leather.




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              • Hank
                Super Senior Member
                • Jul 2002
                • 1345

                #8
                Andrew, I was speaking of grill off. Some people don't even use grills, some remove grills for critical listening. A beautiful cabinet with no grills looks great, and some drivers look good too.

                Comment

                • Andrew Pratt
                  Moderator Emeritus
                  • Aug 2000
                  • 16507

                  #9
                  I'll propbably leave the grills off until the baby is tall enough to reach the M8a driver Luckily that gives me about 12 months from now :P




                  Comment

                  • Andrew Pratt
                    Moderator Emeritus
                    • Aug 2000
                    • 16507

                    #10
                    I finally finished painting the side cheeks for my new towers and have been glueing them in place the last 24 hours so here's some pictures to bring you all upto speed. Click the image to view a much higher resolution version..sorry about the images its pretty dark in my HT room and I can't left these anymore to take them upstairs to the natural light. The sides were painted with numerous coats of various paints trying to get the right look. I first tried spraying on Rustoleum's "black" hammered paint which I couldn't get to look uniform (I generally don't like spray paints) I then ran out and the wal-marts were all out of the black so I tried a different brand (Tremclad) and their charcoal turned out silver which didn't look right at all so I then bought a can of the rustoleum hammered black and rolled on two coats which worked much better.

                    This one doesn't have a larger version but gives you some idea of how they look altogether.


                    Front view


                    here's how the grills turned out.


                    Here's a close up of the top showing the side cheeks and the nice ostrich leather. Its a little greener here then in real life due to the flash.





                    Comment

                    • Bing Fung
                      Ultra Senior Member
                      • Aug 2000
                      • 6521

                      #11
                      EXXXcellent Andrew! The Finish material is a nice custom touch.




                      Bing
                      Bing

                      Comment

                      • Andrew Pratt
                        Moderator Emeritus
                        • Aug 2000
                        • 16507

                        #12
                        thanks bing coming from you that means a lot. One of these days you and christine will have to come by and hear them




                        Comment

                        • Burke Strickland
                          Moderator
                          • Sep 2001
                          • 3161

                          #13
                          Cosmetically, those speakers are turning out very nicely. I hope that in use, they end up sounding as great as they look!

                          Burke

                          PS -- good use of that new camera too.

                          What you DON'T say may be held against you...

                          Comment

                          • Lex
                            Moderator Emeritus
                            • Apr 2001
                            • 27461

                            #14
                            Lookin good Andrew. Nice work! :T

                            Lex
                            Doug
                            "I'm out there Jerry, and I'm loving every minute of it!" - Kramer

                            Comment

                            • Hank
                              Super Senior Member
                              • Jul 2002
                              • 1345

                              #15
                              Andrew, they look great. If you can take a pic that shows the leather in its real color, that would be cool.

                              Comment

                              • Andrew Pratt
                                Moderator Emeritus
                                • Aug 2000
                                • 16507

                                #16
                                Hank the picture further up in this thread is pretty close to how it really looks. (i.e. click here)




                                Comment

                                • efarstad
                                  Moderator Emeritus
                                  • Jun 2001
                                  • 2231

                                  #17
                                  Purty speakers there Andrew...nice job! :T

                                  E





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                                  Comment

                                  • David R.
                                    Member
                                    • Apr 2003
                                    • 90

                                    #18
                                    Andrew how did you end up attaching the grill cloth to the frame? I don't see any staples.. Did you end up routering a grove into the frame like you said above? Can you give any better details on how you did this?

                                    Comment

                                    • David R.
                                      Member
                                      • Apr 2003
                                      • 90

                                      #19
                                      Originally posted by David R.
                                      Andrew how did you end up attaching the grill cloth to the frame? I don't see any staples.. Did you end up routering a grove into the frame like you said above? Can you give any better details on how you did this?
                                      Never mind.. I read your grill cover.. post.

                                      Comment

                                      • Andrew Pratt
                                        Moderator Emeritus
                                        • Aug 2000
                                        • 16507

                                        #20
                                        Yes that's exactly how I did it...works extremely well




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