Looking for a first DIY project.

[wmilas]

Hi all, I'm a new poster I've looked at all the completed threads here and at Zaph's site.

I recently purchased a table saw for other projects and thought I might as well try my hand at a DIY speaker project. I (obviously) would like to start small. After thinking about what I could try my hand at I realized I'm using a nasty set of amplified yamaha speakers with a small sub for my computer speakers. This seems to be the perfect candidate for me to mess up on my first attempt

The problem here is that I can't find a "kit" that would make a single driver, 3" most probably, in a small enough enclosure to fit my needs. The plans on Zaph's site are pretty close to what I want, but are optimized for a bigger enclosure, plus his design mandates that the speakers be elevated to ear level. I was thinking more of a tilted upward enclosure.

While I realize that I could design my own enclosure, I really wanted to build something stock to begin with that has a known response, and then play with tweaking the passive filter to really understand how these things work. Basicly, I want to build something small I can destroy if I tweak the wrong way

I was thinking of using one of those sonic T digital amps to power this. Was thinking of ripping the sonic amp out of its case and putting the drivers filters along with the amp in a nice wooden case, or perhaps some type of metal if I get that motivated. This would allow me to control amp size.

Last step would be to build a small sub to complement this.

I'm willing to document my steps here .

So can anyone suggest a pretty small enclosure? Zaphs was about 9 inches tall and I'm looking more for something 6 inches or so. Or, I could live with 9 inches but I'd need a narrower design than Zaphs. Yes, I understand that I'm going to totally bork alot of response parameters by going smaller but unfortunately this is one of the compromises that this design would have to make. However I'm still looking for an enclosure that would be optimal for its small size

As far as my skills go, I'm a novice woodworker that just spent a buttload of some tools :P. My background is Comp. Eng. back when Comp Eng. was more like EE. I haven't touched a physical circuit except to repair some things in a few of my old amps in years. However part of the reason of wanting to do this project is to fool around with filters and crossovers... I want to see if I can remember anything from years back . Plus the measurement tools and modelers are leaps and bounds beyond what I had available at the time so I'd like to tinker with them.

As far as expense goes, I realize I could buy a Klipsch 2.1 system off the shelf. Thats not the point here. I'd like to try my hand at building something as nice, if not nicer, and I'm not concerned an awful lot about the price (within reason). The whole idea here is to learn something.

Thanks for your (collective) time.

Wayde

[cjd]

A 4" wide cabinet is about as narrow as you can go with a 3" driver.

There's a thread here with a similar question, though different. But some of the issues are mentioned here.

I'm not aware of anything better for your application than what Zaph has.

However, I think you need to approach this differently...

I use these with my laptop, sitting in my comfy chair. Even room for a cat to curl up on my legs while I work.



Ok, so I really just posted that because someone has already complained that I'm posting it a lot. :B

[wmilas]

Nothing wrong with 4 or slighty wider depth.

Can't approach it differently. I sometimes work from home and I have some very powerful compute nodes racked. Its not something I can move around. Have 3 21 inch lcds tethered to do what I do.

If I didn't need the 21" for design and simulation space I'd go the laptop route and access the compute nodes remotely... but I do

I have all my cd's ripped via flac stored on one of the raid arrays and I listen to them when I'm working. Hence I'm trying to squeeze the physical speakers around the center lcd without having to push the left and right ones out too far.

[JonW]

Wayde-

A few things:

As far as expense goes, I realize I could buy a Klipsch 2.1 system off the shelf. Thats not the point here. I'd like to try my hand at building something

First: Excellent attitude. :T

Second: I have not seen anything smaller than the Zap 3” driver design. If you find something else, please post it.

Third: This is the nicest small speaker design I can find:

http://www.rjbaudio.com/Microbe%20SE/microbe%20SE.html

And I’ve been looking for something small that might make for good computer speakers. Too big for you, though.

Fourth: Please tell Chris how sexy his feet are. He really likes hearing that a lot.

[cjd]

hehe...

I've pondered a micro-design but never really get too far - partly because I now have to use headphones at my computer (I also have limited desktop space, with more to be used in the near future I hope).

You can always start with one of the more generally accepted full-range drivers, model up a box, see how far you can get with it.

[Jim85IROC]

I built Zaph's Tangband 3" full range design for my computer. While a lot taller than your target design, the overall footprint is small, and whether I had something 6" tall or 16" tall really didn't matter if it was taking up the same amount of desk space. By building the taller design I got them up to ear height. They make an excellent computer speaker, because they have a very good nearfield sound. They were also extremely easy to build.

For bass, I built a small subwoofer that used the Dayton DA175 7" woofer. It's no room shaker, but it's a fantastic match to the small Tangbands.

[augerpro]

I say build it to your specs, afterall this isn't exactly a high fidelity studio monitor. Slanted baffle is fine, since it's facing up at you anyway. It can be 6 inches tall, but extend the depth so the overall volume is the same.The only important change you're making is baffle size. Since the baffle is much smaller build the crossever with the 8 ohm R2 resistor. Then listen to it and measure it. Maybe try R2 of 10 ohms. Listen and mesure. This way you can see the effects and learn and tinker.