Speaker Holes

[Keefe]

In an effort to finish my speaker enclosures quickly, I have cut many corners. I am about 2/3 of the way through and was wondering how critical the size of the holes in the baffles (for the speakers) are. I have 7in speakers and accidentally (improper measuring) cut one of the holes a little over 1/4 of an in too big. The speaker will still screw in fine, but the hole is way to big (not to mention far from a perfect circle). If I flush mount the woofers, are there any negative effects to this?

The same goes for the tweeters too, but those holes are MUCH worse...

[joecarrow]

For the woofers, you need to make sure there are no air leaks. If they're not round, it's not a huge problem. If there are major portions sticking out blocking the back of the cone from firing into the enclosure, then that's a problem.

For the tweeters, it's even less of a problem if they have their own enclosures. Other than the countersink, my tweeter cutouts are pretty ugly. As long as the drivers have good solid connections to the cabinet, and you don't have holes blowing air, you're in good shape. An old trick I've read is to get some smoke from incense or a lit cigarette, and hold it around your woofer and tweeter while the finished speaker is playing something with a lot of bass. Hopefully the air leaks will be visible with the smoke being blown around, and you can touch them up with some caulk.

PS- it's best to put the caulk on the cabinet with the woofer removed, and let it cure a while before replacing the woofer. Too much exposure to extreme volatile solvent fumes can do bad things to the woofer. Like the smoke thing, this is something I've heard, not had first hand experience with.