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Kudos to Paul on the excellent design; I originally built these for a pretty large room, but elected to go with the MTM version instead, so the TM ONS's are my new surround sound speakers, and DAMN do they sound great! The jump in sound quality over my previous rear surround speakers is enormous.
But before they could go in the HT room, they needed better cabinets, and by better I mean perfect.
I initially built a set of cabinets, but I really rushed them, and they turned out pretty bad. To make a long story short, I kept missing the router cuts by like 1/16" and the holes weren't the right size (which is exactly why you should do practice cuts on scrap wood before routing your panels. Anyway, I ended up making the front panels literally 3 times, and by the third time, I was just rushing them like crazy. Rushed the table saw cuts, rushed the router cuts, rushed the gluing, rushed the veneering, rushed the finishing, and they looked like crap. These are being used as my rear speakers (that I don't even see) and I couldn't stand them.
Here is a shot of the original cabinets and crummy, ugly crossovers, and the finished product below
If you look closely, you can see how god-awful the cuts are around the speaker holes. This is what happens when you rush the veneering process
So because I'm a perfectionist, I started over. And this time, I was going to take my time, and do it perfect.
So first thing's first; I bought some printed circuit boards and remade the crossovers perfectly. Even though you never see them, its important to me for some reason that they look professional.
Here is the Xover layout
And here are the finished crossovers (the ones on the right are for the MTM Overnight Sensations that I'll be building in the near future)
When it comes to cabinet construction, the biggest challenge for me is ALWAYS cutting the veneer around the speaker cutouts. So this time, I decided to build a closed box and veneer it BEFORE cutting the speaker holes with the router, then route the veneered boxes. That way, I'll get perfect cuts for the holes and the veneer. The drawback is I can't chamfer the backside of the driver cutouts, but I think its a fair trade-off.
Perfect holes, perfect veneer cuts
Driver fits perfectly, thanks to several test cuts on scrap wood!
Tweeter also fits perfectly
And now comes the finishing. Coat 1 of oil/urethane mix
Coat 1 on both speakers
Coat 2 of oil/urethane mix
Coat 2 complete
2 coats of Semi-gloss Polyurethane applied
Crossovers installed
Aaaaaannnnnndddd....
Finished product!
Flash shows off the Walnut veneer a bit
But before they could go in the HT room, they needed better cabinets, and by better I mean perfect.
I initially built a set of cabinets, but I really rushed them, and they turned out pretty bad. To make a long story short, I kept missing the router cuts by like 1/16" and the holes weren't the right size (which is exactly why you should do practice cuts on scrap wood before routing your panels. Anyway, I ended up making the front panels literally 3 times, and by the third time, I was just rushing them like crazy. Rushed the table saw cuts, rushed the router cuts, rushed the gluing, rushed the veneering, rushed the finishing, and they looked like crap. These are being used as my rear speakers (that I don't even see) and I couldn't stand them.
Here is a shot of the original cabinets and crummy, ugly crossovers, and the finished product below
If you look closely, you can see how god-awful the cuts are around the speaker holes. This is what happens when you rush the veneering process
So because I'm a perfectionist, I started over. And this time, I was going to take my time, and do it perfect.
So first thing's first; I bought some printed circuit boards and remade the crossovers perfectly. Even though you never see them, its important to me for some reason that they look professional.
Here is the Xover layout
And here are the finished crossovers (the ones on the right are for the MTM Overnight Sensations that I'll be building in the near future)
When it comes to cabinet construction, the biggest challenge for me is ALWAYS cutting the veneer around the speaker cutouts. So this time, I decided to build a closed box and veneer it BEFORE cutting the speaker holes with the router, then route the veneered boxes. That way, I'll get perfect cuts for the holes and the veneer. The drawback is I can't chamfer the backside of the driver cutouts, but I think its a fair trade-off.
Perfect holes, perfect veneer cuts
Driver fits perfectly, thanks to several test cuts on scrap wood!
Tweeter also fits perfectly
And now comes the finishing. Coat 1 of oil/urethane mix
Coat 1 on both speakers
Coat 2 of oil/urethane mix
Coat 2 complete
2 coats of Semi-gloss Polyurethane applied
Crossovers installed
Aaaaaannnnnndddd....
Finished product!
Flash shows off the Walnut veneer a bit
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