DiY speaker suggestions?

[gimpy]

Here goes. I will just jump in and ask my questions. I would like to upgrade my main speakers to do it yourself. Like everyone, I want the best for the least amount of money. Here are the parameters I have set for them:

1: no more than $400. for the pair. (this does not include the cabinets. I have already bought the wood to build them)

2: if posssible, I would like floor standers or a semi-floor stander (I already have book shelf size -- B & W DM 303's (entry level model/price) and want something a little taller.

3: I have a 6-8 ohm A/V receiver, so I think that they should be 8 ohms?
(I planned to get the kit 281's but backed off when I realized they were only 4 ohm speakers). Is it a necessity to match them?

4: I was thinking about an MTM design (don't really know what that means, but I think it means two mid range woofers with a tweeter?). It sounds like, from what I've read, that most of those are 4 ohm? Other designs are OK.

5: I'm not too worried about the bass as I have a cheap sub and plan to build a good one down the road.

I may think of other things later. It seems that most of the kits that I like and have read about are usually 2 or 3 hundred dollars higher than what I can afford. I don't care about the different graphs, etc, because I don't understand them.

Can you give me kit suggestions? Either DIY kits bought from dealers or speakers you or someone else have built from scratch with your own pick of parts that sound as good as dealer kits (at least to you)? Whatever I decide will be from what you good folks suggest and not from me listening to myself as that is not possible.

thx, for reading and helping, Frank

[purplepeople]

I've listened to some of the stuff from Creative Sound. They are decent kit. I'm hoping to get to the next NW DIY event to listen to those Spires again... if they sound good again this time, I might buy a kit for a pair of centre arrays.

I've also read good things about the Parts Express kits, but have never listened to any.

Since you've got the wood, you might consider some version of Lynn Olson's Ariel MTM floorstander. I've heard one rendition of it and it was very good. I don't think there is a specific kit but there is a ton of stuff on the web.

Also, some of the nicest sounding speakers I've heard are based on expensive single drivers like Jordans and Vifas. Not the highest of highs or lowest of lows, but really, really smooth from around 150Hz-15,000kHz.

ensen.

[cdwitmer]

It's interesting that Creative Sound and fullranges should get mentioned together in this post, because Creative Sound is about to bring out a very interesting fullrange driver:

http://www.creativesound.ca/details.php?model=WR125S

Definitely something that piques my curiosity. I wonder why they plan to bring out a 16-ohm version as well as an 8. I guess the 16-ohm will be wired in parallel for MTM type speakers, but if so, why not just go with a midrange driver? But 6 or 8 of the 16s wired in parallel would make a very interesting line array, no doubt.

Christopher Witmer
Tokyo

[ThomasW]

Frank,

I'm afraid that the budget is just a little to low to build a decent set of MTM's. If you can raise it to approx $500 then the link below has a reasonable pair.

http://www.partsexpress.com/projectshowcase/eros/index.html

[gimpy]

Thx for the replies.
purplepeople, I haven't had a chance to look for Lynn Olsen on the internet just yet (I will here in a little bit. My computer is only regular dial-up now, so it takes a while to do a search).

cdwitmer, that looks like a nice driver, but at a hundred a pop, probably a little out of my range (also, I have no clue how to design something using them. Would I just substitute them in someone else's design?)

ThomasW, those really look sweet (I "might" could talk my better half into that extra hundred or so); but, if I'm reading the site correctly, it says they are 4 ohm speakers. I still don't know if my receiver could work with 4 ohms. I'm really going to look real hard at them before I decide.

I wanted towers because I think they look better than bookshelf and because I think/thought that using multiple drivers over single drivers, they would sound better. Maybe that's not necessarily the case? Maybe there are bookshelf size in my price range that would sound as good as towers? or not. I'm open to any/all suggestions.

ThomasW and others, I don't really want to limit myself to mtm, if there are other designs, etc. out there that sound really good. The most limiting part for me is the money. I need to stay as close to the $400.00 or so (since I have bigger projects going on; i.e. landscaping, new garage) and money is getting scarce/harder to come by.

thx, Frank

[robertwb70]

check out adires 10.1 kit $300 -8 ohms 95dB/watt

[gimpy]

ThomasW, have you heard the 281's? How would you compare the sound/quality with the eros?

thx

[PMazz]

I've built both the 281s and the Eros. I'd definitely give the nod to the Eros. The main differences are the 281s have better bass output but the Eros do everything else better. I really like the SS9500 tweeter. I also tried both the parallel and series xover. The series xover blew up (a cap) so I put the parallel back in and couldn't tell the difference. I also padded the tweeter down by ~1.5dB to suit my tastes.

The Eros are going to be a little harder to drive if you're worried about a 4 ohm load. I never had any problems with either, even using an older Sony receiver.

Pete

[motrctyman]

Definitely something that piques my curiosity. I wonder why they plan to bring out a 16-ohm version as well as an 8. I guess the 16-ohm will be wired in parallel for MTM type speakers, but if so, why not just go with a midrange driver? But 6 or 8 of the 16s wired in parallel would make a very interesting line array, no doubt.

Christopher Witmer
Tokyo

The 16-ohm version would be for us tube-heads 8O

[purplepeople]

Wouldn't most units that can do 2 pairs of 8 ohm speakers be able to run a single 4 ohm pair?

ensen.

[Andrew Pratt]

Also there's no reason you couldn't make any bookshelf design into floorstanders...simply install a shelf where the bottom of the bookshelf would normally be to keep the volume correct and then fill the lower cavity with some thing inert to keep it steady. My M8'a towers are built that way.