Ambitious cabinet design for Nat P!

[oldbar]

If you used the free shipping deal(which most people do), what do you expect? So many people complain about shipping costs from the USA. So they use a postal service which with hasaudio is FREE at a certain order price. When something goes wrong or delivery times get thrown out the window which can easily happen, guess who gets the blame? If you were charged what you would pay for shipping via fedex,dhl etc, then you would have reason to complain.

With regards the nat P order. Not much to say really about that one. Mistakes were made, bits weren't ordered when they were meant to be, bits were broken during shipping. But no more. Not doing special orders anymore. If we don't have it, buy overseas.

We try our best.

Not interested in getting into a slanging match with you on here.
To sum it up simply because it is free which you promote on your site after a certain price point you should not complain about it if things go wrong.
I have ordered lots of stuff overseas for a long time and have had no problems untill now.
Anyway I hope that you manage to solve the postal problems that you are having.
Maybe you should consider having a fully registered option in your postal options

[Hdale85]

If you have complaints about your shipping method then I believe the company is a bit at fault, you choose your shipper and what methods to ship with, if they aren't reliable then you shouldn't be using them as they are just going to cause you problems. Most of the blame is of course with the shipping company, but if you have issues then why would you continue to use them?

[serioushifi]

If you have complaints about your shipping method then I believe the company is a bit at fault, you choose your shipper and what methods to ship with, if they aren't reliable then you shouldn't be using them as they are just going to cause you problems. Most of the blame is of course with the shipping company, but if you have issues then why would you continue to use them?

We have never really had issues with the postal service up until recently.

If we always had problems with it, then yes, we would have stopped using them along time ago. The EMS courier service is the next best thing, so we are going to look into this.

But overall, the postal service is ok, although delivery times can change very quickly. A few instances where things have gone pear shaped. It was just our luck to be rather busy when the .... hit the fan.

With the FREE shipping deal, we now have a note saying that we DONOT take responsibility for delivery times. The shipments are covered under insurance, but delivery times are not. However, we should have also offered another option with a confirmed delivery time. You are right. Something we have learnt now.

[serioushifi]

Not interested in getting into a slanging match with you on here.
To sum it up simply because it is free which you promote on your site after a certain price point you should not complain about it if things go wrong.
I have ordered lots of stuff overseas for a long time and have had no problems untill now.
Anyway I hope that you manage to solve the postal problems that you are having.
Maybe you should consider having a fully registered option in your postal options

Yes. I understand this. Usually the postal service is ok. I would suggest you ring aupost and ask them if there are delays with processing at australian mail hubs. Just so you can actually see that there are delays and its not just us saying so. You might want to call nzpost also about this. But we apologize very much for the inconvenience. I would be disappointed aswell.

[baniels]

Hey Johnnz - any more pictures to bring this thread back on point?

[Johnnz]

Mission Complete!

Yes, indeed Baniels
I just finished the last speaker this morning and have carted them from my workshop into the house in my car to keep them out of the pouring rain as much as possible.

As I write I am sat in front of them listening to the Black Eye Peas to get an idea how they handle bass and the tuning of my ports.

First impressions are very detailed soundstage and airy natural sounding. I began to be a bit worried about how the truncated cabinet top might affect the top woofer with less breathing room, but although all my listening is subjective, I am very pleased with how they are sounding. And only have them running off my Rotel rated 50W at 4 ohm (30w at 8ohm). Running up to near 12 oclock I suspect that it losses 100% control of the bass. Playing Aaron Nevilles "Everybody Plays the Fool" a few minutes ago, all the little nuances in the track come through like I have never heard before.

They (my Nat P's) have shown up a difference in sound quality between my music library running (Flac files mainly) and my CD player that I never knew existed before - basically it seems the Music Library sounds too "bright" or harsh in the treble region. Playing discs on the CD player through the same DAC (Musical Fidelity Digilogue) sound far more balanced and listenable.

On another issue, I ended up moving around my hifi gear in the lounge in order to be able to move the speakers further apart from the tv. As it were, they had to be pushed right up against the telly between a door and a window. Aesthetically, with my cabinet design, they really need to be able to be seen from the side otherwise they look rather disappointing I think. Seen from the side they look considerably better and more elegant than straight on (also when seen from a slight angle sitting in front of them the truncated rear top section makes the front baffle look a bit flimsy appearing to have little behind the top half.)

As I said, it's raining here at the moment, but later in the week I will try to get some better photos showing a few more close-ups etc with what seems to be the obligatory outdoor photo shoot!

Set up in the lounge: (gotta dust the music library..)

[Hdale85]

So very jealous...... the natP's are a very decent speaker! But the cabinets you built are just stunning....... You're the one that built that amazing wood HTPC case as well!

[Johnnz]

Thanks Hdale. Very pleased to have them finished now and get in some serious listening time finally

Some more photos:
First my spray rig as requested - nothing flash but worked well enough:



Picture showing Xovers installed and ready for soldering of internal leads:



And last of all a collection of finished pics (only took the one out as they are weighing in at 30kgs each)

Spring has sprung and a new pair of Nat P's are born :lol: :

[baniels]

Wow. That is a very inspiring build. You should be proud!

[Txgrizzly]

very,very nice.... thanks for the pic of your spray rig, was wondering how invloved it was and that would not be hard to duplicate

[fbov]

...They (my Nat P's) have shown up a difference in sound quality between my music library running (Flac files mainly) and my CD player that I never knew existed before - basically it seems the Music Library sounds too "bright" or harsh in the treble region. Playing discs on the CD player through the same DAC (Musical Fidelity Digilogue) sound far more balanced and listenable. ...

Odd... I still have the bias that CDs are harsh because early CDs were harsh.

The cherry blossoms look so out of place here in the northern half of the planet. Wonderful build thread, and nice sounding speakers to boot!

Have fun,
Frank

[Ezcl]

Damn, that's some beautiful handiwork there Johnnz. I'm sitting here listening to music on my Natalies, looking at yours which look MILES better than mine. I'm just a little jealous of your skills.

You should be very proud of those speakers, and I'm eagerly awaiting your next project...

[evilskillit]

Amazing, I think anyone would be proud to have those in their living room.

[JonMarsh]

Mission Complete!

Yes, indeed Baniels
I just finished the last speaker this morning and have carted them from my workshop into the house in my car to keep them out of the pouring rain as much as possible.

As I write I am sat in front of them listening to the Black Eye Peas to get an idea how they handle bass and the tuning of my ports.

First impressions are very detailed soundstage and airy natural sounding. I began to be a bit worried about how the truncated cabinet top might affect the top woofer with less breathing room, but although all my listening is subjective, I am very pleased with how they are sounding. And only have them running off my Rotel rated 50W at 4 ohm (30w at 8ohm). Running up to near 12 oclock I suspect that it losses 100% control of the bass. Playing Aaron Nevilles "Everybody Plays the Fool" a few minutes ago, all the little nuances in the track come through like I have never heard before.

They (my Nat P's) have shown up a difference in sound quality between my music library running (Flac files mainly) and my CD player that I never knew existed before - basically it seems the Music Library sounds too "bright" or harsh in the treble region. Playing discs on the CD player through the same DAC (Musical Fidelity Digilogue) sound far more balanced and listenable.

On another issue, I ended up moving around my hifi gear in the lounge in order to be able to move the speakers further apart from the tv. As it were, they had to be pushed right up against the telly between a door and a window. Aesthetically, with my cabinet design, they really need to be able to be seen from the side otherwise they look rather disappointing I think. Seen from the side they look considerably better and more elegant than straight on (also when seen from a slight angle sitting in front of them the truncated rear top section makes the front baffle look a bit flimsy appearing to have little behind the top half.)

As I said, it's raining here at the moment, but later in the week I will try to get some better photos showing a few more close-ups etc with what seems to be the obligatory outdoor photo shoot!

Set up in the lounge: (gotta dust the music library..)

Now you're at a point where you may need to start looking at different DACs... your good music library should in the end out perform many of your CD's, but if it's not, there may be issues with the playback system and component choice.

They look beautiful, great work putting those together- definitely a work of art! :T

~Jon

[Hdale85]

Need a more appropriate tv stand now, that one looks out of place.

[Johnnz]

Thanks for all the kind comments.
I have been having a blast listening to all my music on these lately. These Nat P's replace my old bookshelf speakers (Mission M71's) which were very well reviewed speakers but too small for our living room. The difference is astounding in sound quality and the Nat P's can really fill the room with music with ease. I am also really quite amazed too at how well my little 30w Rotel can handle playing these large speakers at close to 12 o'clock volume levels. I had thought I would need a new amp immediately, but I think I will hold out a bit longer. Having said that it can drive the Nat P's it does get rather hot still, so I don't let it run endlessly at high volume.

Getting back to my earlier comments about my music library sounding harsh - I have done a lot of further listening and the difference is only noticable in the lower quality MP3 files I still have on it. Even though the minimum bit rate is 192khz on those files, the difference is still very clear especially in the higher frequencies where I am sure that anything in approximately the same frequency gets bound or bundled together with any similar sounding notes and comes out unpleasantly harsh and unnatural. Listening to files I have encoded myself into Flac there is no difference doing an A - B test with the original disc in the CD player.
Both my music library and CD player use the same dac which is an oldie but a goodie (Musical Fidelity Digilogue). It would still be interesting to audition a newer dac sometime.

As for the tv stand - something with angles perhaps?....

[Hdale85]

Yeah, or even something in a similar wood or contrasting wood, maybe a darker wood? Everything else in your system is wood so makes sense