My speakers

[mustang]

This is my first attempt at full range speaker. They took me about a month and a half to complete. I wanted to build a fully capable speaker within a modest price range. I also wanted to do things a little different(driver configuration). I decided to use the Dayton Classic line from Parts Express due to their excellent reputation. I went with a pair of 8 Ohm 8" woofers for the bass and the 8 Ohm 6 1/2" for the mids. The tweeters are the Dayton 1 1/8" shielded type. I also went with the Dayton pre-fab 3-way (375/300-Hz) crossovers. The cabinets are 3/4" MDF covered in Parts Express black ash vinyl laminate. The ports are PSP flared ports tuned to 29Hz.

The dimensions of these beasts are 40"x11"x18", yielding approximately 3.5 cubic feet. They stand about 41 1/2" tall on the black chrome spiked feet and weigh 65lbs each. Impedence measuered up at 3.9 Ohms.

They sound great to me, though they are probably a bit fat in the upper bass(150-200 Hz range). The bass is effortless and fills the room without any significant dead spots. They now reside where my BOSE 701s use to be.

[Feanor]

Mustage,

These look great! I'm interested in building in full-range system myself, (my first too); see my recent thread ... http://forums.audioreview.com/showthread.php?t=12948

I would be very interested to know what software tools you used for the design, and also what measurment equipment you use. Currently I have no measurement capability but I think I'll wnat to remedy that situation soon.

[mustang]

Mustage,

These look great! I'm interested in building in full-range system myself, (my first too); see my recent thread ... http://forums.audioreview.com/showthread.php?t=12948

I would be very interested to know what software tools you used for the design, and also what measurment equipment you use. Currently I have no measurement capability but I think I'll wnat to remedy that situation soon.

Thanks, and honestly they look better in the pictures. It was my first time using laminate and the first speaker is a little rough around the edges, but they look OK. The only software I used was a free download from Parts Express used to determine the volume needed for the woofers. Other than that I took the easy route and bought the pre-fab crossovers. I measured the impedence using a Radio Shack multi meter. I have no intentions of doing frequency response or impedence curves on these. They play loud and clean with plenty of bass and smooth highs. Good enough for me.

[kexodusc]

Mustang, those do look great. I know you're saying you have no plans to do anything else, but most people get the bug sooner or later...
Now, as you get a bit more confidence you can experiment adding a few tweaks to those stock crossovers. A zobel filter or some L-padding is probably the easiest thing to start with. Two components soldered to the existing crossover. Could help a lot. Wouldn't even cost $10.

If you were to post the components of the crossover we could probably help make a few recommendations, if you decide your interested.

Is that the black ash vinyl from Parts Express as well? Looks great.

[Feanor]

It looks like your woofers are on the back of the cabinets. This is a pretty unusual arrangement. I was wondering why you did that?

Seems you're replacing Bose speakers ;) . As you know, Bose enjoys a very low reputation amoung hard-core audiophiles.

[PAT.P]

These look really great ,what order of crossover? Whats the db ? Im want to build a centre already have the driver and box plan and crossover parts but know Im debating on changing to a 4th order instead of 2nd order .Im also looking in adding LPad and series notch filter .Congrad and enjoy.Pat.P

[mustang]

Mustang, those do look great. I know you're saying you have no plans to do anything else, but most people get the bug sooner or later...
Now, as you get a bit more confidence you can experiment adding a few tweaks to those stock crossovers. A zobel filter or some L-padding is probably the easiest thing to start with. Two components soldered to the existing crossover. Could help a lot. Wouldn't even cost $10.

If you were to post the components of the crossover we could probably help make a few recommendations, if you decide your interested.

Is that the black ash vinyl from Parts Express as well? Looks great.

I ordered everything froms Parts Express. I've had these done for about a week now. My biggest downfall is I have no soldering experience. That's why I went with the pre-fabs. They have a diagram on the site showing the crossover design/components, it's in PDF format. Thanks for the input.

[mustang]

It looks like your woofers are on the back of the cabinets. This is a pretty unusual arrangement. I was wondering why you did that?

Seems you're replacing Bose speakers ;) . As you know, Bose enjoys a very low reputation amoung hard-core audiophiles.

Well, I knew I wanted to things a bit different. And I've seen plenty of different speakers with woofers facing forward, backwards, sideways, downward, internal. I didn't think it would have any negative effects on sound as I have experimented with my home theater sub facing backwards and for years now I've had the sub in my car facing the back. Another reason was appearance. I didn't want the speakers to be any taller than they are. I laid out all the drivers beforehand and thought it looked too busy with them all in front with the port. They also now offer a bit of stealthiness, from the front they look like big(huge) two-ways. When all was said and done they didn't let me down. These things rock and all the sound is there. I still like my BOSE speakers and I hope this thread won't turn into a BOSE thrashing.

[Feanor]

Mustage,

I'm not an expert but I would guess rear-firing should be fine. I don't know but possibly there is some rule about how close they need to be to the wall in order to minimize resonances and/or cancellation. E.g. perhaps they ought to be no farther away than 1/4 of a wave length. Given a 375 Hz crossover, that would be 8" or closer to the wall -- but I'm only speculating.

I'm no Bose basher -- in fact, I've never really heard any other their models.