AVS Discussions
Audio => Do-It-Yourself Speakers and Subs => Topic started by: NBPk402 on November 03, 2016, 06:22:59 PM
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I have been wanting to make a full range horn loaded speaker for a while...so today I picked up some 2' x 2' plywood to do some testing. I will be starting with some 2' x 2' plywood horns, and then adding some woofers to them after running REW on them. If they sound as good as I have heard they do, I will then make another one that is bigger. Luckily I have 3 spare EV DH1As to use for 3 new Synergy horns with multiple 15" woofers, and some friends who have helped me get this far. I will post pics up as I progress.
Update:
I decided to just up the size, and go to what I really wanted to do... Go larger :)
The new Synergy horns will have a horn approximately the same size as a Klipsch K-402, but it will not have a flare. This will give me a 40" wide horn that is 26" high, and 26" deep (total depth includes the Ev DH1A driver).
Cost Breakdown:
Eminence Kappa-15C... $109 each (2 required per speaker)
EV DH1A driver... $ I already have 3 spares (enough to do all 3 front speakers), but if I was to buy them used it would be around $100 each
Speaker connectors (2 sets per speaker)...$unknown as I had them laying around already
3 sheets 3/4 MDF... $150
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Here is what I have so far... Does this look right? Suggestions?
Here is a link (http://"https://www.mediafire.com/#ksk3kp03zw8ue") to the Synercalc, Hornresp file.
My friend Chris is helping me (doing most of the work), and last night he found an error. Here is what it looks like after the error was fixed(last image). The red line on the amp gain is the new setting (what was changed is in the BI block...it was changed from 66.28 to 6.63). All of this is for a prototype 2' x2' x2' Synergy style horn. If this works out good... I am thinking of a horn with a 3' or larger mouth. What I have been told is this should go down to 40Hz without any problem... Pretty good for a 2 way horn IMO.
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more pics
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more pics
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Pics of the construction so far...
Basic box 40" wide x 27 1/2" tall, 26" deep.
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_102456_zpsqnt9wftt.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_102456_zpsqnt9wftt.jpg.html)
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_102504_zpspzpi8rvm.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_102504_zpspzpi8rvm.jpg.html)
Sides of horn being mocked up:
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_120950_zpsfr844z2x.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_120950_zpsfr844z2x.jpg.html)
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_121003_zps40xmn3n4.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_121003_zps40xmn3n4.jpg.html)
Ports for horn.
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_131931_zpsx93a6aq6.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_131931_zpsx93a6aq6.jpg.html)
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View of the sides with woofers installed,and compression driver mount.
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_151508_zpsnuybvf0y.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_151508_zpsnuybvf0y.jpg.html)
Front view of horn (we still need to trim off the horn sides which extend beyond the front of the cabinet).
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_151530_zpsif0eszgm.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_151530_zpsif0eszgm.jpg.html)
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Here is the internal woofer cavity with measurements... Hopefully we didn't space the ports to far out to clear the top and bottom angles of the horn... We will find out next weekend.
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_132213_zpsyn3ocrav.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/Our%20Synergy%20speaker%20build/20161127_132213_zpsyn3ocrav.jpg.html)
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Looking forward to this. Synergy horns are one of the toughest speakers to design and build. Good luck with the design and am looking forward to your results. :)
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Thanks Mike!
Today I picked my woofers... I went with the Kappa_15C. Since this is the first one I am building I only ordered 2 (2 per each horn required). Here is a link to the specs...http://www.eminence.com/pdf/Kappa_15C.pdf
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Thanks Mike!
Today I picked my woofers... I went with the Kappa_15C. Since this is the first one I am building I only ordered 2 (2 per each horn required). Here is a link to the specs...http://www.eminence.com/pdf/Kappa_15C.pdf
How high will these play?
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How high will these play?
Are you talking about frequency? We are porting them for a 400-500Hz crossover, but they will play much higher in frequency.
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Are you talking about frequency? We are porting them for a 400-500Hz crossover, but they will play much higher in frequency.
Yes, was referring to how high were you crossing them over in your design.
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I just got these in the mail today...
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/20161111_121016_resized_zps5imoiivy.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/20161111_121016_resized_zps5imoiivy.jpg.html)
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/Synergy%20build/20161111_120955_zps7eer7s35.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/Synergy%20build/20161111_120955_zps7eer7s35.jpg.html)
We are going to Burning Amp this weekend to see other DIY stuff, and hopefully will be able to start cutting wood next weekend.
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I can't wait to see how this turns out. I may want to copy the design if I could keep it about the same size as my La Scala\EV's.
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I can't wait to see how this turns out. I may want to copy the design if I could keep it about the same size as my La Scala\EV's.
The current design, I think will be about the same width as your La Scalas, but hopefully will eliminate the La Scalas as this should be a full range speaker.
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Today I got all of the MDF required for a single horn cut to rectangles, but 2 pieces still need to be cut to triangles, and 2 pieces need to have the front and rear edge bevel cut so it will be flush at the front of the cabinet, and flush in the rear to hold the compression driver. I also need to get 2 woofer rings cut. I have edited the first post with the new size of the horn, and will update with pics when I start to put it together.
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Be sure and take pics, when you start putting it together.
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awesome!
I am 1000% in love with my setup...but i have the itch to build some diy speakers....I want to try the F15's or the new HTM-12
looking forward to follow your progress :)
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I will make sure I get some pics of it going together...hopefully today will go well, and we make some real progress. I am not sure how much time my new friend will have to help me today though.
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Today we got the basic rectangular cabinet together, rear part holding the horn driver, and 2 sides cut, and angled. The horn is a 45 degree horn so far and will extend beyond the cabinet a bit. The sides of the horn are 33". The dimensions of the box are 40" wide 27 1/2" high and 26" deep. I am contemplating making a second section on the horn that will flare out maybe 6" more. From what i understand this will help the polar control of the lower end. By the time we got this far we ran out of time. Hopefully next weekend we can get it finished. I will take pics of the cabinet before we insert the horn inside. If all goes well it shouldn't be long before it is ready to test. :)
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Looking forward to seeing pictures.
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Ron, I would love to stop by and see what you have completed so far!! Is the cabinet at your house or the shop?
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Ron, I would love to stop by and see what you have completed so far!! Is the cabinet at your house or the shop?
It is at his house...hopefully we will finish it this weekend. He thinks it will fit in the back of his SUV. Give me a call when you get a chance.
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thread is useless without pics lol
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thread is useless without pics lol
It didn't make much sense to me to just post a pic of a square box...since that is all we have done so far, plus we ran out of time. I will have pics up after we work on it this weekend.
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all pics are fun :)
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all pics are fun :)
LOL... Hopefully we will make some good progress this weekend, and have lots of pics. :)
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First page now has pics of our speaker progress. Next weekend we will work on getting the angles to cut the top, and bottom of the horn. Once this is completed we will be making a flared horn extension to the front of the horn. This will extend the horn to 46-48" in width, and 32-32" tall. Last will be installing the speaker hookups, and wiring the speakers in place. Once I get these bad boys home I need to figure out what height they sound best at and make/buy something to mount them on.
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First page now has pics of our speaker progress. Next weekend we will work on getting the angles to cut the top, and bottom of the horn. Once this is completed we will be making a flared horn extension to the front of the horn. This will extend the horn to 46-48" in width, and 32-32" tall. Last will be installing the speaker hookups, and wiring the speakers in place. Once I get these bad boys home I need to figure out what height they sound best at and make/buy something to mount them on.
AWESOME JOB!...see i couldn't visualize it at all....now! man thats a huge speaker...gonna be awesome!
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I can't wait to get it finished so I can get it tuned as my center channel! Then we will try and make 2 more. Cash is the issue right now. I have the front 3 channels to sell and a ELK M1 gold alarm/home automation setup to sell (that I never got installed). If I can sell either one it will pay for the rest of the front channels to be built.
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When we make the next set... I am thinking an easier way would be to make the horn pieces about 1/2" larger and then route a groove into the cabinet top and bottom If we do it this way I think it will be stronger, and seal even better. Then we could do the upper and lower pieces of the horns with out having to worry about the angle of cut. Another advantage is that we wouldn't have to keep realigning the panels when we glue and nail.
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Well I just sold my PS3...more cash toward MDF for 2 more speakers! :)
Hopefully I can sell the horns and Bass Bins fast as that will pay for the rest of the wood, and woofers needed.
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Well we have a little setback on the speaker building project. It appears our ports are off by about 1/8", and will be blocked by that amount by the top and bottom horn boards. I need to see if we can come up with a way around this problem.
I have a couple of ideas but I am not sure which way is best. One is to notch the top and bottom boards to clear, and the other is to use a 1/4" board instead of a 3/4" board and then angle cut it. Once it is angle cut, we would than cut another 3/4" board the same size, and angle cut it so we would end up with what appears to be a 1" thick (which it would be) board, but it would (in theory) lower the board by 1/2" vs the original 3/4" thick board. This might work, but it might not as the ports are very close to the horn area and there is not much room for the thinner board, and angles to make a difference. In addition to this we also have the holidays coming up so progress might be halted until after the holidays. I will continue to update the build as we make progress.
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What we decided to do was use 1/2" MDF for the top and bottom sections of the horn shape. The part that we were dreading is finally completed. Making 2 pieces for the horn took 6 hours...the angles were not easy to figure out even with a digital angle reader. We made small pieces to get started, and then eventuall got a piece that was just about perfect. Once we got that far we duplicated it for 3 more pieces. Now we have an extra set of top and bottom horn pieces for templates for the 2nd speaker. Here are to pictures of what we completed. I still need to use some filler for the horn transition, and for the seams.
What do you usually use for a transition? Bondo, wood putty?
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/20161211_155339_zpsihytwfpt.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/20161211_155339_zpsihytwfpt.jpg.html)
(http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u393/ellisr63/20161211_155328_001_zpsoqrebuuu.jpg) (http://s1065.photobucket.com/user/ellisr63/media/20161211_155328_001_zpsoqrebuuu.jpg.html)
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Today we got it to the point that we only need the following:
1: fill holes with wood putty
2: mount speaker wire jacks, and wire speakers up
3: sand speaker cabinet
4: install weatherstripping for sealing cabinet
Hopefully next time we will be to fire it up to see how the compression driver sounds, and then also how the woofers sound. At that time it might be ready to take home, and set up the crossover...for some real serious listening.
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Sorry for the delay in posting pics of the one speaker we have completed. My theater is currently being torn down due to our moving . I will post up some pics of the speaker, and testing results hopefully before I get the room completely torn down. Currently I am waiting for the new amp to be completed.
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The synergy speaker has taken a bit of a turn... I am going the route of using a Klipsch k402 horn, and making it into a synergy horn. Today my k402 arrived. The original synergy we were building was going off of estimates of a k402 horn. Now I can make it closer, and still be out of wood. Another thing is I will be able to compare this horn with the klipsch driver, and the EV driver before synergy conversion. I haven't decided if I will cutry up the Klipsch or just use it for my measurements yet. I am thinking that one made out of wood could sound even better than the fiberglass horn.
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I looked on line and see that several people have used this horn to make a synergy horn. I have always thought that speaker looked interesting, being point source. You can always apply damping material to the fiberglass horn.
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I looked on line and see that several people have used this horn to make a synergy horn. I have always thought that speaker looked interesting, being point source. You can always apply damping material to the fiberglass horn.
I am going to try and use it as a model to make a horn out of MDF, and then make the mdf one a synergy horn. Once that is done...if it sounds better than the Klipsch horn, I will then have to decide if I want to cut the factory horn to make a synergy horn or just make 7 more out of MDF.
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Today we listened to the k402 horn in its new cabinet with the EV DH1a driver, and it sounded great. We compared it to a smaller EV horn with the same driver with both horns being crossed over at 500hz to LA Scala bass bins. The k402 horn sound much fuller on the bottom end than the smaller EV horn driver combo. The EV horn sounds excellent, but the k402 horn takes it up another level. I want to say it sounded even better than the JBL 2360a horn did with the same driver, but that is going by how the JBL sounded in my room, and tune a few months ago. We used the same settings for the MiniDSP that we used on my JBLs, and on the smaller EV horns.
My friend, and I now know why people make the really big horns! BIGGER HORNS SOUND EVEN BETTER! Next we will be tuning the DIY Synergy horn we made, and see how it does compared to the K402, and the EV horn.
I am hoping it sounds better than the EV/LA Scala bass bin combo...if it does I fully expect the Klipsch 402 wood version to sound even better than the K402/LA Scala bass bin combo does. I will post up how the first Synergy compares hopefully in the next week.
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Today I listened to the v1 all mdf that we built...I was very surprised as to the bass output, but something didn't sound right.the horn sounded like there were veils to be removed. My friend and I listed to various songs, and sometimes it sounded great, and at other we heard resonances. On one song we heard things that we have never heard before on that track. The song was Luka by Suzanne Vega.What we both heard was best described as her smacking her lips when she speaks. Has anyone else ever heard this(we did not hear it on the other channel with LA Scala bass bins, and EV horns with EV DH1a drivers)?
When it came to the bass it appeared to go much deeper than the La Scalas setup and having a much warmer sound compared to the La Scalas.
My friend is going to run REW on it again to see he can see what might be causing it to have this effect. We are thinking part of it might be we need to turn the gain down on the woofers as there are 2 compared to the La Scalas 1.
Conclusion so far is when it does something right it is really right, but at other times it needs something...
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We are finally in Mexico. I have a Klipsch k402 that is going to be the testbed for the synergy horn. I have a bunch of projects to do over the next year, and will post them up as I get them done. First will be my new diy AV rack, followed by some new diy speakers for the living room, and then i will work on the synergy horns..
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Today I listened to the v1 all mdf that we built...I was very surprised as to the bass output, but something didn't sound right.the horn sounded like there were veils to be removed. My friend and I listed to various songs, and sometimes it sounded great, and at other we heard resonances. On one song we heard things that we have never heard before on that track. The song was Luka by Suzanne Vega.What we both heard was best described as her smacking her lips when she speaks. Has anyone else ever heard this(we did not hear it on the other channel with LA Scala bass bins, and EV horns with EV DH1a drivers)?
When it came to the bass it appeared to go much deeper than the La Scalas setup and having a much warmer sound compared to the La Scalas.
My friend is going to run REW on it again to see he can see what might be causing it to have this effect. We are thinking part of it might be we need to turn the gain down on the woofers as there are 2 compared to the La Scalas 1.
Conclusion so far is when it does something right it is really right, but at other times it needs something...
Show the REW sweep when you have it. Will be interesting to see the response.
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It will be interesting when I run REW again as our new room has zero treatments with clay walls, ceiling, and floors, and my old JBL setup was in a fully treated room on the edge of being dead. Also I only have the Klipsch 402 which will be the one modified...my friend has the first version made entirely out of wood at his house in a small room about 10x10 , and heavily treated. I am not sure if he is using it or not as I left it with him instead of paying $2 per pound to ship the beast.
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I will post up pics of the completed speakers...now I am working on a smaller version.
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Did you change your screennname?
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Yup.
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Update:
Here is 1 speaker with my acoustic panels when I measured with REW.
The rest are shown in various stages of completion. Inused them as a cabinetless speakercuntil we got the cabinets made.
I now have 1 clamping jig ready for making the wooden 2' version, and hope to have at least a cabinet less version ready by Christmas.
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It has been quite awhile since I have been on here, but here is what I have completed so far.
1: finished 4 K402MEHs,... address Mesquite hardwood to the rear for the mounting pads and the adjoining horn walls, and had a custom paint matched to my cup washers on the F20 horn subs.
2: returned to cabjnetless design, which gives me a more tube like sound in the under 500hz range.
3: I have 2 Celestion 15ftr3070c woofers per MEH. Only the top horn has a compression driver (Celestion axi2050)
3: At first I wired each horn woofer pair as one for each Fosi v3 monoblock per woofer pair, and comp driver. Then I decided to clean up the wiring (saved 1 meter per channel), and rewired amp 1 to left channel, left bottom woofer, to left channel top woofer. Then amp 2 was wired the same, but with the left channel right woofers. I really likemthe way it came out, as it sounds better now.
5: Next i set my levels for 1 pair of woofers per channel, then the other pair, I do the woofers first as they are the least efficient. Next I matched the level of the comp driver to the 2 pairs of woofers per channel. Then I finished off with the f20 pair of horn subs and hooked them both up to the Xilica and summed both the left, and right channels as one output and then split that to each sub. The subs are currently crossed over @60hz. I did this because I have a dead channel on the Xilica. Then I set my mid crossover to 500hz, and tuned from the MLP.
Setup really sounds great now!
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Are you still in Mexico? (Sorry if that isn’t where you moved to. It’s been a while)
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Are you still in Mexico? (Sorry if that isn’t where you moved to. It’s been a while)
Yes!, we are still in Mexico,but in 2027 we plan on moving to the EU. This time I am taking everything I have except the Marantz av8805a and the LG 86UN8570PUB TV as they are only for USA, and would be worth nothing in the EU. I am hoping this summer to have enough saved to get a Storm ISP 16 or 24 MK1 used as a replacement.