Building speakers is not just making a box and adding the drivers. The exact size for the specific driver and the target frequency range and tonality is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more sciency than just slapping together a box for drivers. The box dimensions and chambers inside is almost if not more important then the drivers you choose.
Yep. I built a sub box for a specific area in my car. It was under the necessary volume area for optimum sound. I added a tube to allow air to escape the box. It could have sounded better for sure. But it was in a 1980's car so hardly high fidelity.
Yes! And it's not JUST the volume/size, either. There are SO many other little idiosyncrasies pro-manufactured audiophile-grade speakers have. The rabbit-hole is endless when you're going well beyond what the human ear can theoretically detect and start trying to crack the proverbial "Three Body Problem" of harmonic interference that Audiophiles claim is the reason they pay thousands of dollars for a 3ft piece of copper wire. Like, my inner audiophile was SCREAMING "BEVEL YOUR EDGES! NO SHARP CORNERS INSIDE THE SPEAKER!" and "NO RIGHT ANGLE JOINTS! 3% DISTAL TAPERS IN HEIGHT AND DEPTH! MOLDING ON THE BRACES, DON'T LEAVE THEM 90DEGREES!!" and "NO WOOD GLUE! SILICONE ADHESIVE ONLY!" and "DOUBLE-THICK WALLS! LAMINATE WITH VISCOUS SOUND DAMPENER! LINE THE INSIDE IN LEAD FOIL AND TAR PAPER! MORE MASS MORE MASS!"
When I use a hole saw a tip I was told was to drill a relief hole on the outside of the hole you are drilling with a 10mm drill bit so the dust can escape, stops the mdf from burning which smells awful, lovely build :)
I feel like designing and building 3 way 12-inch stand-mount speakers with air core inductor and film foil cap crossovers, bi-amp binding posts. I want it to sound great with pink floyd and ave have a remove back plate so I can mount the drives in such a way that hides the screw holes and be able to caulk the edges so pressure does not leak out of the enclosure.
I've already started putting together a parts list haha. As soon as I started thinking about it I got too excited to back down. I think I've found a way to make it wireless so you can position it anywhere in your room.
Subwoofers are fun! Dont use wood glue for them, use the strong polyurethane glue and be sure to use a double baffle. I also copied a few kits seen on parts express, except I made mine double thickness for mass. My biggest regret was not using a stronger glue (like the polyurethane gorilla glue), but it still is fantastic during most frequencies. That was also the first speaker I tried a box port, which was fun lol.
Lovely "Overnight Sensation" builds. These were my first speaker build, although I dare say they were not as good looking as yours. Unfortunately bouncing sound off of drywall is a poor Atmos height approximation. The only way to get Atmos overhead is to use ceiling mounted speakers. The bouncing thing was created by Dolby and manufactures as a gimmick to encourage people to buy new gear and get a bit of an effect. Most home theater snobs would advise you to just mount 'height channels' and skip Atmos until you punch holes in your ceiling. That said, it is also true that Atmos isn't heavily used in movies and the best Atmos effect is in the Dolby test suite.
...that are then plugged by screws. These are ALSO ported speakers. SO, the amount of air escaping out of the hole trivial. We're talking square thousandths of an inch in total extra surface area....
I wish I could build stuff like this. Great work man. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a ps1 mod video. Especially after the 39th anniversary reveal from Sony.
Hi, i am realy fan of your video. I love the skill you have to build thigs with some kind of perfection and aestetic sens. Just a little thing : when you build speakers box and put the front panel behind the lateral/top/bottom panel edge your are modifying the speaker frequency response. This must be taking in account when the crossover is developped. It is the same with driver positions on front panel.
Still hoping you'll revise the tower speakers in the future to have the atmos modules inside them, like some Klipsch speakers have them. And I'm sure if you have atmos modules for the rear speakers the immersion will be much better. But overall , you did a fantastic job. Must be great watching a movie and then look at the speakers and think "I made these".
Not sure why every video of yours has a ton of people showing up and complaining about things like the price of your tools or how you made your projects. I think your passion for DIY work that has led you to investing in high end tools that let you make whatever you want, however you want to is super cool. I cannot wait to see you make a functional car or something out of walnut only to have a bunch of haters show up. I will have the popcorn ready!
Nice Job! Great improvement with the towers. I've enjoyed watching the process, the mistakes, adjustments, and growth. Nice video, editing, and info. I'm still a bit confused with your Atmos cabinets though. Why did you recess the baffle? I've never seen anyone do this. Even with the sound damping material, you are essentially creating a megaphone. The thin sound damping material only works for certain frequencies. It won't stop full range diffraction. Also, the angle of your Atmos speakers looks too shallow. Just prop it forward with a book and run your test again. Diffraction and bad angles might be why you are struggling to hear a lot of height effects. I know your receiver can compensate some, but it can solve everything. Not an expert, just a guess.
1) In the original video he mentioned that he doesnt own crimp tongs yet. 2) I'd prefer soldering the sleeve connector anyways. Soldering still provides the most flawless conductivity which is important with audio systems.
Pro-tip: Get a label printer, and label each of your wires. You will appreciate it when you're trying to finish the thing while fatigued, or troubleshooting it later.
Link the Soldering Station? (Link is broken lol). I've also built 6 speakers so far, love building them. Subwoofer builds for theaters are incredibly fun, too lol.
A tip, those "solderless" connectors, that you soldered on the end of the wires from the cross over, are actually crimp connectors and aren't meant to be soldered as you have.
Iirc he mentions in the video that he doesnt have crimp tongs yet. Yes, you could just use a wirecutter and I certainly would if its about wiring a power supply or something. However, soldering still provides the most consistent connection which is a serious upside if youre building a sensitive audio system.
As I said in other comments already, he doesnt own crimp tongs. And soldering the crimp connector makes sense anyways since its a far better connection which is important when building audio systems.
I'm kinda confused. You said in the beginning of the vid more open air in the speaker is a good ting but then filled it with the dacron. The dacron makes sense so you don't have a hollow sound etc but why have that large long open space in the tower at all then?
It's simple, the guy himself doesn't really understand what he's doing or saying. In the video, he just threw in pieces of something, for some unknown reason. So just ignore it. When creating speakers, different damping materials are used for different purposes, namely: *damping the moving system of the speaker (dense felt, dense cotton wool in the windows of the speaker basket) is used to reduce the mumbling of the LF speaker and increase the clarity of the midrange head; *damping the walls with bitumen-like sheets or mastic - increases the mass and brings the physical properties of the board to a more "deaf state", which ultimately improves the bass in terms of clarity and return (ties that increase the rigidity of the long walls also serve this purpose); *pasting the walls with felt, foam rubber, etc. is a fight against reflections at frequencies above 200-250 Hz, where the wavelength is commensurate with the distance between the walls (in other words, eliminating standing waves);. However filling the speaker volume (if the material is not very dense and not close to the speakers) is not damping, but for quasi-increase of internal volume up to 15% (sound from the back side of the speaker travels longer to the walls). All of these and more are calculated and tested BEFORE the speaker creation process begins, as they have a significant impact on the final sound of the speaker. Huge amounts of money were invested in tools and the channel itself, but, unfortunately, not in education... If you are interested in seeing how professionals make DIY speakers, google the HexiBase videos.
Any Speaker builder here? I have a Crazy idea: Instead of connecting all Panels to another, i wonder what would happen when we put a Rubber Strip in between. Like the one that is on a car door. All Panels of a Speaker Flexible mounted. What would happen? Like i said "Crazy" =P
I have a question about the feet. Do the extra 4 holes per speaker that are not fully air tight have a noticeable impact on the sound quality? I only have the most basic understanding of speaker design but I wonder if the non-adjusting nail-on feet would have been better?
You're not wrong, but WITH the feet screwed in, the actual portion of unsealed orifice would be vanishingly small and the speaker is ALREADY a ported design, so there isn't enough pressure in the cabinet for it to meaningfully disrupt dampening. If they were a fully-sealed or a passively-radiated design, especially with high-excursion speakers, there MIGHT be enough of an internal pressure gradient for the escape to be non-trivial, but it would still most certainly be inconsequential. If you're looking for audiophile-grade, tho, it would be considered "fully unacceptible" and would need some kind of "non-penetrating" foot attachment. Now, if you tried to run the speakers WITHOUT the feet screwed in, THEN you'd have essentially the venting capacity of a SECOND port, which is bad.
my god WHY MDF just use balsa wood its not made our of DUST and GLUE. its real wood and has similar sound to MDF from what i understand. but i do not know if the softness of Balsa would be an issue in the long term i will have to see how long the ones i made last.
In some of his other speaker video’s he’s said you don’t need the fancy tools. You can build it with less specialised tools too. He has the tools though so he’s using them
That's not misleading. I did this with a table saw and a harbor freight trim router a year ago for the drivers lol. More expensive tools just makes it faster.
You could do this DIY. I'd actually argue this is probably one of his easier builds. Buy the MDF from a DIY supply shop that will pre cut the sheets for you. The speaker holes can be cut with a drill and hole saw or jigsaw. I suppose you could even use a coping saw if you don't mind taking your time. If you don't or can't solder. Then buy the crossovers pre built. Trimming the veneer can be done with a knife and sand paper. Trim router not needed. All the sanding can be done by hand. I'd say a drill and a jigsaw are all that is needed to build this. Everything else just makes the job easier. Easily less that £100 / $100 in tools if you buy none branded tools.
Sure he does, but all of the things he does in this video can be accomplished with far fewer and less expensive tools. If you don’t know how to use your existing tools to accomplish what he’s doing in this video, then that’s a skill issue, not a tutorial issue.
Don’t even need tools. Come up with a cut list and send it off to a company like send cut send or just make friends with the guy at a big box and give him a nice tip to cut everything for you. Then, it’s just assembly.
![[UNCUT] The Loyal Pin ปิ่นภักดิ์ EP.8 (1/4)](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/7OwUsMs0M5s/mqdefault.jpg)
Did I watch all of these as they came out originally? Yes. Did I still watch all of this again? Again, yes.
man i was thinking the same lol , especially when he said "first time using veneer" lol
SAME
Building speakers is not just making a box and adding the drivers. The exact size for the specific driver and the target frequency range and tonality is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more sciency than just slapping together a box for drivers. The box dimensions and chambers inside is almost if not more important then the drivers you choose.
absolutely true
Correct, but programs do exist today that aid in this (ToidsDIY is a great resource for this, if you are not looking to buy a prefab kit).
Yep.
I built a sub box for a specific area in my car. It was under the necessary volume area for optimum sound.
I added a tube to allow air to escape the box. It could have sounded better for sure. But it was in a 1980's car so hardly high fidelity.
This is one of those things that seems easy on the surface and then there's a whole iceberg of really technical shit.
Yes! And it's not JUST the volume/size, either. There are SO many other little idiosyncrasies pro-manufactured audiophile-grade speakers have. The rabbit-hole is endless when you're going well beyond what the human ear can theoretically detect and start trying to crack the proverbial "Three Body Problem" of harmonic interference that Audiophiles claim is the reason they pay thousands of dollars for a 3ft piece of copper wire. Like, my inner audiophile was SCREAMING "BEVEL YOUR EDGES! NO SHARP CORNERS INSIDE THE SPEAKER!" and "NO RIGHT ANGLE JOINTS! 3% DISTAL TAPERS IN HEIGHT AND DEPTH! MOLDING ON THE BRACES, DON'T LEAVE THEM 90DEGREES!!" and "NO WOOD GLUE! SILICONE ADHESIVE ONLY!" and "DOUBLE-THICK WALLS! LAMINATE WITH VISCOUS SOUND DAMPENER! LINE THE INSIDE IN LEAD FOIL AND TAR PAPER! MORE MASS MORE MASS!"
When I use a hole saw a tip I was told was to drill a relief hole on the outside of the hole you are drilling with a 10mm drill bit so the dust can escape, stops the mdf from burning which smells awful, lovely build :)
I really love the look of those rear firing atmos speakers. It has such a cool intentional presence instead of the usual hidden designs of them.
I feel like designing and building 3 way 12-inch stand-mount speakers with air core inductor and film foil cap crossovers, bi-amp binding posts. I want it to sound great with pink floyd and ave have a remove back plate so I can mount the drives in such a way that hides the screw holes and be able to caulk the edges so pressure does not leak out of the enclosure.
Very cool! You should definitely build a subwoofer
I've already started putting together a parts list haha. As soon as I started thinking about it I got too excited to back down. I think I've found a way to make it wireless so you can position it anywhere in your room.
Subwoofers are fun! Dont use wood glue for them, use the strong polyurethane glue and be sure to use a double baffle. I also copied a few kits seen on parts express, except I made mine double thickness for mass. My biggest regret was not using a stronger glue (like the polyurethane gorilla glue), but it still is fantastic during most frequencies. That was also the first speaker I tried a box port, which was fun lol.
@@ZacBuilds that’ll be cool
@@itsJoshW I just use screws, mostly because the subwoofer I built was a 4th bandpass made to be hidden under my bed
OMG I’m building a speaker for one of my classes this is so helpful!!!!!❤❤❤❤❤
I have veneered speaker cabinets using pvc glue and an iron. Much less fuss and still stuck 10 years later. Nice job in any event..
Great build and video! Maybe a high quality and loud party speaker build are next?
1:22
me a guitarist: i see this as an absolute win
Lovely "Overnight Sensation" builds. These were my first speaker build, although I dare say they were not as good looking as yours.
Unfortunately bouncing sound off of drywall is a poor Atmos height approximation. The only way to get Atmos overhead is to use ceiling mounted speakers. The bouncing thing was created by Dolby and manufactures as a gimmick to encourage people to buy new gear and get a bit of an effect. Most home theater snobs would advise you to just mount 'height channels' and skip Atmos until you punch holes in your ceiling. That said, it is also true that Atmos isn't heavily used in movies and the best Atmos effect is in the Dolby test suite.
nice man!
considdering to make speakers of my own aswell
You go on about how isolation is good for sound then drill 4 holes in he bottom of each of the tower speakers. Makes sense.
...that are then plugged by screws. These are ALSO ported speakers. SO, the amount of air escaping out of the hole trivial. We're talking square thousandths of an inch in total extra surface area....
vibration isolation, not air isolation.
really great video as allways !!!
I wish I could build stuff like this. Great work man. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a ps1 mod video. Especially after the 39th anniversary reveal from Sony.
2:30 ouch that MDF breaking.
Kermit the Frog is also a Carpenter
Hi, i am realy fan of your video. I love the skill you have to build thigs with some kind of perfection and aestetic sens. Just a little thing : when you build speakers box and put the front panel behind the lateral/top/bottom panel edge your are modifying the speaker frequency response. This must be taking in account when the crossover is developped. It is the same with driver positions on front panel.
Uh yeah! This is such a great channel.
Nice speakers 👍 i think a home built sub with a dayton 15 and an pa amp would be an nice upgrade
Still hoping you'll revise the tower speakers in the future to have the atmos modules inside them, like some Klipsch speakers have them. And I'm sure if you have atmos modules for the rear speakers the immersion will be much better. But overall , you did a fantastic job. Must be great watching a movie and then look at the speakers and think "I made these".
What in the world does this have to do with Sonos? I mean, it's beautiful work, as usual, but I was expecting wireless (with the mention of Sonos)
Please build a subwoofer as well! That would be very cool to watch!
Not sure why every video of yours has a ton of people showing up and complaining about things like the price of your tools or how you made your projects. I think your passion for DIY work that has led you to investing in high end tools that let you make whatever you want, however you want to is super cool. I cannot wait to see you make a functional car or something out of walnut only to have a bunch of haters show up. I will have the popcorn ready!
If you want to really test your surround, the beach landing scene in Saving Private Ryan is always a good choice.
Right on time!
takes you a few days using incredibly professional tools. imagine how long its taking us mere mortals
oh man... you should make a cyberdeck... would love to see what you do!
Nice Job! Great improvement with the towers. I've enjoyed watching the process, the mistakes, adjustments, and growth. Nice video, editing, and info. I'm still a bit confused with your Atmos cabinets though. Why did you recess the baffle? I've never seen anyone do this. Even with the sound damping material, you are essentially creating a megaphone. The thin sound damping material only works for certain frequencies. It won't stop full range diffraction. Also, the angle of your Atmos speakers looks too shallow. Just prop it forward with a book and run your test again. Diffraction and bad angles might be why you are struggling to hear a lot of height effects. I know your receiver can compensate some, but it can solve everything. Not an expert, just a guess.
7:20 Unless I'm mistaken, I believe those style of connectors are intended to be crimped on.😅
1) In the original video he mentioned that he doesnt own crimp tongs yet.
2) I'd prefer soldering the sleeve connector anyways. Soldering still provides the most flawless conductivity which is important with audio systems.
Great video! 1 question though. How did you mount your receiver to the bottom shelf?
Same question here
Pro-tip: Get a label printer, and label each of your wires. You will appreciate it when you're trying to finish the thing while fatigued, or troubleshooting it later.
My goodness they look nice
Link the Soldering Station? (Link is broken lol).
I've also built 6 speakers so far, love building them. Subwoofer builds for theaters are incredibly fun, too lol.
Awesome!
Best subwoofer on the market is DIY. The GR Research Servo Subs.
A tip, those "solderless" connectors, that you soldered on the end of the wires from the cross over, are actually crimp connectors and aren't meant to be soldered as you have.
Iirc he mentions in the video that he doesnt have crimp tongs yet. Yes, you could just use a wirecutter and I certainly would if its about wiring a power supply or something. However, soldering still provides the most consistent connection which is a serious upside if youre building a sensitive audio system.
This will sound like diy😂,but joy of creating something is speechless.😊
I mean concrete would be an amazing speaker cabinet material and probably pretty cheap
If i had all those tools i would make my own speakers too
Yes, pleas build a subwoofer. I went with speakerbox design like in car audio and hid it under the couch--stealth style.
Not that i'm an expert, but did he just solder crimp connectors (7:25). But other than that, thanks for the great build.
As I said in other comments already, he doesnt own crimp tongs. And soldering the crimp connector makes sense anyways since its a far better connection which is important when building audio systems.
Cool video
Love your videos. Is cutting off the allen wrench with a band saw hard on the blade? I thought those things were hardened?
I thought you are supposed to use a hard roller for that dynamat like stuff.. to really make it stick and for it to do the best job it can
7:20 you're supposed to cramp those plugs on, not solder them. Hence why they are called solderless plugs
direct wiring is better anyway
That's all well and good but can you make expensive headphones at half the cost?
I'm kinda confused. You said in the beginning of the vid more open air in the speaker is a good ting but then filled it with the dacron. The dacron makes sense so you don't have a hollow sound etc but why have that large long open space in the tower at all then?
It's simple, the guy himself doesn't really understand what he's doing or saying. In the video, he just threw in pieces of something, for some unknown reason. So just ignore it.
When creating speakers, different damping materials are used for different purposes, namely:
*damping the moving system of the speaker (dense felt, dense cotton wool in the windows of the speaker basket) is used to reduce the mumbling of the LF speaker and increase the clarity of the midrange head;
*damping the walls with bitumen-like sheets or mastic - increases the mass and brings the physical properties of the board to a more "deaf state", which ultimately improves the bass in terms of clarity and return (ties that increase the rigidity of the long walls also serve this purpose);
*pasting the walls with felt, foam rubber, etc. is a fight against reflections at frequencies above 200-250 Hz, where the wavelength is commensurate with the distance between the walls (in other words, eliminating standing waves);.
However filling the speaker volume (if the material is not very dense and not close to the speakers) is not damping, but for quasi-increase of internal volume up to 15% (sound from the back side of the speaker travels longer to the walls).
All of these and more are calculated and tested BEFORE the speaker creation process begins, as they have a significant impact on the final sound of the speaker.
Huge amounts of money were invested in tools and the channel itself, but, unfortunately, not in education... If you are interested in seeing how professionals make DIY speakers, google the HexiBase videos.
@@antonymakesstuff Hexibase out there making quasi 8th orders and 7th orders while I'm just now making a 6th order... his knowledge bestows me
Great work but you know what you could just buy sonos speakers and not deal with any of this and get an alright sounding initial setup
Zac you have to get black dbrand dark plates for your ps5
I think I'm gonna buy.
What kind of pants are those beige EMT style pants Zac?
Not trying to hate or anything like that but didn't you already build those speakers and also make a video about it or am I just confusing something?
He made a natural wood version. He explained why he's replacing them in this one
He took all his previous speaker vids and put them in 1 video. This is a re-run episode LOL
@@JEDSaje15 oh okay thanks
No mention of cost? What a missed opportunity.
Any Speaker builder here?
I have a Crazy idea: Instead of connecting all Panels to another, i wonder what would happen when we put a Rubber Strip in between. Like the one that is on a car door.
All Panels of a Speaker Flexible mounted.
What would happen?
Like i said "Crazy" =P
I have a question about the feet. Do the extra 4 holes per speaker that are not fully air tight have a noticeable impact on the sound quality? I only have the most basic understanding of speaker design but I wonder if the non-adjusting nail-on feet would have been better?
You're not wrong, but WITH the feet screwed in, the actual portion of unsealed orifice would be vanishingly small and the speaker is ALREADY a ported design, so there isn't enough pressure in the cabinet for it to meaningfully disrupt dampening. If they were a fully-sealed or a passively-radiated design, especially with high-excursion speakers, there MIGHT be enough of an internal pressure gradient for the escape to be non-trivial, but it would still most certainly be inconsequential. If you're looking for audiophile-grade, tho, it would be considered "fully unacceptible" and would need some kind of "non-penetrating" foot attachment. Now, if you tried to run the speakers WITHOUT the feet screwed in, THEN you'd have essentially the venting capacity of a SECOND port, which is bad.
Audio is a bit off. Awesome video nevertheless :)
You could have put an angle on the top firing speakers itself and avoid the whole tilting thing. Doesn't look "finished"
Soldering Station Link is broken
What kit is he using? It's not linked anywhere,
can anyone recommend a good one?
Haha, that's my phone. The Note20 Ultra
No mirror?
I'd watch a sub build
Build.. if it only was that simple..
I dont have 10k Tools + even space for a whole workshop lying around to just build this
my god WHY MDF just use balsa wood its not made our of DUST and GLUE. its real wood and has similar sound to MDF from what i understand. but i do not know if the softness of Balsa would be an issue in the long term i will have to see how long the ones i made last.
Sub build would be awesome!
Hi
here before 100 likes :D
sure ill build my own speaker- if you givve me 1300 dollars of tools and a safe place to use em XD
just don't add water
Sound the same 😬
Don't buy ready to use well calibrated speaker. Buy a whole workshop and maybe you get good speaker with okay sound for ten times of the price.
2:47 how are you cleaning your towels or are you just... throwing them away?
Nice craftsmanship, but the video title is a bit misleading. You’ve got a workshop with $10,000+ worth of high end tools. Not exactly DIY friendly.
In some of his other speaker video’s he’s said you don’t need the fancy tools. You can build it with less specialised tools too. He has the tools though so he’s using them
That's not misleading. I did this with a table saw and a harbor freight trim router a year ago for the drivers lol. More expensive tools just makes it faster.
You could do this DIY.
I'd actually argue this is probably one of his easier builds.
Buy the MDF from a DIY supply shop that will pre cut the sheets for you.
The speaker holes can be cut with a drill and hole saw or jigsaw. I suppose you could even use a coping saw if you don't mind taking your time.
If you don't or can't solder. Then buy the crossovers pre built.
Trimming the veneer can be done with a knife and sand paper. Trim router not needed.
All the sanding can be done by hand.
I'd say a drill and a jigsaw are all that is needed to build this. Everything else just makes the job easier.
Easily less that £100 / $100 in tools if you buy none branded tools.
Sure he does, but all of the things he does in this video can be accomplished with far fewer and less expensive tools. If you don’t know how to use your existing tools to accomplish what he’s doing in this video, then that’s a skill issue, not a tutorial issue.
Don’t even need tools. Come up with a cut list and send it off to a company like send cut send or just make friends with the guy at a big box and give him a nice tip to cut everything for you. Then, it’s just assembly.
@ZacBuilds the soldering station link leads me to the Polyfil, it's duped