There have been quite a number of posts lately about speaker building and I feel I should throw in my 2 cents. There are a number of questions you have to ask yourself first and answer honestly to determine if DIYing is for you. It will help you as much as it would the kind folk here who are trying to help. These questions are not intended to scare you off - although they might - but rather to help you set your expectations right.
Why do you want to build your own speakers?
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[*]Do you think it will be cheaper than buying an off the shelve speaker? It probably won't be! Not unless you have low standards and at least the basic wood working tools. If your standards are low then you won't have to bother with building proper, good looking enclosures and you won't have to spend lots on drivers. Which brings us back to the question, "Why do you want to do this?"
[*]Do you just want to build something and a speaker seemed like a good idea? Then go ahead and get it out of your system. Buy ANY tweeter and woofer, put them in ANY box, buy just about ANY 2-way 12dB per octave crossover @2.5kHz, connect the drivers CORRECTLY (as in tweeter to the high pass and woofer to the low pass section of the XO - phase is optional), hook them up and enjoy
uke:. However, since you have come as far as a forum like this and asked some questions about the subject you probably want to do a little better than this.
[*]Do you think you can build a speaker for R5k that will give a R20k commercial speaker carrots? You can't! Not unless you build a kit or a published design by people like Troels Gravesen http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/Diy_Loudspeaker_Projects.htm or John "Zaph" Krutke http://www.zaphaudio.com/ et al. It takes LOTS of experience (and time and money) to achieve this. Even if you do build a design like this, you still have to have the proper tools and carpentry skills to pull it off. You could buy assembled boxes but then you're not going to spend R5k only.
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How committed are you?
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[*]Do you see yourself building only this one set of speakers? Then this is most probably not for you. The amount of effort, time and money required to build something that you would not want to braai your next T-bone on is better spent buying a good commercial speaker.
[*]Are you willing to go back to school? There is a LOT to learn if you want to stand any chance of building anything decent. People will help you when you get stuck but they are not going to spoon feed you with everything you need to know.
[*]How much time do you have? If you don't have lots of time then don't bother. You can't rush this.
[*]How well do you cope with failure? If you don't, please move on. You WILL fail somewhere. You need to be able to take it on the chin/pocket and try again and again until you succeed. If you can't or won't do this then just go buy a speaker.
[/list]
The good news
This is a very rewarding hobby if you have the time, patience, money and dedication it demands. Please understand that it is NOT easy or cheap to design and build a good sounding speaker. To get noise out of a box is easy. To get a really good sounding speaker is hard.
If you have a passion for DIYing then you are in good company and people will be more than willing to help and share their knowledge. It is immensely rewarding to listen to music through speakers you have designed and built yourself, but you have to pay your dues...
Why do you want to build your own speakers?
[list type=decimal]
[*]Do you think it will be cheaper than buying an off the shelve speaker? It probably won't be! Not unless you have low standards and at least the basic wood working tools. If your standards are low then you won't have to bother with building proper, good looking enclosures and you won't have to spend lots on drivers. Which brings us back to the question, "Why do you want to do this?"
[*]Do you just want to build something and a speaker seemed like a good idea? Then go ahead and get it out of your system. Buy ANY tweeter and woofer, put them in ANY box, buy just about ANY 2-way 12dB per octave crossover @2.5kHz, connect the drivers CORRECTLY (as in tweeter to the high pass and woofer to the low pass section of the XO - phase is optional), hook them up and enjoy
uke:. However, since you have come as far as a forum like this and asked some questions about the subject you probably want to do a little better than this. [*]Do you think you can build a speaker for R5k that will give a R20k commercial speaker carrots? You can't! Not unless you build a kit or a published design by people like Troels Gravesen http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/Diy_Loudspeaker_Projects.htm or John "Zaph" Krutke http://www.zaphaudio.com/ et al. It takes LOTS of experience (and time and money) to achieve this. Even if you do build a design like this, you still have to have the proper tools and carpentry skills to pull it off. You could buy assembled boxes but then you're not going to spend R5k only.
[/list]
How committed are you?
[list type=decimal]
[*]Do you see yourself building only this one set of speakers? Then this is most probably not for you. The amount of effort, time and money required to build something that you would not want to braai your next T-bone on is better spent buying a good commercial speaker.
[*]Are you willing to go back to school? There is a LOT to learn if you want to stand any chance of building anything decent. People will help you when you get stuck but they are not going to spoon feed you with everything you need to know.
[*]How much time do you have? If you don't have lots of time then don't bother. You can't rush this.
[*]How well do you cope with failure? If you don't, please move on. You WILL fail somewhere. You need to be able to take it on the chin/pocket and try again and again until you succeed. If you can't or won't do this then just go buy a speaker.
[/list]
The good news
This is a very rewarding hobby if you have the time, patience, money and dedication it demands. Please understand that it is NOT easy or cheap to design and build a good sounding speaker. To get noise out of a box is easy. To get a really good sounding speaker is hard.
If you have a passion for DIYing then you are in good company and people will be more than willing to help and share their knowledge. It is immensely rewarding to listen to music through speakers you have designed and built yourself, but you have to pay your dues...
