Spherical satellite speakers

[Kodyl]

Hi

This is my first post here and I have never built a speaker before and I have very little knowledge of pretty much everything regarding this subject. So I have a few question that I hope you guys can answer, but first i'm going to present what I have come up with so far.
I'm looking to build some small spherical satellite speakers based on the Orb Audio/Anthony Gallo look. I plan on doing so using a cnc lathe and cutting it out of solid aluminum that I can get for free at work. However I can only get the aluminium up to ø120mm, so I'm limited to a 3" full range driver or a small 4"

I have been looking around at drivers and found the Dayton Audio RS100S-8 4" full range driver(http://www.intertechnik.de/module/1381989.pdf). I made a drawing of how I could make it look with this driver.




(hole in the back is for mounting, not a vent hole)

I'm planing this to be a sealed speaker and as you can see on the last image in the center cut out, there isn't room for alot of air around the driver(0.24 Liter). Part of the reason why I have been looking at the dayton rs100s-8 is because of its higher rms of 30W, to(as I understand how it works) better counter the lack of air it can compress, compared to some of the others I could find in this pricerange.

I have an Onkyo SR608 reciver and I'm planing on running this as in a 5.1 setup possibly doubling up on speakers for fronts and center speaker so each front channels has 2 speakers each.

I know this isn't exactly the perfect way to make a speaker and I'm guessing a lot of you here would never consider making making something like this. But I am hoping you guys will still be able to help with my questions...

• Any of you have any thoughts on what I plan on making? good bad?
• I saw zaph audio recommends a "breakup notch" with this driver. Is that really needed and if so how can I make one that fits this driver?
• Would this setup be comparable in sound with something like the orb audio or other small satellite speakers?
• Is there another driver I could use insted that would make more sense?
• Would another material be better? I have access to some POM (Polyoxymethylene) plastic thats easy to machine and quite stiff. I can get this at around ø150mm so I could maybe use a bigger driver.

[fwater]

It would be such a shame to hog out so much aluminum to get what will almost certainly be a very poor result. A wattage rating (RMS, peak, whatever) has nothing to do with the size of the enclosure a speaker should go in. In fact, it often has little to do with the amount of power a speaker can actually handle. The part of a speaker's parameters that mostly governs the size Vas, with Qms & Qes and Fs playing an important part. If you don't have a basic understanding of these things, put the brakes on right now and start learning a thing or two playing around with box modelling programs (if I may suggest). There are numerous free ones available with a Google search.

The biggest driver that you could get to live in such a small enclosure will probably be a two-incher. Consider a different material (Delrin or Ultem are dense and inert...better yet, wood!) that will allow a much larger volume. Also, don't forget about how much volume the driver itself will suck up. Off the top of my head, that Dayton needs a full liter to not sound choked.

[chris661]

I expect that it could be good, but with a way-too-small sealed cab, you'd get a very large peak in the midbass, and it would sound pretty awful. Active eq may help, but that'll only get rid of the symptoms of the problem, not get rid of the problem altogether (it'll still be a resonant system, and the resonance will be very audible).

Chris

[Kodyl]

Originally Posted by fwater

The biggest driver that you could get to live in such a small enclosure will probably be a two-incher. Consider a different material (Delrin or Ultem are dense and inert...better yet, wood!) that will allow a much larger volume. Also, don't forget about how much volume the driver itself will suck up. Off the top of my head, that Dayton needs a full liter to not sound choked.

Delrin = Polyoxymethylene I have access to that. So I'm looking at a smaller driver and bigger case.. and yeah I didn't forget about the volume of the driver itself, the volume I listed (0.24 Liter) is with the driver in case.

[Speedskater]

Similar speakers done in wood:

Ikea spherical speakers, first build done.