CHEAP speakers that will make me go deaf?

[mazeroth]

Looking to build some cheap speakers that will play EXTREMELY loud, and sound decent, if that's possible. Thinking something along the lines of having 8-16 drivers per speaker

I have a strong Crown pro amp that does 400w RMS x 2 @ 4ohms or 570w RMS x 2 @ 2ohms to power them, so that should be sufficient.

Any ideas of what you'd recommend as a project for me? Maybe doing something CRAZY like (2) 12" woofers, 8 6.5" mid-midbass and 4-8 tweeters per speaker? Just something INSANE that will make people stare.

I'd like to keep each speaker under $300 for components, if possible. Or if the price needs to be bumped up a little, that's fine.

Thanks!

 

[bonsai171]

how about pushing cue tips too far into your ears? that's a much cheaper way to go deaf j/k, maybe parrallel and series a bunch of drivers like this?

http://www.partsexpress.com/projectshowcase/Kuze3201/Kuze3201.html

 

[mazeroth]

Whoa, that's a crazy project

I was thinking of going with a buttload of these drivers from Parts Express. They seem like a killer deal at $8 each if you compare them to the other 7" Vifa drivers from there:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-493

I could run those for my mid-bass drivers and throw 2-4 of these in the mix for my mids. Do you think these look the same as the 7" ones listed above?

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-492

As for woofers, I have (2) MTX T4124 12" car drivers laying around that I could use. They are subwoofers but I could run them more along the lines of a woofer and not cross them over until higher up. Only problem is I really don't want to use giant woofers in these speakers. I'd like to keep them "thin" looking and MEAN. Tons of drivers that just intimidate people when they see them. I'm sure I could build the speakers to sound pretty good at 50+ hz since they are 7" drivers, and I really don't need DEEP bass.

I can't seem to find a killer tweeter that's inexpensive. I LOVE the Vifa ring radiator (have them in my Polk LSi15s) but they're pretty expensive.

Anywho, thanks for the reply and keep the replies coming!

THANKS!

 

[chad i]

I kind of want to make some crazy big speakers too. I saw a pair of Rent a Center speakers at my cousins recently and honestly the size and beastlyness made me somewhat jealous. His had 2 15 inch woofers, an 8 inch midbass and a mid range and horn tweeter.. I want somthing just as "manly" however, unlike his I would like it to sound good.

I have been going through the Parts Express online catalog and came up with a pretty decent idea of what I want. It would basically be a 3 chamber box. The bottom would house a single 15" Dayton woofer, the middle would house 2 Dayton 8" drivers and the top would have 2 5 1/4 or 6 1/2 and a tweeter.

I however have no clue on how to A. wire somthing like this, B. design a crossover and C. decide how big, Im guessing around 5' tall though and finally if Dayton would be the right choice for drivers. I guess it is pretty sick that I want to even birth somthing like this but...I am man, hear me roar!

By the way, this is my first time posting here. I signed up a few weeks ago so I could look at some different pictures and finally decided to post, nice to meet all of you and I look foward to getting "to know all of you"

Chad

 

[bogoes]

D27 Veritas

Check out these speakers, they will rock hard with dual 10s and are 3-ways. And best yet, they sound great doing it.

http://www.wadsnet.com/~dtenney/d27_veritas.htm

 

[Cal Weldon]

If you want to rock and roll you could try these woofers 18 woofs

With this mid10" mid

And this tweet tweet

with this horn horn

It may cost a little more than you want but it's something to impress your friends for quite some time.

Cal

 

[mazeroth]

Thanks for all the replies, everyone. I'm looking for something more along the lines of MASSIVE amount of drivers versus say an 18" woofer. When I look at the Polk SRT system with it's buttload of drivers it's very intimidating and that's what I'm going for. I already own killer tower speakers (Polk LSi15s) and this is just something I'm going to do for fun. Want to build something with my shop tools and have some fun doing it. This will be my first attempt at building a speaker so I want to go crazy doing it!

Do you guys have any links to crossover building?

Any links to what all those numbers mean when you look at a driver's specifications?

I'm thinking of going 3-way and possibly 4-way, just to do it. Looking for info that shows how to make say 25% of the power go to the woofers, 50% to the midbass drivers, and 25% to the tweeters. That's not the power lineup I'm going to use, but information that would answer those questions.

As always, I thank anyone for their input and keep the feedback coming!

 

[joe carrow]

Thanks for all the replies, everyone. I'm looking for something more along the lines of MASSIVE amount of drivers versus say an 18" woofer. When I look at the Polk SRT system with it's buttload of drivers it's very intimidating and that's what I'm going for. I already own killer tower speakers (Polk LSi15s) and this is just something I'm going to do for fun. Want to build something with my shop tools and have some fun doing it. This will be my first attempt at building a speaker so I want to go crazy doing it!

In this case, may I suggest using passive radiators?

As far as I know, you're really supposed to use two 12 inch PRs for each 12 inch driver. So if you had two 12" subs for the low, it would really look like 6 cones! Come on, you know they're not all powered, but do your friends?

INTIMIDATION!

By the way.. I'm more into the idea of a 'sleeper' system. Hide a dozen Tumults in an IB manifold, build a line array with pro mids, add some horns, then cover them with a nice floral print grille. They'll never see it coming... and never forget it.

 

[gmilitano]

If you are looking for cheap go with

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=269-570

32 aside will get you good SPL especially at 2 ohms since your amp can handle that. $0.69

For the high end, try

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=270-011

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=270-041

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=280-062

The Pioneer buyout drivers have been discussed in a few forms in here.

Does anyone have any experience with those cheap piezo tweeters?

Cheers,
GM.

Looking to build some cheap speakers that will play EXTREMELY loud, and sound decent, if that's possible. Thinking something along the lines of having 8-16 drivers per speaker

...

 

[usekgb]

Re: Re: CHEAP speakers that will make me go deaf?

Whoa, that's a crazy project

I was thinking of going with a buttload of these drivers from Parts Express. They seem like a killer deal at $8 each if you compare them to the other 7" Vifa drivers from there:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-493

I could run those for my mid-bass drivers and throw 2-4 of these in the mix for my mids. Do you think these look the same as the 7" ones listed above?

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-492

I have used the 7" Infinity woofers in one of my projects, and they sound great. I have not used the shielded ones, but they don't seem to go as low as the unshielded. One thing to keep in mind though, you will need a pretty big box if you want good bass extension with these woofers. You need about 3.5 ft^3 for two woofers to really get them going. These drivers may not work for you unless you can live with a really big box.

If you are looking for cheap go with

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=269-570

32 aside will get you good SPL especially at 2 ohms since your amp can handle that. $0.69

For the high end, try

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=270-011

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=270-041

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=280-062

The Pioneer buyout drivers have been discussed in a few forms in here.

Does anyone have any experience with those cheap piezo tweeters?

Cheers,
GM.

Those little 4" drivers are wonderful for the price. You could run a whole bunch of them in a line array and get very respectable SPL's out of them. For the high frequencies, try using a few of the Dayton PT2's in a line. They are relatively inexpensive, and sound pretty good. As for the piezo horns, they are cheap, loud, and sound like it. Personally, I would avoid them unless you want your speakers to sound like cheap PA speakers.
One thing you might consider is, use something like the Eminence LAB12 for bass and cross it over to a line array of the PE 4" widerange drivers at around 150 Hz or so. Then, cross the line over to another line of 2 or 3 of the Dayton PT2's at around 5 kHz or so. This should give you a full range system that will play very loud on a reasonable budget.


Cheers,
Zach

 

[mazeroth]

I think I made up my mind and want to build a line array speaker. I don't know a ton about them and have hours of reading ahead of me, I know this.

Last night Parts Express had these woofers for $8 each, and now they're back up to $14. If I could talk them into selling me them for $8 each would you recommend these drivers? They do 40hz, which would mean I could probably get away with no subwoofer...

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-493

If you don't think that's a good route I was thinking of making an array with these Vifa JBL 4.5" speakers:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-495

I would rather use the Infinity ones, but I can't comprehend a 4.5" that only goes down to 110hz, especially with a massive magnet that it has:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-492

The price on the Infinities is KILLER. Gah...what to do

I also still can't decide on what tweeter to use or how many to use. I see some line arrays with almost as many tweeters as woofers, and some with only 2-4. What gives? Is it math with the efficiency so they both end with the same spl sensitivity?

Thanks!

 

[Hybrid fourdoor]

[
I would rather use the Infinity ones, but I can't comprehend a 4.5" that only goes down to 110hz, especially with a massive magnet that it has:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=299-492

The magnet has a bucking magnet attached to it. So ya its a heavy driver, but only half of the motor structure is actually a motor.

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.

I was thinking about using this driver to do a 6 driver per cab mini array. This would have been for computer usage. I already have 2 of them for some future project....couldn't resist the price.

However I went ahead and called and got the DOTD 7" (called like 2 hourse before the cutoff weeuuhh!). I'm gonna do 4 of them per speaker and couple them with a large horn. I always loved the looks of the JBL HLS line, but I'm not too sure how I'll like Horns, so these should do for computer speakers.

I think I'm going to use the Eminence ASD1001S. Its the only affordable compression driver PE sells ($26ea) that has descent frequency response....all the other cheap ones severly lack in the top end. And maybe a lense like this. The driver has a rating of 103db/W/1m , so it should be easy to match with4 woofers

I'd love to use a JBL lenses...there gorgous, but $280 for plastic is rediculus.

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.

The only <really> cheap tweeter that PE has that looks any good is the Onkyo 269-702, it has a relativly smooth response, and can be used from 4Khz and up....those 4.5" Infinity's would do real well here...just get a powered sub to fill them in. They can do to 100Hz with a ported enclosure no problem. Theydon't have much travel so you don't want to push them, but with 6 or more they might make up for it. The only thing about that tweeter is the ugly faceplate

 

[Hybrid fourdoor]

If I could talk them into selling me them for $8 each would you recommend these drivers?

PS, I won't be holding my breathe

Still a descent price at $14, especially with the frequency extension they have

 

[mazeroth]

I just e-mailed them and told them I had the speakers in my cart for a few hours while I researched and when I went to checkout they jumped back up in price. I live about an hour away from their store so I might just take a drive down there and check them out.

If I do go with the 7" Infinity Vifas I was thinking 8 per line array should be sufficient. Then add a few tweeters to the mix to let them handle the high-end. Would you recommend running a 7" woofer from 40hz to 2.5-4.0k? Or would I be better off doing (4) 7" woofers, (4) 4.5" Infinity Vifas ($4 each) and letting them run the mids, and doing the tweeters? I could cross the 7"s off at 300-500ish, run the mids until I cross over to my tweeters. I am BEYOND new to this stuff so I'm just throwing numbers out

Also, you guys know of any sites that tell you what all the numbers actually mean when looking at speaker specs? And maybe a site that shows you how to compute and build a crossover?

Thanks for any replies!

 

[mikee12345]

http://www.sound.westhost.com/biamp-vs-passive.htm

http://www.sound.westhost.com/lr-passive.htm



Xovers

Also theres that 'basic car audio site' with all those calculators on it... google it.

 

[Hybrid fourdoor]

Well if your gonna go over there try and pickup Great Sound Stereo Speaker Manual, or buy a used one from Amazon. Its a great book, its not too advanced like some others but that whats makes it great for beginners, becuase it goes over the real basics that creat the foundation. Not scaring you with crazy amounts of what ifs and equations.


DIYsubwoofers.org has a good intro to various box designs. Just check out the links on the left side of the page.

WinISD is my favorite simulator. Its free and works pretty well. You can create <T/S value> files for various drivers. It also has active and passive crossover circuit calculators and diagrams under the Calculator tab. Theres also an online version that just does speaker simulation...though not quite as versatile as the download version.

Check out True Audio's Tech pages...under loudspeakers, more importantly Crossover Overview, Neutralizing with a Zobel, Vent questions, and Loudspeaker design tradeoffs.

 

[Hybrid fourdoor]

Also theres that 'basic car audio site' with all those calculators on it... google it.

If you are refferring to loudspeaker101.com, they are no more




However the12volt.com is still alive

 

[Cal Weldon]

By the way.. I'm more into the idea of a 'sleeper' system. -snip- They'll never see it coming... and never forget it.

I'm with you Joe. I thinks it's better to have a fast car with a crappy exterior than a nice shiny-wheel job that goes bye-bye on pink slip day.

Some of my best results have come from people not seeing what they were about to listen to.

maseroth,
I think your enthusiasm is great. I just hope you don't overload on your first speaker though. It sounds like you'll have your hands full.
I used to think the best way to go was 3 ways or 4 ways. Now I have learned that reducing the number of Xover points and drivers (especially tweeters) and therefore the point source concerns on the high end is a good thing (thanks Martha Stewart).

My - make your teeth hurt, watch out for explosive diarrhea, cause we're gonna hit the magical 130dB mark - speakers are:
2 - 15's in one cabinet and 1 - 15" and a 511 horn in another cabinet per side.

I'm running approx 1500 watts which is enough to make the girls want to sit on the speakers. They look like crap but they sure get rave reviews. Not bad for my personal outdoor stereo.

Anyway, enjoy your project, just be careful not to put too much on your plate first time round.

As many have told me over the years: K.I.S.S.

Cheers,
Cal