Radio Shack monster box (and deal!)

[mballoni]

Hi, I'm new here, just wanted to share my recent return to the art of half-assed speaker building.

I recently put together a cabinet for a band I'm in here in sunny San Diego, CA. As you may already know, Radio Shack is getting out of the business of selling speaker components to the public...apparently cellphones are much more lucrative. So you should visit your local store and see what they've got lying around, and be sure to ask what they've got in back, too...you never know. Here's what I bought and what it cost me (clearance prices):

rectangular piezo horn tweeter: 75 watts RMS, 92 dB/W/m - $10
10" woofer: 60 watts RMS, 90 dB/W/m - $20
15" woofer: 150 watts RMS, 91 dB/W/m - $20

Clearly, if you can find 15's for $20/each you're totally stoked. Build yourself a car subwoofer, a home subwoofer, the best 3-ways imaginable, you name it. Maybe you'll even find a fabled 18" (sub)woofer: I had one in college...it was worth the $140/each back then...solid clean output down to 30 Hz in a ported 2' X 2' X 3' box...maybe you can get one for a steal now.

Anywho, I used the attached speaker info graphic and a cabinet calculator (go metric!) to learn that my 24" wide X 36" tall X 10" deep cabinet made of 3/4" plywood simply needed to have a 3" hole cut into the front of it to be well ported (no tube required). My father-in-law had a 2.5" hole cutting drill bit attachment thingie, so I said what the hell. That's half-assed, right there!

I've got separate connectors for the tweeter and 10" speaker together (no crossover -> no loss in power! half-assed!) and for the 15" alone (no filter on that, either...half-assed!). My brother-in-law'll sing (very loudly!) out the tweeter+10, his roommate will play bass (very loudly!) out the uncut 15. We got two old 35 watt Optimus PA amps (thanks, Tone control!) from my father-in-law in exchange for giving him my old Radio Shack single cassette recorder (the dinky ~8" wide, ~6" tall, ~6" deep one with the dual mic jacks and little tiny level controls and LED meters...we've use a Tascam 4 track now). I love Radio Shack...well, I used to. We're all set!

In theory you could make a great 3-way with this set of drivers and a good crossover (you're *totally* stoked if you can find a 3-way crossover at your local Radio Shack...or anywhere in San Diego, really). Maybe let the 15 see from 200 Hz - or maybe even 400 Hz - on down, then let the 10 see from that 200-400 Hz on up to around 2 kHz (it's rated to 2.5 kHz), and the piezo will take it from there (it's rated from 1.8 kHz). I bet the 10 could handle way more than 60 watts RMS between 400-2000 Hz. I had a setup like this in high school (15/10/tweeter), and I remember my chest feeling the *snare* hits on Credence Clearwater Revival songs like Susie Q when I stood in front of it, even a couple meters away (go metric!). Those 15's can really deliver a wallop, especially with a 10" *midrange*!

The speaker grills and cabinet corners and the handle and all the non-wood swag ended up costing more than the drivers. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, people. Buy drivers. Build speakers. Have fun!