Tony Gee's Low Budget Speaker - Build Thread

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mrevie

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Joined 2009
#1
Hi all,

My name's Steve and I'm a uni student living in Townsville, Australia. I've only very recently discovered the wonders of loudspeaker building and have just started my first project. I decided to go with someone else's design first up - Tony Gee's Low Budget Speaker. It's a simple two way MTM, which uses affordable easy to implement drivers and a none too complex crossover. Perfect for my first time!The drivers are from the German company Monacor and I've elected to use fairly nice components in the crossover (Mundorf Supreme caps and copper foil coils). I have to say, Tony Gee's website is amazing. He has put so much effort into each and every one of his designs, not to mention his extensive capacitor test database. So a big thanks to Tony for letting me use his design!

I was planning on waiting until the project is complete before starting a build thread, but I'm far too impatient for that. At his point in time, one box is complete (but raw) and the other will be done in the next day or so. From here, I need to decide on how I want to finish them. The current front runner is a Jarrah veneer. I would have preferred an Ebony veneer, but at AUD220 per m2, I think I'll pass.

Here's the progress so far: (I'll update as things progress)

Panels fresh from the saw:
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Assembly begins
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Crossover components and circle cutting jig arrive!
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Completed crossovers
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Routed the driver cutouts
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Completing the assembly of the first box and starting to damp the second
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Completed first box (Front, raw)
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Completed first box (Back, raw)
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I just realised I don't have any photos of the actual drivers, I'll be sure to take some and post them.

Thanks!

Steve.
 
#5
I had a fair bit of difficulty sourcing the drivers as well, as they weren't able to be air mailed out of the EU. Eventually, I found a shop that was able to send them to me via sea relatively cheaply (http://www.lautsprechershop.de). The Australian Monacor suppliers quote for the drivers without shipping was more expensive than what I got them for with shipping from Germany.

Using a real wood veneer, it shouldn't bee too difficult to just use a thin strip to do the bevels. Without them the boxes look a little chunky. They're a little bit wider than Tony's design because I ended up using 25mm thick MDF as I couldn't find the 22mm variety anywhere.
 
#6
Mrevie, I'm possibly a bit premature with this post, but just wanted to let you know that I used iron-on jarah veneer and the job came up really well. The red tones in the wood look great.

However there were two problems
1. By the time I went back and bought several packets of veneer, it added a fair bit to the cost of what started out as a budget speaker....but hey, it looks good so what the heck
2. After about a year the mdf appeared to shrink just a little in thickness. This meant that if you get the light just right, you can see the plugs for the screws (not a problem for you) and along the edge where one panel butts against the other you can see a raised line the width of the pannel. Perhaps I should have sealed them inside and out before veneering.

There are some images about halfway through this post....

http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=119968

Never the less, the jarah with a matt finish looks really good and was pretty easy to do....easier than gloss and better looking IMHO. The Veneer was easy to use too, including getting it to form around the 20mm radius on the front baffle.

Good luck!
 
#7
After getting some prices for veneers and looking at a few different finishes on speakers. I've decided to finish them in high gloss black. Complete random change of finish, I know. Hopefully it will turn out well. Lots of sanding. 🙁
 
#8
Those Monacor woofers are said to be really very nice

I wont call this "low budget" at all

It might very well be the best ever made by Tony Gee 😎

And hurray, at last he is doing a proper paralel filter
And it even have a nice zobel on tweeter

This will have my honets attention
You may be in fore something special here
If Tony Gee has done his work right, this may beat the socks off the rest of whats out there

🙂
 
#11
I also have a question, if anyone is up for answering it..

The 45 degree bevel on the edges of the baffle is supposed to be bigger in Tony's design, but I thought a smaller bevel would look more aesthetically pleasing. Will this smaller bevel have a negative effect of baffle difraction?
 
#15
I think it would be good to move them just slightly forward and inwards away from the sidewall, if possible

Might not be more than just a few centimeter needed
I would experiment a bit with that

At my place only a few millimeters makes a difference, also with regards to angling towaeds listening position
 
#17
Since taking that photo I have ben having a fiddle with the position. In the position that the left speaker was in originally there was quite a bit of boomy(?) bass coming out of the corner.

I'm also planning on builing a DIY preamp and amp. However, i like to understand what I'm doing so rather than buying a kit and just doing it I'm busily doing all the reading I can find. Any suggestions for good resources for chip amps?
 
#18
mrevie said:


In the position that the left speaker was in originally there was quite a bit of boomy(?) bass coming out of the corner.
Click to expand...


Sounds like you may have solved it

But if that closed corner continues to present a problem you may try to do your own "basstrap"

Find a PVC drain pipe
Drill it out with lots of holes, as many as possible
Fill the pipe with acoustilux polyfill or what you call it
Wrap some insulating material from building construction around it
Clothe the whole thing in velour cloth
Place it standing behind the speaker

It might work, but I havent tried it
 
#19
tinitus said:

Find a PVC drain pipe
Drill it out with lots of holes, as many as possible
Fill the pipe with acoustilux polyfill or what you call it
Wrap some insulating material from building construction around it
Clothe the whole thing in velour cloth
Place it standing behind the speaker

It might work, but I havent tried it
Click to expand...

Is it an illumination or you have seen this design somewhere ?



Anyway, nice build!

I am always tempted by Tony Gee's design but the expensive ones... And I cant afford them right now...
 
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