Line Array Build Progress - **PICS**

[theCybe 5,000+ posts]

Those are so hot.

Very good work brandon

 

[brandontw 10+ year member]

Those are so hot.
Very good work brandon

lets just hope they sound as good as they look:veryhapp:

 

[IamDeMan 5,000+ posts]

Well this project was a little more than i bargained for i guess, but finally i am starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I have had a hard time geting around to working on it with working and school full time, but christmas break has given me a chance to get a bit more done. I got one speaker all wired up and ready to seal up and paint. I tested it to make sure all of the speakers were working and they were.//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/eek.gif.771b7a90cf45cabdc554ff1121c21c4a.gif Wow, i can tell these are going to be impressive, and they werent even in an enclosure, just a panel of speakers.
I finally got a decent digicam that wasnt made by retarded possums, so here are a few pics of the project... enjoy.//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/up2something.gif.dd110ecf3ae4b76050d87598f2f8de7c.gif

Your craftsmanship on these is looking really **** impressive! Very nice work thus far. What would is that you are using? Are you apinting or staining? I can only hope man looks this impressive.

 

[Pyro_By_Nature 5,000+ posts]

How hard/expensive is it to build a pair of these? And more importantly...........how's the output? I've been wanting to build a pair and experiment but I don't know where to start.Would it be possible for you to point me in the right direction?

 

[IamDeMan 5,000+ posts]

How hard/expensive is it to build a pair of these? And more importantly...........how's the output? I've been wanting to build a pair and experiment but I don't know where to start.Would it be possible for you to point me in the right direction?

Here is output potential...http://forums.caraudio.com/vb/showthread.php?t=135860

As far as ease, that depends on if you have the right tools. Not to difficult for the skilled with proper tools. Price used to be dirt cheap when PE had the NSBs , but sadly the NSBs are no more. I suppose it can be done relatively cheap with another driver still, but not as cheap as $.50 NSBs //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

 

[brandontw 10+ year member]

How hard/expensive is it to build a pair of these? And more importantly...........how's the output? I've been wanting to build a pair and experiment but I don't know where to start.Would it be possible for you to point me in the right direction?

Its a little harder than I planned, but still not to difficult... as far as the cost... I got the NSB's for 50 cents per speak, then the tang band tweets were 17 or so, and crossovers, 30 for the pair.

That’s the easy part though, my biggest challenge was getting wood for cheap, I would have used MDF, but I wasn’t sure about the structural integrity for a 7 foot tower, and it also would have weighed A LOT. In retrospect, I should have used birch plywood or something similar, but hindsight is always 20/20 eh?

I opted to use 1” plywood boards (they turn out to be less than 1”) it turn’s out to be roughly 70 dollars for the wood -this was the biggest mistake of the project, and almost its downfall. The wood is soft, brittle, knotty, and warped. I picked the straightest ones HD had and still they were VERY bent. This made assembly and creating the 4 inch holes a nightmare. One of the bridges in between the NSB’s actually cracked in the making and I had to glue it back together, and this made me very uncomfortable. In addition, the quality of the wood made chamfering the insides of the holes for the NSB’s completely impossible. I am just hoping this doesn’t ruin the sound of the speakers. The knots in the wood were a bear because they are super hard and don’t cut screw or glue worth a crap.

So, my one piece of advice: use plywood of some sort if you would like to build some of these. I figures out it would have only cost me like 15 bucks more for a couple of sheets of nice plywood L

A minimum tool list:

Table saw or:

Skill Saw if you got skills (I got skills)

Palm sander

Jigsaw

Drill press, if you plan to use a hole saw for the 4 inch holes, unless you are a robot and can hole a hand drill that strong.

Bits, drill, and such

Other various stuff that you need to do stuff.i cant think of everything that I need right

 

[brandontw 10+ year member]

well today was a productive day. I went out to my dads shop early in the AM

(tough for me on a weekend) and got to work on these speakers, i was determined to hear them by the end of the day. about 8 hours later, They were ready to play.

What i did today:

wired all 32 mids

wired tweets

installed crossovers

installed terminal cups

polyfill

internal bracing

sanded and filled screw holes

attatched front speaker plate onto final box

fabricated MDF base

attatched base

Im sorry i forgot my digicam, so no pics today

, but nonethe less i got to plug them into my dads equipment and give them a test run. I started with:

postal service-such great heights

then went to hed kandi - empty streets remix

then disturbed

then godsmack

then lil john

then brooks and dunn

then dixie chicks

then lost at last

then finished with some vocals from evanescence

me and my dad agree...these things ROCK!!!

super loud, distortion free

great vertical dispersion and depth, we were both amazed by it.

great sound quality too, not harsh at all, very easy to listen to, and smooth and crisp.

Total build cost ~ 200$

Cost of my dads B&W 601 shelf speaks - 700$

The look on my dads face when he heard these totally owning his speaks....PRICELESS

 

[thylantyr 10+ year member]

Total build cost ~ 200$

Cost of my dads B&W 601 shelf speaks - 700$

My NSB/PT2 array cost 10x more to build than yours. The big costs were construction materials

to make the over-the-top budget array, second big cost is the 20 tweeters. I could

do it cheaper but didn't.

So... $2k to build, but it beats store bought speakers costing $20k. I auditoned

many high end systems like B&W {$16k speakers} and the array offers alot

more. Even Martin Logan electrostats were boring by comparison.

 

[brandontw 10+ year member]

Total build cost ~ 200$Cost of my dads B&W 601 shelf speaks - 700$

My NSB/PT2 array cost 10x more to build than yours. The big costs were construction materials

to make the over-the-top budget array, second big cost is the 20 tweeters. I could

do it cheaper but didn't.

So... $2k to build, but it beats store bought speakers costing $20k. I auditoned

many high end systems like B&W {$16k speakers} and the array offers alot

more. Even Martin Logan electrostats were boring by comparison.

Totally sweet.

 

[brandontw 10+ year member]

My dad was talking about me making a smaller array for him, mabye with 8 mids and 2 tweets per tower. If i did this i would probably use better mids, perhaps these:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=264-818

and the tweets, i might go with these:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=264-822

if i used 8 mids and 2 tweets per tower, that would be like ~480W RMS power handling:crazy: it seems like these would sound wicked. and i could make them so they would sit on a table or a stand, and the vertical dispersion would still be decent.

what do you think of this?

i want the final load to be 4 ohms, so im not sure about the crossover..any ideas?

 

[joetama 5,000+ posts]

Total build cost ~ 200$Cost of my dads B&W 601 shelf speaks - 700$

My NSB/PT2 array cost 10x more to build than yours. The big costs were construction materials

to make the over-the-top budget array, second big cost is the 20 tweeters. I could

do it cheaper but didn't.

So... $2k to build, but it beats store bought speakers costing $20k. I auditoned

many high end systems like B&W {$16k speakers} and the array offers alot

more. Even Martin Logan electrostats were boring by comparison.

How were they better? How did they compare in imagining, color, depth, and tone?

 

[thylantyr 10+ year member]

My dad was talking about me making a smaller array for him, mabye with 8 mids and 2 tweets per tower. If i did this i would probably use better mids, perhaps these:http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=264-818

and the tweets, i might go with these:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Partnumber=264-822

if i used 8 mids and 2 tweets per tower, that would be like ~480W RMS power handling:crazy: it seems like these would sound wicked. and i could make them so they would sit on a table or a stand, and the vertical dispersion would still be decent.

what do you think of this?

i want the final load to be 4 ohms, so im not sure about the crossover..any ideas?

Small arrays are neat but you may miss the horsepower of the big array.

Floor to ceiling type of arrays really shine, but cost more. It's only money,

go big. Build once not twice, he may want a bigger one later...

 

[joetama 5,000+ posts]

Which B&W's did they sound better than? And on what points did they sound better....

 

[thylantyr 10+ year member]

Small arrays are neat but you may miss the horsepower of the big array.Floor to ceiling type of arrays really shine, but cost more. It's only money,

go big. Build once not twice, he may want a bigger one later...

Comparing store bought vs. DIY always gets this reaction.

Analyze both camps.

The non-DIY'er has to rely on auditions to find the sound they want. They

compare products. Many times the products they like are out of their

budget so they settle for less. Sometimes they are happy with the purchase

on a smaller budget, good for them. Sometimes they don't know that there is

an elite solution because they haven't been exposed to all the possibilities.

A seasoned DIY'er will know all the possibility or many of them. They will also

audition speakers but most of the time they are not satisfied because...

A) speakers are nice, but expensive

B) speakers are boring and expensive

C) speakers are lame and affordable

If there is no satisfaction in store bought then the DIY'er will DIY and study

the art.

Analogy -> You want a fast car, zero to sixty in 3 seconds. Visiting the local

Toyota, Nissan, Ford, GM dealer, you are unable to find it, maybe you can get

excited but it's not the exact thrill ride you seek. What do you do? You find

$200k cars that do this job, but if you can't afford it you build your own muscle

car for $20k. The reason the muscle car beats store bought product is because

you are specificially looking for something in a car.

In my case, I like the sound systems to have high impact akin to fast accelleration

of a car. I don't care about comfortable seats or quiet ride, or any other fancy shmancy feature. When I audition store speakers I'm looking for that specific element and it's not there.

Example, the salesman was bragging about the 'slam' in the sound of their

flagship setup -> B&W w/McIntosh .. I didn't hear any slam, maybe zero to

60 in 7 seconds is slam for him, but for me I want zero to 60 in 1 second. To me,

the sound was dull and boring in that respect. In other words, a dragster would

be my sound system //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif Or fighter jet //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

I have studied on how to get the sound I want. I spent many

ages figuring out the recipe for what makes me happy. A line array is a good

example of what I like. High horsepower, fast accelleration. Ride comfort is

not the first item on the list, but that doesn't mean it can't be comfortable,

you can do things to make it very comfortable.

// comedy //

What I find funny about audio is --> What people avoid is what they really

like but don't know it.

People don't want big speakers with high SQL and 10kw of power, that is

the first reaction you hear. But after they blindly audition a system like this,

they can't live without it, unbeknownst to them it's big and has high power.

 

[joetama 5,000+ posts]

I don’t know, I'm about balance, clarity, and having a clean open sound. If you want brutal SPL just buy some JBL gear and pump an *** load of wattage on it. I don’t see how you can justify spending $2,250.00 on a 10001 or $1,300.00 on a PLX (Prices from Sound Broker). I think you are buying a Pinto for $200 and making mods that make it cost more than a Ferrari. I don’t mind people who know what they like and know how to make something sound good, but I do mind people telling me that what I know is wrong. I have heard big loud powerful speakers, Meyer M3D, MILO, MSL-3A, MSL-6, JBL Line array etc. But, I still don’t look for that type sound in my living room. To each his own…