Surrounds Build Project

Well I finally bit the bullet and decided to get into DIY speakers by building a surround kit designed in part by Rick Craig from Selah Audio and a friend many of you already know Steve Withey (swithey). Steve's HT build thread.

I always had an interest in DIY speakers, just no motivation to build them until now. With an HT build going on I had to get my money's worth on four surround speakers to timbre match my LCR's (B&W 604's and LCR-6). I could've bought the matching speakers from my B&W dealer, Marvins Electronics, but didn't. Due to the b&w ported design I could not place them in the HT columns.

The surround XO were designed and built by Rick. BSC was optimized for speaker placement.



I'm using Steve's enclosure design with a slight modification to the bi-pole side surrounds. I increased the angle of the baffles to 15° from 10°. Since my HT room is so much smaller than Steve's, I wanted to shift the sound envelope, if you will, away from the corners.






Wood cutting will begin tomorrow !

Hi Willd,

I heard lots of great things, from the folks at HTGuide, about the RS series speakers from PE. Im really glad I made the choice, with a little coercion from Swithey, to build these.

Yes the tweeter is a SEAS 27TDFC.

If you sing up for the PE catalog, about once a month they send out a small flyer with
lots of items on clearance or sale.

Early Saturday morning....Well not so early Saturday morning. Made the cut sheet in Cutlist Plus (Bridgewood Design software). I laid out the parts on 24" x 48" x 3/4"
MDF. Smaller sheets means easier to handle when no help is available. Although I could buy at HD already cut to 24" x 48", I called my hardwood supplier and the had it
cut for me for no cost and the MDF cost me a couple of bucks less than HD.

...To make some saw dust I go !!

Got all the enclosure parts cut to size and holes for the drives cut out, and began putting together the di-pole surrounds.

Here im just making sure things line up correctly.



All the cuts were made with the tablesaw blade at a 15° angle.



To make sure I maintained the 15° angle on all cuts even after reseting the saw. I setup my sliding T-Bevel to 15°.



Before I bored the holes for the drivers I dadoed all the sides for the braces.




Time to cut holes. The small holes are there so the terminals of the tweeter can clear. I also drew some reference lines for the hole locations.




Setting up my Jasper Circle cutting jig. This thing needs to sit centered on the router base.





The jig comes with a 1/4" spiral bit, but I use a 1/2" straight cut CMT bit. It covers more area than the 1/4" so it's faster to cut the hole.



I didn't get any photos of the hole cutting process. Sorry
Here are the holes....One baffle down five more to go..





To be continued.....

Wow I gues i need to read the rules on image posting. My last post had one to many and the system told me to remove it.
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One dipole glued the other in clamps with glue drying. I'm back to the shop to work on the Rear Surrounds.....





By the way, I will veneer these with Ash and stain black to match my the HT LCR.

There is a nice long thread over at HTGuide.com for a set of full size floorstanders.
Click here to go directly to the thread. They also have several DIY builds on the Mission Accomplished sub-forum.

They have B.O.M. and plans for all the completed speakers.

Thanks, Steve.. Shouldn't be a problem heading this way to audition the speakers. It'll just be a long time from now. I have to halt progress on the HT to figure out HVAC requirements and changes for HT and equipment closet and family life. School is almost over and we have to plan the summer.

Yea. I've though about the mini-split system, but I just need to increase the size of my supply duct and put in a large return. According to my HVAC coworker my system will be able to handle it.

Anyhow...I started put the Rear Surrounds together just to try out before I veneer. Here's a shot of the XO.




A little trick I learned from my dad and grandad - MDF doesn't accept screws very well. After pre-drilling, a drop of thin CA glue (Cynoacrylite) in the hole will harden the MDF making it harder for screws to pull out. You can also drill, glue, and tap the hole with machine threads without problems.




Completed Rear Surrounds last night about 11:30 PM. I made the enclosures based on Switheys plans since he already had great results. Im thinking about making them a bit narrower (1.5") and add the volume back by increasing the depth. I would also separate the woofer and tweeter a bit more (.5").






No sound tests yet !!! Today after work

Finished the dipoles. I need to go pick up the veneer



Another shot...



Dry Fitting in column...

Room for pics

I got the polyfill from Walmart. The size thing is just a "if I had to build them again I would"..thing. After thinking about it, I don' think I have the time to re-build.


Im going home for lunch to listen to the speakers for an hour. I got some John Coltrane for raw music and I really like Diana Krall's vocals..

I have to say....HOLY SH%& !!!!!!.
I'm pretty impressed, and they're just surrounds. As you can see my review won't be too technical. I don't want to confuse all the newbs with speaker auditioner jargon.

Did I say .....HOLY SH%& !!!!!! yet ? I was playing John Coltrane, one of my favorite jazz musicians. The detail was incredible for such a small speaker. The soundstaging, phenomenal. Then went in Diana Krall and Bobby Knight for vocals.....One more time .....HOLY SH%& !!!!!!

That's about as good as a review I can give right now

He's got me hooked already just a bit more reeling-in..

I know, I know !! Pretty darned good X-overs. I'm gonna put the others together. Friday I'll pick up some veneer.. woo-hoo !

The dipoles aren't built yet. those are the rear surround monopoles. I should be finishing the dipoles this weekend. The crossovers were designed by Rick Craig @ Selah Audio and they are his intelectual property.