DIY Speakers

[Gonzbull]

You guess very wrong my friend. With the right skills and tools, commercial quality can be greatly surpassed. And that's both build and sound quality. The area that is sometimes not up to par is Finish.

[Gonzbull]

 

My DIY bamboo enclosure for Tannoy HPD speakers. Sounds glorious and is rock solid. Looks great too( from the outside).

[Gonzbull]

Well not much of a redesign at all. I went with the original Tannoy plans and increased the volume a bit. Most of the changes are in the material, bracing and the tuning of the port. All the caps and resistors were replaced in the crossovers. I bypassed the switches and replaced the wiring. I gots lots of advice of the Tannoy Yahoo forum. Much needed as well as it was a first.

[Gonzbull]

I guess I would equate 'commercial' as being something that is mass produced. Hours and days spent working does not mean quality.

I chose bamboo for its density as blownsi mentioned.

Here in New Zealand bamboo ply is readily available. It does however require sharp tools as it tends to chip. Perfect material for speaker cabinets. And it looks great.

[Gonzbull]

Natural hardwoods make great musical instruments where you want the coloration/resonance of the wood... but are bad for the same reason in speakers. Man made compounds with high rigidity and no resonant character are a better choice. If you like the appearance of wood, veneer can be used on the enclosure surface without harm to playback.

 

Bamboo as a material is too lightweight for good speaker enclosure material.

 

I suggest a bit of reading on the properties of bamboo ply. Most speaker enclosures are still made of wood. How is a DIYer supposed to make something out of man made compounds if they have no experience in the area or access to said compound. Wood is available everywhere.