Hi Gents,
I was looking through some of my old photos and came across some interesting projects - some of these I didn't even remember doing until looking at the pictures again. There are many of these kinds of projects in my archives - some you may have seen, and probably a couple you have never seen.
Anyway, I thought I would share some of the work I did in the past - feel free to comment, ask questions, etc on any of these:
This is a set of speakers I built in 2006 for a customer who desperately wanted something with a rounded top in bright red
The rounded top was done by means of coopering: cut staves at slight angles, then glue and finally sand smooth.
This is a medium sized bottom firing subwoofer also built for a customer in 2006. The customer didn't want the subwoofer to look like a subwoofer, so this is the design we decided on:
This is a set of speaker I built for myself in early 2006. The AVForums founder (Kay) kindly spent a day at my place helping sand these things at the time. I didn't have all the nice tools I have these days so it was a damn heavy job! Thanks Kay!
This is a cabinet I built for myself in early 2007. It is solid Kiaat with frosted glass panels in the doors. No veneer to be found anywhere.
The cabinet was sold a year or two later to one of my friends.
This is a set of speakers I built for a customer in early 2007. The cabinets are Maple veneer on MDF with Purple-heart inlay:
This is a set of curved Walnut speakers I built for myself in 2007 and later ended up selling. Unfortunately I was shafted in the deal by the buyer, but I guess that's school fees. As a result of what happened with this deal my entire way of doing business has changed for the better.
Construction is also coopered:
This is a small entrance table I made for my place in 2007. It has a dark stained Saligna frame (bottom) with the top being made of Maple with resin filled panels. I still have this in my house and it still works for its living. The picture doesn't do it justice unfortunately...
This set of speakers was my second venture into the world of high efficiency. It took an absolute enormous amount of work to make these - they also featured matrix bracing inside with interlocking brace pieces. It was as heavy as all hell and as strong as a bull. These were sold a year or two later to a friend:
This is the famous (infamous?) LITIL speaker kit which I designed over December of 2010. I am not 100% sure now, but I think there are around 10 pairs floating around which were built by interested participants. Some of them have even found their way out of the country and are now playing music in bedrooms and studies in far-away and strange lands...
Early in 2011 I was commissioned by a customer (now a good friend) who needed help painting, finishing and assembling his set of Linkwitz Orions:
A set of stands for Yamaha NS1000 or NS2000 speakers I made for a customer in 2011:
A downward-firing subwoofer with veneer work I did for a customer in 2011. The lighter color veneer is Maple, and the darker bits are reclaimed Walnut.
I went through a brief phase in 2011 where I was playing around with veneer inlays and things:
This is a set of ZRT speakers which I built for a customer in 2011. A couple of years later the speakers came back to me for crossover rework after which I renamed them IRT. They have been sold to a number of forum members since then...
This is the PALADIN Leviathan - my first High Efficiency subwoofer employing an 18" driver in a 250 liter enclosure and powered by an on-board DSP plate amplifier from Hypex. I built this over December of 2011. This thing was an absolute beast. I still have it here though it has been decommissioned for the past 2 years. Construction is 25mm marine plywood with matrix bracing and finished with Maple veneer and satin black paint:
This is a set of speakers I built for myself in May 2012. At the time it was the most technically challenging construction I had ever done. The results were absolutely worth it. I had complements on the sound of these from guys who are notoriously difficult to get a kind word out of. These have since been sold and have left the country. They are driven by what I understand to be a full Mark Levinson system. It makes me proud that this is the case because it shows they can stand their own in a high-end system.
I went as far as to have a special lamination of different woods made up for the construction of these cabinets. The red bits of wood is Bubinga which I toned to a vivid finish. All the aluminium and brass pieces you see were machined on my lathe at home. The paint is dead-flat black and it really pops with the bright red pieces and polished aluminium hardware. Each driver is decoupled from the cabinet, and each cabinet is decoupled from the other cabinets.
Here I started messing around with the HE stuff again and for the first time in my life I actually built someone else's design. The speaker stayed this way for a couple of months before I decided that I wasn't satisfied with the overall presentation. The final modified version of these things formed the basis for the speakers I listen to these days and consider to be my reference standard. They are still unfinished (not painted, etc) and I may or may not actually give them paint at some point...
This set of speakers was built in early 2013. I built a pair which were eventually sold off and as far as I know these are doing their think somewhere in or near Cape Town these days...
This is a set of speakers I built for a customer in mid 2013 based on a design by Troels:
This is a small pair of floor standing speaker I built near the end of 2013. It was an experiment in mass loaded tapered quarterwave design (ML-TQWT). They are still here with me standing around and patiently awaiting my attention to finish the crossovers. I have some preliminary crossovers for them done and am really happy with what I hear from them.
Finish is clear bamboo with Walnut inlay.
This project started in mid 2014 as an exercise in absolute insanity. The project has been placed on hold for the time being as I need to figure out whether of not I am truly in the mood to spend a full year building a single set of speakers or not. I am sure it will look and sound amazing, but I just don't know whether it truly justifies that kind of investment in time...
Well, that all I have for now. Let me know what you think :thinking:
Kind Regards,
Ian.
I was looking through some of my old photos and came across some interesting projects - some of these I didn't even remember doing until looking at the pictures again. There are many of these kinds of projects in my archives - some you may have seen, and probably a couple you have never seen.
Anyway, I thought I would share some of the work I did in the past - feel free to comment, ask questions, etc on any of these:
This is a set of speakers I built in 2006 for a customer who desperately wanted something with a rounded top in bright red
The rounded top was done by means of coopering: cut staves at slight angles, then glue and finally sand smooth.
This is a medium sized bottom firing subwoofer also built for a customer in 2006. The customer didn't want the subwoofer to look like a subwoofer, so this is the design we decided on:
This is a set of speaker I built for myself in early 2006. The AVForums founder (Kay) kindly spent a day at my place helping sand these things at the time. I didn't have all the nice tools I have these days so it was a damn heavy job! Thanks Kay!
This is a cabinet I built for myself in early 2007. It is solid Kiaat with frosted glass panels in the doors. No veneer to be found anywhere.
The cabinet was sold a year or two later to one of my friends.
This is a set of speakers I built for a customer in early 2007. The cabinets are Maple veneer on MDF with Purple-heart inlay:
This is a set of curved Walnut speakers I built for myself in 2007 and later ended up selling. Unfortunately I was shafted in the deal by the buyer, but I guess that's school fees. As a result of what happened with this deal my entire way of doing business has changed for the better.
Construction is also coopered:
This is a small entrance table I made for my place in 2007. It has a dark stained Saligna frame (bottom) with the top being made of Maple with resin filled panels. I still have this in my house and it still works for its living. The picture doesn't do it justice unfortunately...
This set of speakers was my second venture into the world of high efficiency. It took an absolute enormous amount of work to make these - they also featured matrix bracing inside with interlocking brace pieces. It was as heavy as all hell and as strong as a bull. These were sold a year or two later to a friend:
This is the famous (infamous?) LITIL speaker kit which I designed over December of 2010. I am not 100% sure now, but I think there are around 10 pairs floating around which were built by interested participants. Some of them have even found their way out of the country and are now playing music in bedrooms and studies in far-away and strange lands...
Early in 2011 I was commissioned by a customer (now a good friend) who needed help painting, finishing and assembling his set of Linkwitz Orions:
A set of stands for Yamaha NS1000 or NS2000 speakers I made for a customer in 2011:
A downward-firing subwoofer with veneer work I did for a customer in 2011. The lighter color veneer is Maple, and the darker bits are reclaimed Walnut.
I went through a brief phase in 2011 where I was playing around with veneer inlays and things:
This is a set of ZRT speakers which I built for a customer in 2011. A couple of years later the speakers came back to me for crossover rework after which I renamed them IRT. They have been sold to a number of forum members since then...
This is the PALADIN Leviathan - my first High Efficiency subwoofer employing an 18" driver in a 250 liter enclosure and powered by an on-board DSP plate amplifier from Hypex. I built this over December of 2011. This thing was an absolute beast. I still have it here though it has been decommissioned for the past 2 years. Construction is 25mm marine plywood with matrix bracing and finished with Maple veneer and satin black paint:
This is a set of speakers I built for myself in May 2012. At the time it was the most technically challenging construction I had ever done. The results were absolutely worth it. I had complements on the sound of these from guys who are notoriously difficult to get a kind word out of. These have since been sold and have left the country. They are driven by what I understand to be a full Mark Levinson system. It makes me proud that this is the case because it shows they can stand their own in a high-end system.
I went as far as to have a special lamination of different woods made up for the construction of these cabinets. The red bits of wood is Bubinga which I toned to a vivid finish. All the aluminium and brass pieces you see were machined on my lathe at home. The paint is dead-flat black and it really pops with the bright red pieces and polished aluminium hardware. Each driver is decoupled from the cabinet, and each cabinet is decoupled from the other cabinets.
Here I started messing around with the HE stuff again and for the first time in my life I actually built someone else's design. The speaker stayed this way for a couple of months before I decided that I wasn't satisfied with the overall presentation. The final modified version of these things formed the basis for the speakers I listen to these days and consider to be my reference standard. They are still unfinished (not painted, etc) and I may or may not actually give them paint at some point...
This set of speakers was built in early 2013. I built a pair which were eventually sold off and as far as I know these are doing their think somewhere in or near Cape Town these days...
This is a set of speakers I built for a customer in mid 2013 based on a design by Troels:
This is a small pair of floor standing speaker I built near the end of 2013. It was an experiment in mass loaded tapered quarterwave design (ML-TQWT). They are still here with me standing around and patiently awaiting my attention to finish the crossovers. I have some preliminary crossovers for them done and am really happy with what I hear from them.
Finish is clear bamboo with Walnut inlay.
This project started in mid 2014 as an exercise in absolute insanity. The project has been placed on hold for the time being as I need to figure out whether of not I am truly in the mood to spend a full year building a single set of speakers or not. I am sure it will look and sound amazing, but I just don't know whether it truly justifies that kind of investment in time...
Well, that all I have for now. Let me know what you think :thinking:
Kind Regards,
Ian.
