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DIY2.2A kit build

Got this kit on sale earlier in October on the prime day sales event. Spent more money on veneer than the kit. Curley Maple and black walnut burl.

Sounds pretty good. Bright and dynamic speaker that gets the toes tapping. Bass is decent for the size. Glad I made this kit, learned a lot about veneering. I made a set of speakers years ago, but they did not sound good. I think I will revisit those speakers and see if I can fix them with mods to crossover.

Thanks for leading the way on these projects, and sharing your knowledge and skills. Next project is the phone preamp. I have all the parts ready to go.

6 comments

6 Comments

plate&grid

Nov 09, 2023

I just listened to blood sweat and tears, spinning wheel, and they sounded really good. I am not a very good objective listener.

plate&grid

Nov 08, 2023

I wanted to add auto sound reading material. I have some in storage, need to get it and install. The note I listen to these the more I find I am wanting something more from them. Teeeter sounds very good. The mids occasionally sound harsh to my ears. I have a very challenging room for bass. So not sure it is the speakers or my room with regards to bass.

I asked the vendor's support desk about the cross over build. There was conflicting information about the values of R1 and R2. I never got a reply. I looked at your videos Stephie, and it looked like you made them just like the picture as I did, And swapping the components does not seem to make sense.

Does my schematic for the crossover look correct?

Which resistor should be mounted next to the small inductor, and which next to the large?

I made mine just like the image of the assembled cross over shown in the manual. 1.5 ohm resistor physically adjacent to the larger capacitor and larger inductor.

Big Safari

Oct 30, 2023

Nicely done! I too picked up the same kit during prime days. The packaging was completely destroyed but the contents were surprisingly intact except broken corners etc. I built them per instructions without any mods. My work with the enclosed "veneer" was horrible...so I won't post any pictures, I think I might try to veneer them properly later in few months.

plate&grid

Oct 31, 2023

Replying to

Thanks, I watched a YouTube video of the stock vinyl going wrong and I knew that was beyond me.

Since you had broken corners, I would use auto body filler, and sand them till they are flat and square corners before trying to veneer them. Paperbacked veener would have been easier, but it is more expensive. Apply the glue to one side of speaker, than dry glue with hair dryer or gently with a heat gun till glue is transparent, or just wait if you are patient.

The raw wood veneer would want to curl up and become unmanageable with glue applied. What I found worked well was using a sewing cutting mat, covering that with parchment paper, then putting the veneer on top, then tape the veneer and parchment paper to the cutting mat. Apply glue evenly with a putty knife or glue roller, then gently dry glue with heat gun or hair drier till it just becomes transparent.

Then turn the speaker over and place on top of the veneer. Press down and then trim excess off with carpet knife or utility knife as close as you can without cutting into it. Like 1/8} extra is good target. Then flip over after all 4 sides trimmed, and iron on with gentle heat with parchment paper between iron and wood. Paper keeps glue from gluing to table if there are wholes, and protects wood during ironing. Cotton setting caused splitting, I think I did wool or silk, then let dry for 30 minutes then trim remains edge with veneer trimmer, or just sand flush with a sanding block carefully to not sand through corner, or router with trim bit.

Once finished and complete, find the pre drilled holes and drill the veneer, and drill wide just through veneer layer, or screws will try to lift veneer.

Glue. I used grill a gorilla glue carpenter's glue. In theory this can loosen with age, but will probably be fine for these small speakers. There is glue that is made specifically for the iron on method. I think it is called hot press. Do not, I repeat do not use cold press glue with iron on method, it takes too long to dry, and does not tack well. Hide glue works well, but needs to be heated up in water bath first, will slide around while wet, and it really needs a day or two to cure before doing the next panel. I reinforced my screw holes with CA glue (superglue).

Picture below is what veneer looked like with glue applied, and dry to touch, ready to mate with other dried to touch glue on the cabinet. Trimming the veneer for the openings was done with a trim bit in a router, but the recessed areas had to be trimmed slowly and carefully with hobby knife and then used miniature cylinder drum sanding bits in drill to sand to edge. This took 3 weekends to veneer and finish, probably should have taken 4 weekends to not rush. I made lots of mistakes along the way.

Big Safari

Nov 06, 2023

Replying to

Thank you for your tips and tricks. I think I have a can of Bondo in my garage and will definitely use it to clean up the corners. Have you done any other "mods" or improvements to the assembly and crossover? And how do you find the sound? I have listened to them on 3 diff amps and they seem to like a lot of power....>50W RMS into 8ohms. With tone flat on all amps, they sounded really great in the highs and the midrange, though not so great in the lower end....but that was too be expected. I am wondering if some additional dampening like "No-Rez" would help in addition to the dacron included in the box. Thought

Skunkie

Nov 08, 2023

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Replying to

Placement in the room is critical to getting good low end out of rear ported speakers like this. I also covered the inside surfaces of mine with that butyl/aluminum sound deading sheeting in addition to the suppled material, which helps to deaden the MDF.