Tweet
I probably shouldn't call them Wolf's unless Wolf approves them, because I've ended up changing almost everything from his design.
To start with, I'm using 4-ohm NS3's instead of the 8-ohm set he uses. They cost half as much, which is nice, plus I'll be driving these from a 12v amp and wanted to get full power. The T/S parameters are apparently a bit different, but a few months ago Wolf indicated that this should be barely within parameters for his design (though it would require twice the capacitance on the filter). Because of the higher capacitance needed, no audio caps were available (or reasonably priced), so I picked up a pair of Nichicon bipolar electrolytic 1,000 uF caps from an electronics place. They were $2 each and way smaller than pairing up 500 uF Daytons.
Then, I decided to rear-mount the driver, because I can't stand to see the squarish frame on those NS3's.
Then, I changed the dimensions into something a little slenderer and more graceful, while keeping the enclosure volume the same. The internal width is the absolute minimum the frame can fit inside, which means I'll need to be really careful cutting the hole and mounting the driver to keep everything aligned.
Then, I screwed up the construction. I had sketched out all my dimensions but had an arrow pointing to the front of the baffle, when it should have only referred to the depth of the side panels. As a result, I cut the thing too shallow by half an inch. Instead of 64 cubic inches, I'm going to wind up at 58 cubic inches, minus a bit more for the new driver position. WinISD doesn't think it'll matter much, but I'm still annoyed at the slip-up.
Now that I'm done talking about my screw-ups, here's where things sit this morning. This is likely the smallest set of speakers I'll ever build, which makes them a great candidate for solid wood construction. If you start gluing solid boards together with the grain running perpendicular, as these are where the baffle meets the top and bottom, you can have serious issues with differential expansion and contraction. You can usually get away with it for a few inches, but beyond the 4.5" width of the baffle I would worry about these self-destructing once summer humidity hits. Since I think I can get away with it in this size, I decided to use up a chunk of glulam maple beam someone gave me. This is basically plywood on steroids, with the laminations running through the board instead of across it. With the black glue, it winds up looking a lot like Zebrawood, but is a lot easier to work with. I'm probably going to finish them with something clear. Maple is hard enough to dye cleanly when it's all the same board; I don't think I've got much hope of putting consistent color on this stuff.
I'm hoping to finish these up in the next day or two, but I need to pick up a replacement router bit to rabbet the side panels to accept the back panel.
To start with, I'm using 4-ohm NS3's instead of the 8-ohm set he uses. They cost half as much, which is nice, plus I'll be driving these from a 12v amp and wanted to get full power. The T/S parameters are apparently a bit different, but a few months ago Wolf indicated that this should be barely within parameters for his design (though it would require twice the capacitance on the filter). Because of the higher capacitance needed, no audio caps were available (or reasonably priced), so I picked up a pair of Nichicon bipolar electrolytic 1,000 uF caps from an electronics place. They were $2 each and way smaller than pairing up 500 uF Daytons.
Then, I decided to rear-mount the driver, because I can't stand to see the squarish frame on those NS3's.
Then, I changed the dimensions into something a little slenderer and more graceful, while keeping the enclosure volume the same. The internal width is the absolute minimum the frame can fit inside, which means I'll need to be really careful cutting the hole and mounting the driver to keep everything aligned.
Then, I screwed up the construction. I had sketched out all my dimensions but had an arrow pointing to the front of the baffle, when it should have only referred to the depth of the side panels. As a result, I cut the thing too shallow by half an inch. Instead of 64 cubic inches, I'm going to wind up at 58 cubic inches, minus a bit more for the new driver position. WinISD doesn't think it'll matter much, but I'm still annoyed at the slip-up.
Now that I'm done talking about my screw-ups, here's where things sit this morning. This is likely the smallest set of speakers I'll ever build, which makes them a great candidate for solid wood construction. If you start gluing solid boards together with the grain running perpendicular, as these are where the baffle meets the top and bottom, you can have serious issues with differential expansion and contraction. You can usually get away with it for a few inches, but beyond the 4.5" width of the baffle I would worry about these self-destructing once summer humidity hits. Since I think I can get away with it in this size, I decided to use up a chunk of glulam maple beam someone gave me. This is basically plywood on steroids, with the laminations running through the board instead of across it. With the black glue, it winds up looking a lot like Zebrawood, but is a lot easier to work with. I'm probably going to finish them with something clear. Maple is hard enough to dye cleanly when it's all the same board; I don't think I've got much hope of putting consistent color on this stuff.
I'm hoping to finish these up in the next day or two, but I need to pick up a replacement router bit to rabbet the side panels to accept the back panel.
Comment