DIY Flat Panel Speaker Love

[Unbiasedsound]

I see people build Rich's design and or Tech ingredients design and claim that they sound really good and or say they sound better then the average speaker which is not true. These people are most likely the average joe and not into hifi and or they are deaf. LOL

Even Andrew Jones cheap pioneer speakers will sound better then the average beginners DML design.

DML's do have great potential though one just needs to know how to bring it out.

[Unbiasedsound]

Ahh **** this topic has been dead for a while now. I bring it back up.

[Kornbread]

I'd start a bit cautious. Since you already have some decent bookshelves ...

For now, experiment with the exciter panels but keep them in a size that will fit into the drop ceiling. That way if you don't care for them as mains they can be hidden in the drop ceiling for rear surrounds (maybe height channels for the front/rear?) and take up zero room space or hung on the rear wall/side wall. Even though they are as thin as a sheet of styrofoam, from the front, visually, they can be quite intrusive. If you don't like the panels, use the existing bookshelves for mains.

Same for the sub/subs. If it's just a plain drop ceiling, build them into the ceiling and save considerable floor space. Since they are hidden out of the way, I'd consider multiples to help even out room response.

My av receiver is maybe 10+ years old so I have not a clue as to how far they have advanced in those years concerting eq and processing.

I don't recall ever making a .zma file for any of the exciters I played around with but can only guess that the impedance will vary greatly depending on the panel they are attached to. IIRC, they were a fairly easy load to drive ... but my memory could be wrong.

Just my $.02.

[troglodytes]

Hey everyone. I'm new to the forum and wanted to join because I've been digging through some of these long posts over the past week while I research the use of exciters and how they may be my perfect solution to our basement home theater. I just wanted to ask a few questions before I start really diving down the rabbit hole of purchasing and experimenting with materials and placements.

First off, the plan was always to have a 5.1 system, but I'm perfectly happy with a 2.1 system if the sound is enveloping. The room itself is open but half is used for watching TV/movies while the other half is an office space. Listening position is about 13 ft from the tv/speakers currently and the ceiling is 8ft with drop ceiling. I have a Sony STR DN1080 which provides 100W the LR Fronts / 150W to the Center / 80W to the rear surrounds. What I wanted to do was put DAEX25FHE-4 exciters in the drop ceilings panels on Left & Right fronts and run each of those in series to a XPS hanging panel on either side of the TV to bring the impedance on each channel to 8 ohms, which should play nicely with my AVR. I wanted to pair the entire thing with the Dayton Audio Sub-1000 10".

Now, I know that no one out there can tell me whether this will sound great or not because every room/panel/setup is different, but I wanted to ask if I'm going about this the right way, or is the configuration not what the exciters were intended for? I see a lot of talk of using crossover and EQ management, but I was hoping to use the AVRs crossover in my scenario, and for EQ management I was hooping to get away with the AVR calibration and built in equalizer as I'm trying to keep this a pretty budget setup.

I already have several speaker options to go in the room as an alternative (Aerial 5B bookshelves, B&W Matrix 1, KEF 203 Bookshelves and Energy Connoisseur C3), but the idea of super clean look flat panel (or hidden in ceiling) speakers along with the fun of a DIY project is really intriguing...and to be honest will allow me to maybe clean out some of my speakers because I'm running out of room. However, if my expectations are completely out of line with what the exciters can provide, please let me know.

Also, also if I were to attempt a 5.1 system it would probably look something like the following:

R/L: 2 DAEX25FHE-4 on two panels (4 exciters total)
Center: 2 DAEX25FHE-4 on one XPS panel (2 exciters total)
Rears: 1 DAEX13CT-8 on one panel( 2 exciters total)
Sub: DA Sub-1000

Is this a setup will experimenting with?

[MisterD]

Did you try bonding? How did it go?

Haven’t yet. Got 4 of the 2’x2’ Foamular panels here waiting. Weather is cold and rainy/snowy out and I want to bond them outside on a piece of glass so they’re perfectly flat. I’ll do them as soon as I get a couple warmer days, then let you all know how it works out.

[Bob Johnson]

Try the finish 1/4 sande plywood at Lowe’s. Works well

[Bob Johnson]

Have not found sheet tonewood large enough yet to try but the sande ply at Lowe’s or Home Depot works pretty well.

[Bob Johnson]

Was looking for this thanks. These JMLs see to be too braced to work correctly. Maybe we need a instrument builder to help us with this. These are never going to be close to full range.

[Bob Johnson]

I was looking for this. No way are these JMC speakers worth anything close to what they want for them

[Bob Johnson]

I have used finish plywood from home improvement stores with good results as long as you restrict to over 1k

[Bob Johnson]

Kornbread. Thanks for your comments and the link to the diy event in Indiana. Does anyone know of a DIY event in the northeast? The more I read about open baffle for lows and DML for highs it seems quite rational.

[Brewster56]

A lady did a YouTube video on what is the best Styrofoam glue. Glidden Gripper primer was the winner. Haven't tried it but interested in how it works on sanded XPS.

[Brij]

Hey folks!

I’m thinking of bonding two 2’ square panels together, edge to edge, to make a 2’x4’. Thoughts?

Did you try bonding? How did it go?

[Dukk]

Ordered up 3 pairs of different exciters last night. Time for some experimenting

[Kornbread]

But now have them passively crossed over at 2K and they lose all the extra resonances. Ran a few sweeps and found very little distortion. Yes 2K is high but I added a few ported boxes to handle below 2K and the difference is quite dramatic.

My idea is as follows - Try this wood material for mids/highs and some open baffle woofer designs - perhaps 2 15's in a open baffle dipole design. Bi Amp with a Mini DSP for the adjustments. Thinking the Goldwood 15's can go up to about 1-2k . has anyone tried this. It brings together the open baffle+ dipole idea for both sets of drivers. Never seen this done yet . Looked around for any examples and didn't find any.

Also has anyone tried real tonewood? Specifically Spruce ?

And are there any DYI events in the northeast coming up soon? I would like try this out there.

I was wanting a one driver, crossoverless speaker but after toasting a lot (6?) of the daex32 (I think the large panels used were becoming too excited and forcing the exciter past its excursion limits) the thought occurred to use the exciters as conventional drivers are with a smaller lighter exciter for the migs/highs and a bass shaker, on a separate panel, for the lows. The experiment got cut short as the frustration level increased due to the reliability issue and a warning that no further exciters would be replaced. I have yet to see someone use a bass shaker for the low end. You game?

Somewhere in one of the other large threads, someone did use tonewood for their panel. Don't remember their results.

InDIYana 2020