Bookshelf speakers for a school project.

Recently, I have been taking some online courses on acoustics and speaker building, and I built (from scratch) a pair of bookshelf speakers as a "school project."

Marius Tanasescu is the creator of a series of online audio courses on Udemy.com. I have finished his first course, Audio 101: Speaker Design Basics, and Enclosure Basics, and decided to build a basic pair of speakers to apply my learning.




The drivers are GRS 8FR-8 units I bought from Parts Express for $15.98 each. These are 8", 8 ohm, 60W units. To keep things simple for this build, I chose to use full-range speakers.

Each speaker is 15.5" high, 10.25" wide, and 13.5" long, The enclosures are made from 5/8" (16.13 mm) particle board. I covered the enclosures with black and woodgrain-patterned self-adhesive vinyl.

The final product sounds great! I've tested them with classical music, some country, a little rock, and a couple of movies. The big cones really put out sound; even at low volumes, they still dominate the room. Being full-range drivers, they are a little weak at the extreme ends of the frequency scale, but still sound good.





For my next project, I am planning to build a subwoofer to add some of the missing bass to this setup. In the future, I also plan to experiment with different paints and other finishes to get a system that looks as good as it sounds.

P.S. If anyone is interested in taking any of these audio courses, they normally cost about $95-$100 each, but I would suggest using the new student discount at Udemy to save (often 85%+) of money. If you're already a member, just wait--sooner or later they usually go on sale.

 

DIY is immensely satisfying, although these days it's hard to save money that way, given how cheap stuff from China can be. Looking forward to your next project.

S.

 

Thanks! The parts for the subwoofer arrived a few days ago. I'm starting as we speak.