How to: Build Your Own HiFi Speakers — 4x cheaper than buying from Amazon
Instructions for building the Overnight Sensation MT Bookshelf Speakers
A great way to get into Hi-Fi audio at a reasonable price is to build your own pair of speakers. These are the best entry level DIY speakers for under $200 for the set. At 9 inches tall, these bookshelf speakers provide enough bass to be standalone, and the frequency response is warm and thorough. They are meant for smaller rooms and near-field listening, but for the price, they are a home run.
There’s no shortage of good speakers to buy that are already made for you — so why build your own? A huge draw is the deal you get: generally, $100 of parts is equivalent to a $300 to $400 sounding speaker. Also, while bluetooth speakers and streaming services are convenient, building your own speakers adds a physical component to the experience. Since music is constantly playing in the background — everywhere from grocery stores to bathrooms — it is passively listened to. Hopefully, building your own speakers and actively, contemplatively listening will help to bring music to the foreground.
Parts Needed (with cost)
- Overnight Sensation DIY kit from parts express ($138)
- Drill + bits ($35)
- 12 inch clamps ($24)
- Gorilla Glue ($4)
- Sanding block ($3)
- Electrical Tape ($1)
- Wire stripper/cutter ($5)
- Solder ($4)
- Soldering Iron ($15)
- #6 x 3/4" Deep Thread Pan Head Screws Black 100 Pcs.($2.90)
- JSC Wire 16 AWG Red Primary Hook Up Wire 100 ft. USA ($17.32)
- JSC Wire 16 AWG Black Primary Hook Up Wire 100 ft. USA ($17.32)
- PartsExpress Binding Post Banana Jack with 1" Thread 2 Pair Black Gold ($14.49)
- Crossover PC Board 4–5/16" x 3–1/8" For #320–430 x 2 (two boards) ($15)
- Epoxy ($5)
- Egg Crate Foam ($7)
- Hot Glue ($7)
Total Cost with drill: $319.03
Total Cost without drill (since I already had one): $284.03
Assembling the Cabinets
The first step is to assemble the cabinets. The kit comes with pre-fabricated cabinets, so there is no need to cut the wood yourself. Apply gorilla wood glue around the edges of the cabinet; fit the pieces together, and clamp the pieces together until the glue sets. It should take about 24 hours to dry.
After the cabinets dry, paint or stain the wood. I chose to spray paint the cabinets black with a matte finish. Using spray paint was easy, but I think staining the wood would have yielded better results.
Next, drill holes and install the binding posts in the back. Drill pilot holes for the tube:
Install the port tube to the back cabinet. Screw it in and set it to 6 inches length.
Install egg crate foam padding on the inside walls and ceiling using hot glue. This will help with dampening and make the speakers sound cleaner. The cabinets should be fully assembled besides the back piece.
Assembling the Crossover
The crossover splits the frequencies between the driver (low frequencies) and tweeter (high frequencies).
I ordered custom printed PCB’s from Ebay, to ensure my connections would be secure using terminal blocks.
Place all the components (the resisters and capacitors) onto the board. If you buy PCB’s, then the layouts of the components are printed on the boards for you. Otherwise, if you use wood, the assembly of the crossover is displayed in the build manual.
After the component parts are in place, solder each component to its soldering point. If you are using the PCB, all you need to do is add solder to the back of the board at each point. This mends the connection between the components.
Check that the components are correctly soldered, then glue them in place. This will prevent them from moving, as there will be a lot of rattling inside the cabinet.
Putting it all together
Cut speaker wire and input a positive and negative wire into each the 3 ports. However, don’t solder them to the woofer and tweeter yet — it’s easier to do this after the board is placed into the cabinet by running the wires through the woofer and tweeter holes.
Solder the input lines to the back of the binding posts on the cabinet.
Use gorilla glue to glue the PCB to the inside of the speaker. Then, run the input lines for the tweeter and woofer through their respective holes. Attach the respective wires to the tweeter and woofer, and now solder the wires.
Then, place the tweeter in the top hole — it should fit very snug, so no glue needed. I had to use a hammer to get it in place. Place the woofer in the large hole, and screw it in place. Here’s what the inside should look like:
The final step is to glue on the back panel, and that’s it! Here’s the final product — they sound even better than they look!
This project gave me an even bigger appreciation for the art of creating speakers. I’d recommend it to anyone looking to get into more hi-fi systems and to learn more about electronics in general. Please note that these are passive speakers, so they need a power source. These are pretty inefficient speakers, so they require a lot of power to reach their full potential. My current setup pairs the Overnight Sensations with a Denon AVR X1500H 7.2 receiver as well as a Klipsch R-10SW 10 inch 300w subwoofer.
Spencer is a Data Scientist at an e-commerce company in Los Angeles and graduate from UCLA. Some of my passions are hi-fi audio, healthy living, and data science. Connect with me on LinkedIn, mentioning this story when you write.
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