Designer:
Herman

Project Category:
Portable Speakers

Project Level:
Intermediate

Project Time:
8-20 Hours

Project Cost:
$100 – $500

Project Description:
Let me introduce a pair of portable speakers. This is not my first work, but one of the best, to my mind.

One of the speakers, the one of light and dark wood color, is built with the use of typical Dayton components. The second speaker, of light wood color, is built with custom components.

The speakers are made in retro style. They are made of solid ash. As far as I know, ash is one of the best materials for acoustic systems. The speakers are completely portable, with battery life around 20 hours at medium volume. The functional of these portable speakers is not inferior to most of popular speaker brands, like Bose, Marshall, JBL and so on.

Below is a list of functions of each speaker:

Light wood speaker:

• Two input signals: wire connection – mini jack or Bluetooth 4.2. Wire connection is recommended.

• Bluetooth connection LED indicator, with two colors in one hole.

• Three control buttons: fist – Play\Pause, second – next track or long press volume up, third – previous track or long press volume down.

• On the back side, battery level indicator (4 LEDs).

• On the back side, USB port for an external charging device (like powerbank), with maximum output current 2A.

• Support of NFC connection.

• Abilit to connect a second same speaker, for joint work of the two speakers, like left channel and right channel.

• Ability to connect two Bluetooth devices at the same time.

• Support of control by mobile application, examples are in the pictures attached.

• Support of audio codec apt-X.

• Output power – 2 x 15w.

• Battery capacity 5200 mAh.

Light and dark wood speaker:

• Two input signals: wire connection – mini jack or Bluetooth 4.2. Wire connection is recommended.

• Three LED indicators on the front side: First LED (blue) – BT connection, Second LED (red) – device turned on, Third LED (green) – battery check.

• The volume knob.

• On the back side, battery level indicator (4 LEDs).

• On the back side, USB port for external charging device (like powerbank), with maximum output current 2A.

• Support of NFC connection.

• Support of audio codec apt-X.

• Output power – 2 x 30w

• Battery capacity 5200 mAh.

Design Goals:
My design goal is building portable speakers with good sound quality, beautiful design, high functionality and low final cost. On top of that, I get great pleasure from designing and building these speakers. And music that comes from these speakers gives me more enjoyment when I realize that I built them myself.

Driver Selection:
Light wood speaker:

Peerless by Tymphany 830878 3-1/2″ Passive Radiator

Part # 264-1060

Dayton Audio ND16FA-6 5/8″ Soft Dome Neodymium Tweeter

Part # 275-025

Dayton Audio ND90-8 3-1/2″ Aluminum Cone Full-Range Neo Driver 8 Ohm

Part # 290-210

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Light and dark wood speaker:

Peerless by Tymphany 830878 3-1/2″ Passive Radiator

Part # 264-1060

Dayton Audio ND16FA-6 5/8″ Soft Dome Neodymium Tweeter

Part # 275-025

Dayton Audio ND91-4 3-1/2″ Aluminum Cone Full-Range Driver 4 Ohm

Part # 290-224

Enclosure Design:
Enclosure design in both speakers – passive radiator. In my opinion, the use of passive radiators saves space and makes the final speaker of smaller size when compared with the type of reflex port enclosure. The material of manufacture is solid ash thickness 15 mm. Speakers size: Light and dark wood – 30x21x15 cm; Light wood – 31x22x15 cm. Each speaker weight is 3 kg. The design and drawing was developed by myself from scratch.

Enclosure Assembly:
The body was glued with PVC glue, in order to strengthen the design in each corner of the body was inserted spacer. The surfaces of the hulls were polished and treated with oil. For tightness, all holes were sealed with sealing tape or filled with hot melt glue.

Crossover Design:
I used passive crossover. Crossover frequency of light and dark wood speaker is 3200Hz, of light wood speaker is 3500Hz.

Conclusion:
First of all, I gained huge experience in building portable speakers. In second, my opinion is my speakers look great, have good sound quality and high functional. I will be very interested to hear your opinion about my work.

About the Designer:
My name is Herman. And I am 26 years old. I am an IT engineer. Sound and acoustic systems are my hobby, and that hobby gives me a lot of fun. I don’t have a lot of experience in building speakers, in fact, this is my second big project, so do not judge strictly. At this moment, I have a lot of ideas for speakers design, and I hope you will see it. I consider selling this kind of acoustics. If you are interested, please write to me, I will be glad.

Project Parts List: