DIY Speaker & Full range Shootout @ Mensicus Audio

[mattsk8]

REGULAR (not sure how you guys tolerate diet) either Coke or Mtn Dew. Thanks!!

Update. We're going to open the event up for Friday as well. I think Bryan will be there, Jim Holtz, obviously the Meniscus guys and I'll be there as well. Waiting to get a head count for Friday before I attempt to finalize any kind of scheduling.

As far as scheduling goes, right now I know Meniscus is going to have a few or more different full range speaker options to demo, plus I know Ben (Wolf) is bringing his full range build as well. In addition to the full range demo, we also have a wealth of different DIY builds to demo. I was also contemplating a simple contest... basically we could select a winner for "best all around speaker" at the event, and a winner for "best bang for your buck". I would save the contest for Saturday because I'm fairly sure there will be a better turn out on Saturday.

What do you guys think???

[bkeane1259]

Just my opinion but a "best all around speaker" category sounds fine to me (pun intended). However, a "best bang for your buck" category will be impossible to sort out. This is because you're going to have to strictly define "bang for your buck" to make it fair. I have a $225 tower speaker build in my rec room that sounds (and is) awesome but only because I used buyout drivers and used parts. It would be impossible to replicate anywhere close to that price point today. How will you decide what constitutes best bang for anyone's buck? Does that make sense? JMHO.....

[Wolf]

I will not be there for Friday. I/Matt will arrive early Saturday morning.
Fenghuang is a 'mostly full range' build, as it does have a full xover and a tweeter coming in at 7.4kHz.

I'm with ya- if no Code present, Regular Mtn Dew for me too!
Wolf

[meniscus]

Just to be clear, "Full Range" = single driver. We are supplying these.

[mattsk8]

Just my opinion but a "best all around speaker" category sounds fine to me (pun intended). However, a "best bang for your buck" category will be impossible to sort out. This is because you're going to have to strictly define "bang for your buck" to make it fair. I have a $225 tower speaker build in my rec room that sounds (and is) awesome but only because I used buyout drivers and used parts. It would be impossible to replicate anywhere close to that price point today. How will you decide what constitutes best bang for anyone's buck? Does that make sense? JMHO.....

That definitely makes sense. Maybe just do a 1st, 2nd and 3rd for best sounding speaker?? Maybe have anonymous forms to submit at the end?? Just thinking out loud

[Mike220]

Three things,

1) I won't have the finalist TL's done in time
2) Friday's get together will start at what time?
3) What hotel do you guys recommend?

Committed:
The Meniscus Audio crew. Thanks you guys very much for hosting this!!
Kenrhodes- New Curved Cabinet Project
Wolf- Fenghuang
Jim Holtz- Statements II + Finalists
duanebro- Powered Sub
speedle- Kairos
marvin +1- New Design
mattsk8- Blues MTM ML-TL, ER18, etc...
isaeagle4031 Armonicos
Mike220- SPEEDSTER TMM's
Bryan K- Docere MLTL
Vega406
wrxified- Blues TM + MTM


(EDITED FOR JIM HOLTZ)

[Jim Holtz]

Mike and I talked and I'll be bringing my original pair of Finalists along with the Statements II. I hope I can wedge them all in my Outback for the journey! I also let Matt know of the change.

Thanks for the speaker list edit Mike!

Jim

[mjgeorge]

That's great news Jim! I was very much looking forward to listening to a pair of Finalists.

[speedle]

This is all very exciting! See you folks Saturday at 9.

[Jim Holtz]

I booked hotel reservations today and will be there both Friday and Saturday. I'm looking forward to it!

Jim

[S7910]

Well, I've gotten the weekend off from both jobs. Next hurdle: anyone willing to share a hotel room Friday and Saturday?

[mattsk8]

Mike, this works very well because now I get to see and hear your Speedster build!! I can't wait to hear the finalists so I'm glad Jim is bringing these .

Three things,

1) I won't have the finalist TL's done in time
2) Friday's get together will start at what time?
3) What hotel do you guys recommend?

We'll plan on getting together Friday at (roughly) 6:30. If you're early or late it won't matter, we'll leave Friday open as far as any kind of scheduling goes, it can be a day to get acquainted. I'll be getting there at around 10am to help set up on Friday.

As far as hotels go, there are lots of options that are fairly close to Meniscus. I know Jim found a good hotel, so you can either PM him to see which one, or feel free to send me a PM as well and I'll be glad to help out.

[mattsk8]

One more thing, I should have my Blues MTM towers built tonight, really excited to listen to these!! I'm going to leave them naked simply because there's no way I'll get them all veneered by then, especially because I loaned the resaw I use to make my veneer to a friend so I don't have it right now. Short version is, my Blues MTM ML/TL will be bare MDF .

The good part of that is, not finishing these leaves me with some extra shop time . So I'm going to build a kit that Paul Carmody recently designed called the Spitfire. This is a TM that uses the same HiVi woofer as the Blues, but uses a different tweeter. So I'll be bringing this as well. These will also be naked

[Wolf]

Cool, Matt! It will go hand in hand with the Nephila project I will be bringing. I only have the baffles to attach yet, as well as some minor soldering work in the xover before then, and maybe voice for a small bit. Looking forward to hearing the Spitifre...

Wolf

PS- less than 3 weeks to go....

[mattsk8]

Cool, Matt! It will go hand in hand with the Nephila project I will be bringing. I only have the baffles to attach yet, as well as some minor soldering work in the xover before then, and maybe voice for a small bit. Looking forward to hearing the Spitifre...

Wolf

PS- less than 3 weeks to go....

I'm hard at it!! Was up until 2am last night working on a removable crossover so I can play with them a little. I got the crossovers done and hopefully I'll be mounting drivers tonight and listening to these. Just need to scrape some woodglue runoff, sand the cabinets, then it's go time . Once these are done I'll fire up the saws again and build those Spitfires.

Can't wait to hear what you're working on Ben.