NoPrice DIY

The MonoPrice 6.5 inch 2 way speakers suck, but even if you throw out the drivers the boxes are the cheapest box you can find. This is an attempt at making a good speaker from a shit speaker by doing a full driver replacement

The results so far are pretty good. The box is too damn small for much, but I should have a good living room speaker when done - with a nice flat top end. I'm measuring 6dB output gains over the original drivers so it's much more sound, and I think with a sub could be a good speaker when I get done. I'm still working on the crossover and tweaks.

The driver selection was based on frequency response and efficiency, as well as the holes left in the speakers from removing the existing drivers. I'm using a 4 ohm tweeter and woofer, the original drivers were both 4 ohm, so I don't think I'm breaking any rules here.

Tweeter is a Vifa BC25SC06-04, a cheap little horn loaded textile dome that has very nice response based on the measurements from Zaph Audio.

The woofer is the wool cone Silver Flute W17RC38-04 6.5 Inch unit. Based on the FR charts from Zaph there is a 4k bump on the woofer and a 4k dip on the tweeter's response.. so I'm hoping that they cancel each other out.

The response should be a little bit of the "V" response with a 2dB dip from 1kHz-5k, but honestly it's the kind of response that people pay a pretty penny for at the hifi shops because it sounds nice.

For the box I've got a 1 inch port tube that I will attempt to tune to around 55-60Hz and use in the existing hole that the terminal cup occupies. A pair of quality screw thru terminals from Madisound will replace the t-cup. Also for the box is some automotive asphalt based sound damping wrap for the inside of the cabinet to in theory help kill resonance without taking up any of the very limited air space with braces.

I'll be attempting to keep the cost around $100 for the pair to be upgraded.. I'm sure I'll spend more finding the solution, but it should be a good time.

Other content you may like: