How to Build Center Channel Speakers
If you want to know how to build center channel speakers, you're in the midst of home theater design. It's best to know the differences between horizontal and vertical center speaker design. Horizontal is the overwhelming choice for home theaters. Vertical is the standard for movie theaters and concert venues. The difference has to do with convenience in the case of home theaters, and accuracy of off-axis listening in the case of professional settings. Now the fun starts; there are abundant web resources to help you every step of the way.
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Things You'll Need
- speaker design plans
- 3/4" plywood
- speaker components
- power saw
- power drill
- router
- wood screws
- silicon caulk
- damping material
- speaker wire
- screwdriver
- pliers
- wire stripper
Instructions
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Start With A Plan
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Get some design software. In our computer age, software that creates speaker design is excellent. winISD is freeware for Windows PCs that is well known. Download it at www.linearteam.org. WinSpeakerz s another download software program that costs $79.00, but can be first tested with a free demo for Windows users. The Loudspeaker Design Cookbook can be purchased from partsexpress.com for $39.95.
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Determine your speaker design. Check stores, web construction examples, and chat boards for ideas and suggestions on components and box/enclosure building. Focal and SEAS are excellent choices for loudspeaker components, and madisound.com has enclosures that can rival fine furniture.
Consider duplicating the loudspeaker components in your main left and right speaker. In movie theaters, the center speaker is the same as the left and right mains. That's not always practical in home theaters, which is again why horizontal center speakers are popular. Matching those components, buying them online or in local electronic parts stores, and just buying the cabinet pre-made or building your own, can yield the same seamless sound characteristics across the "front stage."
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Get your loudspeaker components. Dual mid-range designs with a single tweeter (known as MTM, for mid-range, tweeter, mid-range) that mirror the components of the main left and right speakers are the most popular choices.
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Buy finished boxes. Everything from inexpensive cabinets to fine furniture grade wood is ready-made for DIY center speakers. Check www.partsexpress.com for great selection or www.madisound.com for excellent quality, but there are many other sources.
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Build custom cabinets. Use 3/4-inch plywood on all surfaces. If building a center speaker in this way, buy the wood at a hardware store, lumberyard or home products store and have them cut your panels to size for you. If you have a table saw or a friend with cabinet-making experience, make use of that instead.
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Screw and glue with wood glue all connecting panels. Clamp with C clamps or corner clamps all joined surfaces until they're completely dry.
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Apply silicone caulk to all joined surfaces within the cabinet before installing the speakers into the cabinet. Silicone caulk emits gases as it dries that can damage speaker surrounds.
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Fill all screw holes with wood glue or wood putty.
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Sand and finish all cabinet surfaces with your choice of paint or veneer.
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Install the loudspeaker components, one or two mid-ranges and perhaps a tweeter, and the terminal cup on the back, connecting with wires the terminal cup and speakers.
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Tips & Warnings
A compromise building solution is to modify an existing center speaker with the drivers and/or crossover of the left and right front speakers. This can make a different-brand speaker sound sonically similar to the main left and right speakers. An example is a Mitsubishi center speaker with JBL left and right speakers. Replacing the tweeter in the Mitsubishi center speaker yields good sonic characteristics, and all that is required is purchasing a separate speaker component that is the same as the tweeter in the existing speakers and installing it in the center speaker cabinet.
References
Resources
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