# DIY sound system for band or bar?



## JonDeath (Dec 4, 2009)

Dying to know if anyone has built one of these since I'm a musician and build a lot of my own enclosures as well as active preamp circuits. 

I have a 5,000+ watt RMS system I pieced together with twenty 15 inch aluminum cone drivers and a dozen other various sized drivers only there's one HUGE short coming. I haven't built the dozen+ enclosures I'll need!
With that much wattage, the proposed cabinet size with dual 15's in each cabinet, I should be able to rely on the 1/2 a watt per audience member formula since the number of drivers is so high, they're so large and the enclosures will all be 4 x 2 x 2. 
Yes, a humble 10,000+ audience system I know 

How about something more sensible though. 
I'm now committed to these digital T amps I bought a few of and really believe these suckers could drive a professional grade sound system. I've got a 100 x 4 watt class D T amp I'm trying to decide what to do with as well as a big brand home subwoofer amp.
Maybe something with some 10's for full range and 12's for a sub so I have a more compact system for starting out at the small gigs. I don't want to be one of those dicks in a moderate sized venue with 200 watt guitar amps, a half dozen 15 inch woofers driven by a couple thousand watts etc. melting off the audience faces and ensuring the stock in "Miracle Ear" keeps rising.


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## blusky4u (Dec 6, 2009)

Personally myself I've done something close to this a few years back and the system now is in Jamaica in a night club. I was running a Macintosh 2500 power supply running off of a 35 amp circut breaker. After it was set up and we fine tuned the system with a computerized EQ,DBX compressor/limiter we figured it was pushing out an honest 740 each side. For speakers I choose EAW cabinets. I choose to run the full power of the 740 directly into the EAW's 18 bass bins then from the bass bins up to some 3-way 15 cabinets. I choose to run the speaker system this way because the 18's were virtually bullet proof and they'd end up soaking up enough power so I wouldnt be blowing out the 3 way 15 cabinets on top. The 3-way 15 cabinets consisted of a 15 in driver then a massive midrange speaker and for the highs a huge and I mean a huge dome tweeter. I've not seen a dome tweeter this l arge before. Once everything was set up and tweaked out cam the white pink noise generator and my friend read out the room. Once the system was powered up and we put some real volume to the music the computer read out that the sound pressure was equal to standing center stage of the hartford civic center when the rolling stones were playing and that's loud and the sound pressure was intense but it was nice distortion free super clean music. I give my thanks to Bobby Cireo at the Stereo House in Hartford Ct for helping me put together this system and setting it up. This system was literally bullet proof. Never not once was a speaker ever blown and I attribute that to the super clean power that McIntosh is noted for. As for the EAW's the inside speaker componants are actually JBL. Theres noting like running with Pro Audio. It's a huge step above anything else thats out there. My opinion Pro Audio's the way to go if ones wallet can afford it.epper:


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## chad (Jun 30, 2005)

EAW uses RCF drivers, not JBL


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## Ga foo 88 (Dec 18, 2005)

many people are using pro-audio coaxials in the home audio 2 channel set ups. P. audio, Radian, even the eminence betas with selenium d220ti CD or B&C DE250s look goode. These are based solely on what I have read about othersusing


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## chad (Jun 30, 2005)

Don't forget the pioneers of coax, Altec, P/A/S, and Urei... in fact many early P/A/S coaxes had blue horns 

I mixed on a PA for a long time that had a JBL2241, a P/A/S 15 with a 2" throat horn, and a JBL 2450 bolted to the back of that. Potent little cab wheny ou got them in multiples and let those 18's couple.


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## blusky4u (Dec 6, 2009)

Back in 1990 I was told that the drivers in the EAW's were JBL Chad. I never tore one apart because I never had the need to. You could be and more than likely are right. I'm just going by what I was told at the time. Anyways what impressed me the most was how clean sounding the entire system sounded. Everything from lows,mids to the highs were right on. It felt as though you were standing i front of a live band. Anyways - Now on to something Chad had mentioned about RCF drivers. First off thank you for correcting me Chad's probably correct in his statement and since I'm in a page with many sound Gurus I'm gonna go with what I'm told here. 
Does anyone know of a company that sells good quality speakers for a build in a car? I've seen so many different company's in the audio magazines and in peoples cars some quite costly and some not. What I'm looking for is to put together a system that's real clean from the lows to the highs and everything in-between so I'm looking for suggestions when it comes to speakers as well as my next question and that would be on the subject of crossovers for this particular car build. One company that I saw that makes a product is Elate Audio. They make an item called ADMW. It's where I can take a 2-way component system and add on to that 2 way system and convert it to a 3 way system. Basically its Morel's 3-way add-on kit. The kit is available in 6", 9" and 10", all of which are equipped with a high quality Hi-Pass/Low-Pass crossover. Installers can use the kit to upgrade most 2-way component systems or coaxial speakers by adding another bass woofer to improve dynamic range, bass response and overall sound quality. I'm just not impressed with what I've seen for 3 way systems out and about. Any suggestions?


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## SlipAngle (Oct 2, 2009)

Have you had any luck tracking down an amp?

I just picked up one of these http://www.wharfedalepro.com/Home/Products/CLASSICPRODUCTS/LXLXESERIES/LX218BLX218BE/tabid/115/Default.aspx for home audio subwoofer duties and am trying to decide what route to go to power it.


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## blusky4u (Dec 6, 2009)

I wish I could hear that once its completed


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