Construction of horn speakers
by Jesper Wongjun Nygaard Sørensen - jn@nyga.dk
Here you will find a description of how my speakers were build. I build them together with my friend Kenneth Fuglsig Frausing at Hørning Listefabrik.
From the beginning the idea was to build a pair of speakers based on the old principal of horn speakers.
Horn speakers come in many sizes and shapes, but common for most of them is that they are made with only one full range unit. It is an old design from before the high power units.
The idea is that you have a low power full range unite, and then you build a cabinet for it that enforce the sound. This was the way to build speakers in the old days.
This speaker still has some advantages. The main advantage is that the it is very efficient. Compared to modern speakers, horn speakers can produce approximately 10 times more sound from the same power input.
The units in my speakers are Lowther PM6A. The membrane in this speaker only weighs 11g, so it does not take a lot of power to drive it.
To begin with we played with formulas, and tried to come up with the best shape for the speaker. After a while we stumbled over the Hedelund Horn.
We fell in love with it the minute we saw it, and agreed that this was the speaker we should build. I contacted Jan and with no hesitation he sent us the drawings - Thanks.
We started by cutting the sites and all the different parts used in the construction. Then we glued all the parts on the side. We tried to do it all at once, but we run out of clamps.
This is how it looked like before we glued the other side on.
Then it was time to make the stand. We choose to make it from cherry wood.
The wood wash cut into pieces, planed and glued together.
After that it was planed again
And the cut out for the speaker was made in the front.
Then it was time to assemble the speakers for the first time.
The side and front is attached with machine screws in case we want to change the color and wood type later.
Then it was time to cut the stand in the right angle
Here we have the speakers before painting
This was a good feeling
The paintjob was done by my grandfather. He did a good job. They haven’t been touched for 11 years, and still look good.
My friend Kenneth’s came to rest here
And here you see mine. At the time I lived in a small flat, so you could not help noticing them when you came in.
©2013 Jesper Wongjun Nygaard Sørensen - jn@nyga.dk