BUILD THREAD: 4 Stereo Integrity 18's

[Scrappydue]

OK, lets try and get this started. Well i have been to a lot of G2G with avs guys since i have been back in MO. All of which are huge bass heads. It is just as bad if not worse than being a member of this forum lol.

well of course many of the guys owning dual pb-13 ultras before told me i had great subs but there was better out there! and i think to my self, "of course there is, GREAT". well after much research at night in bed irritating the wife with the glow of my iPad, i decided to give the DIY a go.

well you can officially put me in that group of guys that will always recommend diy first now.

it is addicting, it was a blast, and it by far us the very most bang for your buck! all worth it in the end though.

so i settled on building 4 4cu ft sealed enclosures for 18" Stereo Integrity drivers. all powered by an inuke 6000 dsp. let the pics begin.

[Scrappydue]

So start this off this was not 100% DIY as i did not cut the wood myself. but i still consider it a great project as i do not have the woodworking skills, nor the tools to do this kind of stuff...YET

So i ordered 4 cubic foot flat packs from DIYsoundgroup.com. this is a great company to wkr with and from what i understand erich does it in his spare time and makes no profit from it. either way ordering was a breeze with paypal, erich shipped asap. packages showed up quickly and well packed.

First thing i did was compare an 18" woofer to a 13" woofer for fun and to bring a little more excitement to the table for myself.

[Scrappydue]

the next thing i did was pull all the pieces out of one box to mock one up and see what i would be building. no instructions or anything, the panels were very easy to figure out how they went together. heres what it looked like. sorry for sideways pics. this forum does not like mac computers.

[Scrappydue]

and one more from the side of the mock up

[Scrappydue]

I put all panels together with gorilla wood glue and then a few brad nails since i do not own any clamps.

Started with what would be the back of the box that is cnc'ed for the cross braces. they only go in one way.short two first, then the long one. after i glued and nailed them i decided to learn from friends mistakes and seal as i went instead of having my head in getting high on fumes trying to do it all after lol.

[Scrappydue]

another view of the sides on and you can see i have it up on paint cans which made it easy to spin and brad nail by myself.

[Scrappydue]

Call it the top or bottom, but it goes on next lol

[Scrappydue]

front baffle goes on next. it has to go on before the other side due to the cuts being so precise. if not you end up having to hammer the front baffle in a risk damaging something.

[Scrappydue]

First box took me about three hours to build by myself. But i wanted to take my time and make sure everything was going together smooth. Last box took me about 40 minutes lol. i am a fast learner, and really can get going once i get a pattern down.

here is a terrible picture of how much space two would take up on each side of the screen. i was excited this night

[Scrappydue]

Now, that the boxes are complete, let's move on to the drivers. i ordered 4 4ohm DVC 18" subs from stereo integrity. They are quite intimidating at first....

[Scrappydue]

Another size shot from the side. for being one of the cheapest 18" home theater drivers out there the build quality on these in fantastic. very heavy duty everything!

[Scrappydue]

Well after the boxes were done and i took a break for a couple days to keep peace with the wife, i decided to get started on the wiring of the subs.

Tinned the internal wires for the series connection of each sub.

[Scrappydue]

Here is a shot of the internal wire to keep each sub in series for an 8 ohm load externally

[Scrappydue]

after subs were wired, i sat up all four boxes in a kind of assembly line to get sides painted quickly. I used Duratex which is extremely nice but expensive. i bought their rollers as i could not find anything, anywhere that looked similar. finish came out great!

Edited October 31, 2013 by Scrappydue

[Scrappydue]

well sides didnt take too long at all. one hour to dry, then a second coat.

[Scrappydue]

My new painting line. the old way was starting to drive me crazy with 8 minutes of painting then waiting an hour to dry!!! lol

this way i could do four sides at once and by the time i got done with the last one i could go straight to second coat on the first one again. this sped things up considerably .

[Scrappydue]

after i was done painting it was time to mark and drill for the binding posts. i just measured from the top on each side and then taped across for a perfect even line then spit the distance in half and give each side an extra inch. so two inches in between posts.

[Scrappydue]

i decided to go with some dayton gold binding posts. they are a nice quality heavy duty post.

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with the holes drilled and the tops off the binding posts they just get hammered into place of course with a towel over them to protect them.

[Scrappydue]

and here is what they looked like in and with the tops back on them.