The Lii Crystal 10 is a well built single full range driver formally the flagship of Lii Audio from China. These were replaced with a new Silver model last year. Similar in specs and utilizing the same frame the Crystal and Silver drivers can be interchanged in existing enclosures. This presented an opportunity for existing users to order the Silvers and plop the drivers into the Crystal enclosures. There are positive results with the switch as spoken by a few on this forum. Better bass, lusher mids are some of the improvements.  It also gave DIYers an opportunity to purchase the old flagships and witness first hand the previous buzz of the Crystals.
I purchased a set of Crystals here in the classified section from a member who just did the switch in his “Official” Lii cabinet. His impressions were similar with others albeit the Silvers were bass shy as compared to his departing 100 hour Crystals. I’m sure by now those Silvers are not bass shy after some break in time.
I checked out the plans of the official cabinets on Lii’s site and almost started to make plans on a build, but changed my mind because of the complexity. I always enjoy a challenge when it comes to cabinet making and was looking forward to this one. My curiosity got the best of me because of all the previous hype and the fact these would replace the 20 year old Jordans. The other cabinet designed by Leon Huijgen as shown by Lii caught my attention. It would only consume 2 sheets of MDF and take a day to build! No brainer! Ordered the drivers Tuesday, received Thursday, listening Saturday to well driven Crystals. This aligns with today’s computer driven society, right?
All parts cut.
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Driver hole being routed on the baffle.

Felt being applied to the back horn guide.

Placement marks drawn and top assembled to sides.

Baffle installed after back and horn guide are stapled in place.

Felt stapled back to expose a glue edge.

Horn guide attached to the baffle with glue.

Cabinets ready to roll.


My experience with the Crystals does aligned with what has been said good and bad. Bass shy but much better as compared with the Jordans. Attention grabbing mids and crystal clear highs (no pun intended). Leon’s cabinet has builders mention that a resonance is present and the design drops the crystals response off at 60 hz. I concur with those issues. In my room there is resonance at 86 and 183 hz. 86 hz is the room and 183 is the speaker cabinet. The measured frequency drops like a rock at 60 hz. I knew about the room resonance and have plans to address it at a later time. The cabinet can be tamed with properly placed bracing. All these observations were taken with an frequency generator app on my cell plugged into the ZKIT1. The bass can be improved with cabinet alternations.

Starting with the cabinets placed on the beefed up carpeted covered concrete floor imaging suffered as well as bass. Making some 1 1/2" glued up MDF boards the same size as the base dimensions and spiking the made up bases to the floor improved imaging. Bass was still weak but stable.

Looking at the cabinets, I thought why not glue up some 8/4 oak and replace the MDF with a larger base that can serve as a good building foundation. Reasoning two fold of changing cabinet resonance and boltesting bass response. From the looks the designer cut the horn end at about a quarter wave and left the exposed sides free to resonate. Not sure the reason. My guess would be height issue of placing the drivers too high of the seated listener.

Glued up oak being planed for a flat surface.

Spikes added to the bottom surface.

Bases with cabinets in Chariot.


The bass was enhanced with the new bases but still weak. Building up to open the bottom of the horn a couple of inches made the bass loose but a little stronger.

Moving up to take advantage of the full opening of the horn improved the bass down to 40hz then tapering to 30hz before dropping off. The bass is solid. The height of the driver is a tad taller than the Jordans and more work is instore to mend this base into the design.


I will posts as work is done.

John




John

Thanks Rob. Felt will help with shout. Now sure about howling. Might be resonance causing that.

The shop has become my happy place over this pandemic. I started this past summer seeking and acquiring tools to fit. It has become very capable for a variety of projects.

Leon's cabinets are a very capable basic design. 2 sheets of MDF stacked flat and clamped on top 2x4s spaning a set of horses will set up all rips for the build. There are 2 small pieces that have 45 degee crosscuts. All cuts can be done with a good circular saw and good straight edge. I just clamp a good level for cutting the panels down to size for easy handling and working with stationary equipment. Assembly is straight forward with proper marking. The MDF can be painted, veneered, or even clad with some good grade plywood. Hole for the drivers can be cut with a jig saw.

Good luck with the Silvers.

John

2 years ago I was planning/preparing to see the world with a bicycle in retirement. Retirement came as well as covid. Shifting gears accommodating another passion I decided to build a basement woodworking shop. This led to that - now spring will bring another project of building a shed to accommodate all yard tools. Then I will build a panel saw for the 30 year old 7 1/4" circular saw that is dear to me. I digress...

At present there is resonance at 87, 140 and 157hz with a hole at 104hz. Placing the cabinets on 1 1/2" glued up oak spiked to concrete and blocking the baffle/back panels making the existing bottom openings 4 1/4" bigger for a total area that creates the same area as the inside horizontal plane, created the new peaks of resonance. The 104hz hole did not change. The idea is to get the total resonance closer to the hole. This concurs with what I hear. Ths bass at this point is solid meaning bass notes can be followed with ease. Seperaton from the bass guitar and kick drum is distinct on good recordings. Not chest pounding but filled with pleasant moving  detail.

Placing broom sticks horizontal on the side panels will do little changing resonance. It will just join the two sides and most likely resonate together at the same frequency.

Full range single driver speakers build upon Decware's design of keeping the signal intact. The acronym KISS comes to mind in music reproduction. At the turn of this century, I hung out with a group from the Madisound forum. We use to have competitions with speaker building that actually concluded with an event where our designs were judged live. Of all the speakers that I heard over my life single driver always presented the most detail in any given situation especially OB. Why? Placing two drivers in the same space and fed the same signal creates a fight between the two that is compounded by a designer who adds all kind of circuits attempting to referee the bout.

I am still figuring out how to refine the base keeping in mind not to chock the horn!

If your up for a read here is a thread about my room dimensions and build:

https://www.decware.com/cgi-bin/yabb22/YaBB.pl?num=1581779674

John

Wow! Voight pipes! I had to jog my memory on that speaker. At one time it inspired me to build but never got done.

John