Very clever with the 2X4s but where did you get that much lumber for $20?  It's still through the roof where I am.

The look a bit 70s den-ish.  

In my space too they don't seem to suffer much from being close to the back wall.

My understanding is that a dense hardwood would be much better, but I have not had an opportunity to compare.  My impression is that pine or fir still outcompetes anything in this price range.

Indeed, 1.5 inches thick.

Shomei'a,

If you go to the Decware products starting page, click on speakers, and scroll down the page you'll see two Zen Master open baffle products. If you click on one of the baffles, you'll find detailed information about the speaker design and hardwood offerings.

If you want to get a sense of the sound quality, scroll down toward the bottom of the product listing. Steve was kind enough to post videos w/ high quality microphones to capture the sound of several different types of music. These recordings are designed to be listened with headphones. So you can use your smart phone or computer headphone jack to listen, as long as you have IEM's or headphones.

This will give you a fairly good sense of how the Li Audio F15 drivers in the open baffle speakers sound.

HK

Fell down another rabbit hole. Put some F15s into a cut in half butch block table top. 36 x 25 routed a hole 2" above centerline. Made a plinth from scrap wood. Wow it's going be hard to get out of this hole.

https://ibb.co/6sX2cCd [img][/img]


Been moving them around a lot. Should have the speakers broken in by the time my UFO2 gets here. Been cold here in the north. Have some ideas for them when it warms up.

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Very nice! The F15s are an amazing value.
If you get to a point where you cut yours into ovals, those cutoffs make sexy legs for the baffle. I just glued and clamped them on and it is a nice sturdy joint.
More importantly, how do yours sound? Mine are so fun to listen to. Almost addictive. On jazz and acoustic they are just alive. And even with rock they jam in a way that many audiophile speakers can’t. One area my F15s are challenged is with Lisa Hannigan her voice sounds rather shouty on the Liis where it is silky smooth on my Magnepans. It could be the lack of density with my pine baffles or maybe the room. Let us know how yours sound.

Interesting about the tilt.  With mine, I was getting a bit stale with the sound but tilting seemed to bring it all back to life -- scale and presence.  I have the more "traditional" build though.

Mine are build like a brick shit-house.  I picked that up from Steve's.  They also weight over 100 lbs each with the extra 25 lbs of lead ballast.  

I built my base like I did because I don't like the aesthetics of Steve's design but then he claimed that the solid block in back was needed to stiffen the bottom edge of the baffle.  Taking his word for that I built the boxes as stiffeners but figured it might be cool to use them for ballast too.

Added a little more weight in the back.

Thanks Joe,

Plan on taking them to the north woods with my Schiit system. The finish will match their new home. Was a rewarding project.

Joseph

Mannytheseacow,

My F15s are the older model, would like to hear the improved version also. Using Dayton Audio SA100 with the W-15. Sounds great using the high level inputs. Nice easy set up, blends together well.

Noticed a lot of smaller sounding recordings on smaller speaker get big and lively using the F15s. They are easy to enjoy. Did notice the Sarah and Steve's big baffles sound demo. Caught my ear, sounded wonderful!

Joseph

Mannytheseacow,

When I run a 6SL7 tube they sound like that, but present set-up I'm not hearing reverb. They are sounding smooth and clean.

Joseph

Mannytheseacow,

The f-15s like tubes, with a tube pre-amp and SS amps. They respond to tubes on the Torri extremely well. They are very revealing when it comes to tubes.

Joseph

Joseph- regarding the reverb, upon more listening I’ve decided that it’s just the transparency of the system that allows the reverb or acoustics in the recording to be extremely perceivable. It is related to track I’m listening to and comes and goes with various recordings.
I did connect my Hegel to the Lii’s, and found nothing to gain. It has 100x the power I need and quite frankly just isn’t as good with the Lii’s as my zkit. I didn’t try it with a tube pre, per se, but did try it with a few hours of classical and jazz through my restored fm3 tuner, as well as with some LPs and streaming.
At the end of the day, this zkit and the Lii’s is just lovely. Wow. I really don’t even want to add a w15 because I don’t feel that I’m missing anything. Sure it could go lower, but the f15s are just really really nice, even with digital and bass heavy tracks.
My inherent nature of needing to build things will probably lead me to a w15 eventually but I think I’ll sell my solid state system first.

Mannytheseacow that was great! It is what happens with real transparency compared to mass produced hifi gear. Welcome to the club.

I think if you wanted to extend the bass of these large F15 baffles you would need a large box or infinite baffle. Low bass is highly overrated when everything else is stellar and the weight is right. The problem with W15 is the efficiency is lower and the speed is slower so you have to compensate with power and damping. This will often lead to more affordable solid state power amps that make it hard to match the sound of the main speakers. Myself, I would like to see something that is as fast as the F15 for bass. So far the only thing I have found is the F18 and only if situated in a large baffle or turned up pretty loud. They are tight as a brick just like the F15 so the bass is a perfect match but lower. It makes the whole space shudder from the projection and efficiency. Cross the F18 as a low bass driver somewhere between 50 and 100 hz and you could simply parallel it with the main F15 speakers all from the 2 watt Zen amp. It would shake the house. A single inductor or inductor and cap depending on room is all you would need to make that happen. Trust me when you can get all the sound from the same amplifier the harmonics and timing are so sharply focused that you will have a benchmark that is almost impossible to beat.

Happy Listening,

Steve

Mannytheseacow,

That's great, sound like you found better perspective with your set up. Sorry wasn't trying to compare amps with the F-15. Trying to compare my RP600m to the F-15 .They help out my Schiit system a lot. James Brown sounds like he's singing in a box with the RP600M. With the F-15 he's performing on a big stage. Don't be afraid to try the W-15. Guess it matters more with the genres of music you listen to. Now I want to build some baffles that Steve was talking about. That's what makes these Lii speakers so cool.

Have a great day!

Joseph

Shipping is a killer, indeed.
I recently sent a one and a half pound box to my cousin in Australia. The shipping was $129, via USPS.
Creating the "legal" manifest was going to be worse. I finally declared them as a collection of small family heirlooms to keep from having to list about 400 philatelic items and franked military covers from our uncle, some of which are considered valued art to Customs. Yikes!

Still cost a bundle.

Thanks everyone for sharing their opinions and experiences. What I love about this forum.

Thanks for Starting this thread Mannytheseacow. Building these F15s baffles has been a huge tool in my Hifi education. They were the first piece of gear that showed me how important synergy can be.

Joseph

Here are my Zenmaster clones.