Homegrown speaker created with foam plate

We know what you're thinking, and trust us, we're right there with you. We've no idea how a speaker constructed from a foam plate could sound anything close to decent, but judging by the comments from folks that have made their own, it may actually be worth your while to do the same over your holiday break. Reportedly, all you'll need is a standard foam plate, a couple of paper strips, two business cards, some wire, a bit of glue / tape, a neodymium magnet and an audio plug; once you've gathered your materials, you can hit the read link for the how-to guide of putting together the relatively simple device. Of course, we aren't responsible for any strange looks you get should you choose to pimp your new sound system to members of your extended family.

[Shawn @ Dec 24th 2007 8:14AM]

woooot! A speaker MacGyver sytle. I'm gonna try it.

[John from Buffalo @ Dec 24th 2007 8:18AM]

Note the 1994 laptop and cheap budget Winamp player! Old School!

[Slick @ Dec 24th 2007 3:26PM]

"Cheap budget Winamp player"?

Winamp is better and faster than almost any other media player out there. I've been using it for years, not because I just like tradition, but because I've never found anything beter than it.

[Krono6 @ Dec 24th 2007 3:36PM]

Foobar2000.

[Slick @ Dec 24th 2007 4:31PM]

What about it? I've tried it, and I prefer Winamp by a large margin. You can't just name a program; you've gotta back it up.

[Grandalf @ Dec 24th 2007 8:38AM]

Apparently the guy made a previous version using a plastic cup, and has made some wierd headphones which works with a crystal radio... what ever that might be :)

[nih @ Dec 24th 2007 9:37AM]

Crystal radio is basically an AM radio receiver powered by the signal it's picking up. It was incredibly useful back in the days before everyone had power, but you had a tiny earpiece through which to listen and it wasn't all that loud.

[3rdsun @ Dec 24th 2007 8:55AM]

You forgot to mention the wire. Cant get the magnet moving without a coil

[Tabajara Labs @ Dec 24th 2007 8:56AM]

Hey, none of you can spot that THIS IS A FAKE?!?!?!

[samuraisushimonster @ Dec 24th 2007 10:35AM]

it not fake i made it but its not loud because i used the wrong type of wire heres a link to a youtube video of it

http://youtube.com/watch?v=LNR97k2gdJk

[CHEESEMAN @ Dec 24th 2007 10:31AM]

its real dumba$$

[M Sanchez @ Mar 14th 2008 2:15AM]

The speaker made by the Householdsucker is fake. This is a real one. It truly works.
Maybe you should try it by yourself before waisting our time with your comments.

[Jesse S @ Dec 24th 2007 9:12AM]

No.

[Gus @ Dec 24th 2007 10:16AM]

This looks cool through if I was not so lazy I would try and make this.

[Bradley @ Dec 24th 2007 11:01AM]

No, this is real. I've done it myself a few years ago. And I actually had an old laptop and I even used WinAmp. Really cool. Its not real loud, but it can be done. If you hook it up to an external amp you can get more noise. And it is pretty good sound.

[Erick @ Dec 24th 2007 11:08AM]

This works

http://youtube.com/watch?v=wOXUBWl1T5U

[James Tusick @ Dec 24th 2007 12:37PM]

This speaker does work, in my high school engineering class we had to do a similar project. I figured out that the best material for the cone is a manila folder cut a certain way. To make the coil, just wrap some copper wire into a cylinder with a magnet in the middle. The red and black wires attach to each end of the copper wire wrapped around the magnet. The speaker I made had fairly high sound quality, a good range of tone, and it was loud enough to be heard across a classroom. Try it, there's nothing like 6.1 papercraft surround!

[James Tusick @ Dec 24th 2007 12:41PM]

It's a bit more complicated than I previously stated using the magnet. A "magnet cylinder" should run from about a quarter inch above the center of the cone (on the side that the sound comes out) to about an inch out of the back. Then the copper wire has to be wrapped around the magnet without being mounted to the cone to allow the cone to move (the diameter of the wire cylinder should be a slight amount larger than the diameter of the magnet cylinder so the cone will move freely). It's easiest to have some sort of case when making this speaker.

[Ian @ Dec 24th 2007 3:18PM]

well in my physics class in high school i made a speaker out of some wire wrapped around a straw, and then used a magnet to push, i think a small paper plate. sound was terrible and you couldnt hear it worth a damn, but it did work. although we were getting audio through a radio from FM, so yea it sounded like crap.

anyway thats bomb that its nice and loud and gets a decent frequency response

[Nick @ Dec 24th 2007 11:57PM]

Welcome to engineering 101: http://engr.smu.edu/ee/1382/Speaker%20Lab.doc

[Rich B @ Dec 25th 2007 8:14PM]

With a few changed components, you could make you're own microphone too, no?

[orochi @ Dec 25th 2007 9:23PM]

I saw this in the latest issue of Make. Pretty nifty stuff. I want to try it when I get some time.

[Kenny @ Dec 26th 2007 8:53AM]

we used to make these as kids out of 7-11 Slurpee Lids. They sound like sh!! but they worked so everyone could hear the walkman.