Make a custom speaker housing

Background info
This is a project that I produced for my Product Design GCSE, I then adapted it so that it would be easier to explain as an Instructable

The Project
The speaker has a custom housing that suits a certain theme, for my GCSE I chose the theme of the 4 seasons, but the main style I chose was a snowflake and that's the style that I will be using to explain the design and build proccess.

Please don't forget to vote this for the contests :)

NOTE:
It is possible that some may steps change as I continue with my GCSE and evaluate the speakers further.

Step 1: Materials and equipment

Materials

• 3mm Acrylic plastic - Speaker housing & amp housing - 1300x500mm (This may change  for your designs, but I found used this amount, and had some left over)
• 3mm Acrylic plastic - Speaker grills - 160x100mm
• A pair of speakers - I used a pair of Peerless 3 inch full range speakers - you might have to edit the files if you wish to use a different speaker.
• A amp (Height needs to be under 50mm at the moment - It will require more modding otherwise, but I plan to do that soon) - I just used one that I found lying around, but you must make sure that the speakers have the right power rating.
• x38 10mm M4 bolts - These are used to hold all the housings together (Can be a different width, but M4 is what I used and it is strong enough)
• x8 30mm M4 bolts - These are used to hold the speaker and customisable front on. (As I said with the 20mm bolts, I used M4, but other sizes might work)
• x46 M4 Nuts - Used to fix all the bolts in place.
• x12 M4 Self tapping screws - This is to screw into the wall or what ever you are connecting to, length is to your discretion.
• Hot glue

Equipment

• Access to a laser cutter
• Access to a oven or similar (Optional - for bending)
• A drill
• A pasta bowl (Optional - for bending)
• The correct M4 tool for the fixing that you are using (In my case it was a M4 hex key)
• Hot glue gun

Comments

[mchoate]

very nicely done ... looks very clean ... couldn't you use boiling water to soften the plastic to avoid smells from cooking it (maybe that's not a problem)

[alexw2150]

Yes, you could use boiling water to soften the plastic - it may even work better, as it might give more evenly distributed heating :D I used a oven that is well used and I didn't smell anything apart from the acrylic plastic.

[wobbler]

Overall, this is a clever and well thought out design. However, I think the nuts and bolts showing on the front of the amp let down its generally clean lines. Given that they are like that to hold the case together, I'd suggest putting a false white front over these, held on with either supermagnets or double sided tape with a suitable hole for the volume control. You could leave a slight gap around the volume control and sandwich an LED between the front panel and the new front to give a glow around the volume control when the amp is on.

[alexw2150]

This is a good idea, but would a line of hot glue on the inside be sufficient? As it would require less laser cutting, but it would also mean that you couldn't take the amp housing apart as easily : / Thanks for the feedback, I will experiment with your idea and see how it comes out :)

[Nick_de]

Cool idea with the bowl for bending the acrylic!

[Ballesss]

Sansa + rockbox is the best.

[Edgar]

I have a neat pack of Instructables to talk about, today on my Blog, and your's one of them! :)
http://faz-voce-mesmo.blogspot.pt/2012/11/instructables-traceparts-e-noticias.html

[alexw2150]

Awesome! Thanks for including it in your blog.

[mischka]

Beautiful design.