I have written a small review on the Zaph Audio ZA-SR71 loudspeaker design. The ZA-SR71 is a popular and a well-regarded design among the DIY community and rightfully so.
The ZA-SR71 is both technically well-designed and a good performer sonically, paired with a high performance/price ratio.
I have personally built and used the ZA-SR71 for some years now and I listen to them from time to time and I still enjoy them. I’ve used the ZA-SR71 as a sort of DIY reference loudspeaker and sometimes used it to benchmark other loudspeaker designs against.
I’ve made a small modification to the original ZA-SR71 regarding the enclosure volume. I found the 14 liter enclosure way too small for the Seas ER18RNX mid-woofer and I increased the volume to 18 liters. Besides that, I’ve used exactly the same cross-over and the same cross-over components sold by Madisound in the ZA-SR71 loudspeaker kit.
In my review I’ve measured the driver units individually and the measurements includes, T-S parameters, distortion, impedance and frequency measurements as well as measurements for the finished design.
Please visit Zaph Audio website for the full ZA-SR71 design documentation regarding cross-over schematics, tuning options and the designer’s comments to the ZA-SR71.
I’ve also made some cross-over simulation based on my own measurements to show some effect of changing the listening distance to the loudspeaker as well as showing the driver units cross-over slopes and phase behavior etc.
I think John Krutke (Zaph Audio) made a very nice DIY loudspeaker design with the ZA-SR71 and I just want to say that this review is my personal opinion and is based on my own sound preferences, measurements and design views and shouldn’t be consider as criticism to another loudspeaker designers design choices.
For the full review see:
ZaphAudio ZA-SR71 Review!
Seas ER18RNX
Seas 27TDFC
/Göran
Author of the “AudioExcite Loudspeaker Design” website