Speaker Project

This instructable will show you how to make a speaker with few materials and even fewer skills. It is a fun little project that can be done by anyone and can be made as simply or as complicated and crazy as you like. Have Fun!

Speakers work by sending electrical impulses through a wire which create a magnetic field around a coil inside the speaker. This coil is attached to the flexible part of the speaker and surround a magnet. When the impulses create the field, the coil moves up and down over the magnets and carries the flexible membrane of the speaker with it creating vibrations in the air. Those vibrations then travel through the air and hit your eardrum, causing it to vibrate. This is what is perceived as sound.

You'll need:

1 Paper Plate
2 Plastic Bowls

14 Disk Magnets ( All neodymium. They can be purchased at Home Depot for $3.98 for a pack of 6)

1 Large, Square Magnet [ OPTIONAL ]

A 3.5mm Headphone Jack

Hot Glue and Glue Gun

Stapler and Staples

Construction Paper

Soldering Iron and Solder

Scissors

Oreo’s

4m of magnet wire

A Lighter

Guitar Amp [OPTIONAL]

To create the speaker cone, take the construction paper and cut a single strip out of it. Then, wrap that strip around the magnets, leaving some space, and hot glue into place.

Take the 4 meters of magnet wire and begin to wrap around the speaker cone. Make sure these coils are tight and leave some excess wire on each end to create the electrical connection. Then, using the lighter, burn the insulation off of the leads to create a good electrical connection, a later step. Double check that these coils are tight. We had sound issues when there was excess space between the coils and, as such, the speaker didn't work correctly. Moral of the story, Make those coils tight!

To create the top plate, take one paper plate and cut a slit in it; going approximately half way into the plate. Next, overlap the two flaps to create a "cone shape" and use staples to hold the shape. Finally, take the scissors and cut a hole in the bottom of the cone to make space for the coils.

Take the construction paper and cut a circle out of it. Next, take the coil assembly and hot glue it to this piece in the middle. Then, hot glue the whole assembly to the top plate, making sure that the coils and the excess wire fit through the bottom hole.

To create the base, take one of the paper bowls and cut off about 2/3 of the bottom. Then, hot glue this section to the full and untouched paper bowl. Next, take the column of magnets and the square magnet and sandwich the bowl between them in the middle.

Take the top plate and place it on the base, making sure that the coils surround the column of magnets in the base. Then, take the two magnet wire leads and solder the ground of the 35 mm headphone jack to one lead, and the left and right audio channels to the other.

While building the project, don't forget to take some selfies and eat some Oreo's!