Home-Made IEMs
Oct 18, 2023 at 12:11 AM Post #15,571 of 16,077
Yeah I don't know what to expect. I found some copper clad board on Amazon, but even the thinnest I could find was still about 1.5mm thick, way overkill. I ran across an ebay seller that had some old stock thin PCB. It was about 8 1/2 x 11 inches and is pretty flexible. I measured the thickness but don't remember the exact measurement (at work now). I hoped to make any pads where wire landed as big as possible, but 'big' is an oxymoron word working on such a tiny board. Before getting the thin board, I did a tiny test board from the 1.5mm stuff with some random extra fine tip Sharpie marks. It etched clean and the copper looked where I cleaned off the Sharpie, but didn't try to solder to it. I'll have to go home and buff it up with a tiny piece of steel wool and see how it solders to some wire. And also experiment with some of the thinner board.

I recently transferred a set of drivers from some Westone UM Pro 30s to some custom shells. There's a small crossover board in those but I found it's very easy to pull the litz wire off the board along with the copper trace just handling the driver trying to get the audio output tube pushed through the hole in the shell.

I will definitely report back on how building the crossovers goes.
A long time ago I developed my own UV PCBs using inkjet traces on transparency film. Not sure if that would be practical for something of this size though. If you have an FDM printer, have you thought about getting a laser for it and cutting the copper that way? The lasers are very cheap and should have good accuracy but I've not tried it
 
Oct 18, 2023 at 1:57 PM Post #15,572 of 16,077
Hi . I need some help guys . I need new transparent resin for shells , because im kinda tired of nice-fit resin from ali . Its curs soft and very weak . And im sure im doing it all right.
Which uv resin you will recommend that won’t also turn yellow?
Thank uou
 
Oct 18, 2023 at 5:56 PM Post #15,574 of 16,077
Hi . I need some help guys . I need new transparent resin for shells , because im kinda tired of nice-fit resin from ali . Its curs soft and very weak . And im sure im doing it all right.
Which uv resin you will recommend that won’t also turn yellow?
Thank uou
If you are in US go to warner tech https://www.warnertechcare.com/products they carry Dreve, Detax and others. Expensive, but these are the resins to use for IEMs.
 
Oct 18, 2023 at 5:59 PM Post #15,575 of 16,077
I have a question about the RAB series. The differences between the 30263/32257/30233 models seems to only be the bass response, is that accurate, or does the venting affect treble/midrange/technical performance as well?
Very much from memory - difference is in impedance and venting, but I think they also have different internal design to a degree and will vary in THD as well.
 
Oct 19, 2023 at 12:06 PM Post #15,580 of 16,077
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Figure I should post what I've done so far here too. End goal is a 1BA mids with 2DD for subbass and treble, but so far I've invested a lot more time into ergonomics and design. Having a lot of fun with it
 

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Oct 19, 2023 at 12:24 PM Post #15,581 of 16,077
I have a really simple question but one that has a lot of different answers, what effect does different sized of acoustic tubing have on sound ? I have 1.5mm ID and 2mm ID but the 2mm tubing is quite a squeeze in the canal when using two tubes with a gk.
Any smart people answers on the effect of the tubing size ?
 
Oct 20, 2023 at 3:03 AM Post #15,582 of 16,077
Anyone know what would cause bass leakage after front vent has been covered, and coupler is sealed?(first pic compares against Truthear Zero Red measured with same tips to show that there is a seal, second pic shows just the bass DD, comparison with front vent covered/uncovered.)
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Oct 20, 2023 at 8:44 AM Post #15,583 of 16,077
Do you buy from the same website?
I use pro3dure pouring resins. If you are using the Ali nicefit resins, you will probably do best with either the Egger or Dreve. Pro3dure cures at a bit different UV wavelength. For lacquers I use the Pro3dure Lacquer and the Detax Shellac. I have purchased all my liquids through warner.
 
Oct 20, 2023 at 9:44 AM Post #15,584 of 16,077
A long time ago I developed my own UV PCBs using inkjet traces on transparency film. Not sure if that would be practical for something of this size though. If you have an FDM printer, have you thought about getting a laser for it and cutting the copper that way? The lasers are very cheap and should have good accuracy but I've not tried it
I have a NEJE laser engraver, much larger than needed for this kind of work, but I figured I may use it for other projects. I've used it on various shell colors created from Fotoplast. For the record, if you ever want to use a laser engraver on translucent UV created shells, the power and speed changes from color to color, and even isn't consistent on two shells the same color if one is slighter thicker and darker than the other. And the blue laser has a hard time on blue shells. But the results were pretty consistent on black shells. I found a simple solution that generates the same results one any color shell for small paint fillable text, that being spray paint the shell being engraved black (or at least the engraving area, but being so small you end up spraying the whole shell). The spray paint is easy enough to remove with fingernail polish remover.

But that wasn't the point. I thought about using the laser to etch away the copper from the board, since the board is so thin I could probably use the laser to cut the tiny boards out as well as etch the copper. I guess I have a new experiment to try, but if anyone has etched copper from a pcb with an LED laser please share.
 
Oct 20, 2023 at 10:10 AM Post #15,585 of 16,077
I have a really simple question but one that has a lot of different answers, what effect does different sized of acoustic tubing have on sound ? I have 1.5mm ID and 2mm ID but the 2mm tubing is quite a squeeze in the canal when using two tubes with a gk.
Any smart people answers on the effect of the tubing size ?
This is such a wide conversation. The short of it, wider tubing is great for filtering out low end. Smaller ID filters out high frequency. Tube length can amplify and filter certain frequency ranges. You will have to account for resonances and reflections. Its a simple question with a novel’s worth of potential responses.
 

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