homebuilt audio mixer desk

Actually the Behringer line of pro equipment is so low in price, you couldn't compete with it. I have this model and am so far contented with it:

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ciao Ban
Bordighera, Italy

You're joking surely ? The 'semi-pro' products widely available are so competitively priced that attempting to make money by manufacturing them is difficult.

I did this 30+ yrs ago when there really was a financial reason.

If you don't understand the circuitry don't even remotely consider trying. The stuff on sale is pretty high performing and you won't be able to make anything comparable if you don't have many years of design expereince.

You would have trouble even sourcing some of the key components ( like ultra low noise input transistors for the mic amps ) and would have to pay extortionate hobbyist prices.

The commercial stuff also comes in a nicely finished tough case with decent controls and has been tested for electrical safety.

Graham

No they dont. Check out

Decent mixers are quite a big project.

Yes. I used to design them at Studiomaster.

Look, dude, the make them in china for pennies. You will never be able to build up a decent one cheaper than what you can buy them for.

Kevin Aylward snipped-for-privacy@anasoft.co.uk

SuperSpice, a very affordable Mixed-Mode Windows Simulator with Schematic Capture, Waveform Display, FFT's and Filter Design.

Hi Dave. You can get decent quality budget mixers for a few hundred dollars. The components alone for a home built mixer would be more than that! Could you use several smaller mixers?

A modest (quality and complexity) mixer would make a good project for learning electronics and there are schematics on the net and in hobby books. If you want 16 channels and decent quality forget about DIY unless you are really experienced in audio electronics AND have stacks of time. To get low noise performance, the circuit design; layout and grounding must be right and that takes a LOT of skill. Otherwise it will oscillate or sound like a mouldy cassette tape.

dave wrote:

Yes. I have.

If you think buying a mixer board is expensive, just wait until you count up the cost of building your own!

It will cost you $700 to buy a really good 16 channel mixer that it would take you well over 700 hours to duplicate.

(And that's new - there are some real bargains on eBay)

If you want to do it to learn, that's well worth doing. If you want to do it to save money, get a job a McDonald's for two weeks and buy one.

ok ok ok I get the point. It was mainly as an interesting construction project. Thanks anyway.

dave wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Its interesting hearing the chorus from the nay sayers - yes it makes no sense from a purely economic perspective to make a 16 channel mixer - you are simply in 3 decades too late. Like many others here, I was building such items in the '70s, and in those times, the weekly rental from one such mixer could cover all my living expenses (rent, car & intoxicants) for the week. These days it wouldn't fill the tank. The skills gained in the process however were much more transferable however (Metalwork, aluminium welding, anodising, photography, silkscreening, PCB etching,circuit analysis and design, layout etc etc etc) {though there's not a lot of use for competence in Bishop Graphics these days}.The net result of this anti - DIY sentiment (or acceptance that the Chinese are the only people who can/should build things these days) is the extraordinary paucity of people who can fix these things when they go wrong. Does give rise to the occasional suppressed evil chuckle when todays swarm of "Graduates of the $$$ School of Audio Engineering" fader jocks run round like headless chickens when the PA doesn't do what it oughtta. Build it and be damned. M

I also agree with that ! :-)

LOL , it happened to me a 1/4 of century ago ... & this thread reminds me about that times ... :-)

I actually built (my construction!) a 12-ch mono one BUT never finished it to be usable (on the desk it worked perfectly & also made but not finished the case). It had also a "spring type" reverberation system ... the remains could be seen on my site under Music ... That time parts costed me a fortune /but anyway only 1/3 of price than a made quality factory one/ .... but not to mention how many of my free time involved ... but it was a challenge... :-)

Well, building it at least I learned a lot & hey, a LED-VU meter after decades, last year finished in my 5,25" PC bay & a project on my site under Electronics ... served few youngster modders to reproduce it .. at least some of my effort served to someone ... :-)

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                          Regards,  SPAJKY ®
   &  visit my site @ http://www.spajky.vze.com 

That it would be for sure. A long project even. You would learn plenty. Been there - done that. Then made it ( pro-audio ) my profession. It doesn't pay especially well though, so I've done more 'routine' stuff too.

Graham