New speakers unveiled from Clayton Shaw - Caladan

He is making plenty of money. He would not sell it, if he were not.

4 woofs.....$700, 2 tweeters $150, 6 caps $80, 4 inductors...$50.....4 binding posts $200, wire $100, 6 footers $300. All prices above retail....wholesale 50% less so = $800 max. Two pieces of wood machined....$200.....four brackets.....$150.....shipping boxes $200....so $1500 max plus his labor. He can assemble one pair easily in a day and pack and ship it. The speaker is super simple. The baffles are all cut on a cnc machine and then he just finishes them 20 at a time with paint or varnish. The wire already comes twisted together. He just runs it in the channels the cnc machine makes. He can assmeble 5 pairs at once....if he has enough tables. Not bad.....maybe? $1500 a day more than cost parts.....working 6 days a week that is $468K a year over parts.......That is NOT a loss leader!!!!!!!! Of course, he has expenses and a partner and it costs a few thousand $ to go to the show. I know what it cost to run a business. However, when the business is small like his.....you can make seriously good money if you have steady business. This is what he is counting on.....and he is getting a very powerful promo from Ron.  Free advertising is best!

The above costs are what I know about the speaker from seeing the review and knowing what those parts costs. This is just a quesstimate (the actual cost of parts and labor may be much more).

Selling direct has many advantages. The speaker is very smart.....he is very smart. I am sure he will sell a ton as this is a massively great speaker for the money.

However, you have probably seen my post about making your own bi-amped fully eqed time aligned fully dipole speaker for the same money that uses the same woofs but uses 4 planars from 400hz on up.......mucho better....but you have to build it.......and if you bi-amped using 2 modded GaN 1 digital amps.....OMG!

Ozzy62,

How do you see it? What are your calculations of money in the speaker? Must be way different than mine. I have been in the high end audio business since the late 70s.

From what I see, he is making good money selling them at that price point. Look at the picture on Clayton’s site of him soldering the speaker. That thing is super simple and light. The speakers from Spatial (Clayton’s old company) are way heavier and thicker (3 inches thick of exotic baffle material), have way heavier stands, have way, way more parts and more expensive parts. That is why they are more money. He probably has less people to split the money with now that he is on his own. I don’t see him raising the price. He is going to crank them out.....just like the Mofi $3600 retail bookshelf speaker. The Mofi has ordinary jacks, wire and lots of ordinary Chinese xover parts. The Caladan has way better sounding binding posts, wire and xover parts. The Caladan also goes lower in the bass and is more efficient. Because it is open baffle and you can get to everything super easy.....you could bi-amp the speaker real easy to make it sound even better. The Caladan is also way simpler and easier to manufacture.......and can be done here in the US of A.......and the Caladan is going to sound way better. Some people need/want box speakers. Me, I love me an open baffle speaker. No box.....no box sound.

This looks like the tweeter he is using:

https://www.parts-express.com/Dayton-Audio-RST28F-4-1-1-8-Reference-Series-Fabric-Dome-Tweeter-4-Ohm-275-141?quantity=1

When you mind and heart are not open......then you react from your ego.

These are probably the woofs he is using:

https://usspeaker.com/beyma%2012BR70-1.htm

Here is the wire he is using:

https://jupitercondenser.com/products/copy-of-stranded-tinned-copper-wire-lacquered-cotton-insulation

For  $1200 you can buy the 4 woofs, 2 tweeters, wire and all xover parts.. This would be usng an even better coil on the midrange (Jantzen 12 gauge waxed paper foil).  Then you make a baffle and wire it up.  I would not use binding posts. I would hardwire the speaker cable to the wires going to the xover parts. 

Another possibility would be to cut off the back of the tweeter so there is no chamber.  This would lower the resonant frequency of the tweeter and probably allow a more transparent sound.  However, power handling could be compromised.  I do this to my Vifa tweeters that are sitting on top of my two way speaker.  The Vifa tweeter sounds way better with the back cut off.  However, it is not doing real low frequencies like the one in the Caladan.  However, if you used a digital xover and used steep slopes then you could cross it over at 1K and play 110db.

Another possibility would be to make the speaker with just the woofs and then put a shelf on top and mount the tweeter on a recessed baffle with felt on the top of the speaker to time align the tweeter with the woofs.  Mucho better than just tilting the speaker back a bit.  Of course, everything I suggest has to be measured and listened to.

You can just make the baffle with the drivers mounted and use a $500 Minidsp Flex as the digital xover.  Then you need two amps (modded Fosi V3 would be great for the bass and inexpensive).  This way you can time align the tweeter to the woofs and equalize the whole speaker and use whatever amps you want on the woofs and tweets......but if you are going to go that far then you might as well use a stack of 4 planars for the mids and highs and cross over at 400hz as explained before and on my website.

Only about 5% of audiophiles are DIYers......so this info is not hurting Clayton's pocketbook. Most of you are rolling your eyes after reading all this.....he he.  It is good eye exercise.

Have fun!

You can get as much bass as you want with open baffle.....you just need more woofer area than a woofer in a box. The Caladan with its two 12s has great bass for most people. You can also do the open baffle servo subs and get 15 hz. You can use 6 12s in a stack on each side and a line source of planars to the ceiling and digital xover and biamped and have a speaker that costs less than $10K and is better than most Wilson or Vivid (overall). If you can afford Wilson or Vivid, you certainly have the living room space to put the speaker out where they belong. Wilsons and Vivids sound way better when they are WAY out in the room. Open baffle speakers can image like crazy.....but you have to know what you are doing to make it work. Look at the IO Design speaker from Italy. No baffles at all......and great sound and imaging.

There are those that put the woofers in a box and have open baffle mids and highs. This way you get more bass out of a smaller driver. The Qualio IQ comes to mind. Great speaker.....and with mods would be world class.

There is no "system". The ego makes limitations. The mind and heart explores all possibilities and does so experientially.

Let’s see, from listening to an online video presentation you say these new speakers go deeper, tighter and with a more seemless xover......ha ha. So, did you A/B in your own room the Caladan with the latest $9800 X4 Ultra’s? The woofers in the X4 and the ones in the Caladan are the same. The X4 has a way heavier and more dead baffle and stand. The latest X4 has a completely redone xover, super....I mean super parts. I am sure it sounds way, way, way better than any of the X3s, and X5s that anyone has heard.....including Ron. The midrange driver in the old X3 and X5 had horrible binding posts on them.....yikes, no way you can get transparency through a junk brass binding post. These new woofers by Beyma used on the X4 and the Caladan have copper tabs for the inputs.....not massive brass posts. Way better. We should make "noise" when we really know something is true. Otherwise, it is best to make Nonoise.......he he.

I was responding to a post by Nonoise......but I don't see his post.  Anyway, some Info for you.

I am about to order the 4 woofs for my own diy open baffle speaker.   Same woofs as in the Caladan but I want to try a $50 dipole planar on top crossed over at 400hz.  Theoretically speaking, it should be way better than the Caladan.  You can make it yourself for around $1300.  You can also buy the two tweeters that Clayton uses for less than $100 and do a Caladan clone for about the same price.  But I don't think a forward firing $40 tweeter crossed over at 1K will be anywhere near as good as a dipole planar crossed over at 400hz......and my speaker will be time aligned....unlike the Caladan where the tweeter sound hits your ear way before the rest of the spectrum.  Of course you could set back the tweeter on a Caladan clone but it would not look anything like a Caladan and Clayton would not want to go to that trouble for such a budget speaker.

If this sounds as good as I think, I will open my place to people in the Bay Area to come over and listen (for free).  I am not making speakers......just promoting the idea.  Check out my webpages for more info....if you have not already.  These speakers are so easy to make even a 10 year old could do it (intelligent and co-ordinated and supervised...of course).

Of course, even bigger versions could be made with a line source of planars and bi amping, etc.  But even the basic one would probably beat most $10K speakers.  You can build a crude version in one day.....just need a jig saw and a screw driver.  Buy the plywood at Home Depot and have them cut it to your size......you just cut the round holes and assemble.....easy as pie.

I should have this all done in about one month.  Stay tuned for more info.   This goin' to be fun!!!!!

We are all learning from each other.   We are all each others Guru brothers (and sisters).  We are a projection machine.  We see nothing but our own self.  When you point the finger at someone.....three are pointing back to you.  Love yourself so much that all you see is EVERYONE's beauty.

Jaytor,   Check out the two pics on the bottom of my webpage about making these and other bi-amped versions.  The first pic shows someone who has a two way speaker using two ($20 each) 12s and the planar driver.  That is not a box....it is an open baffle speaker.....with a top on it (no back).  You can see his separate baffle for the planar that can be moved up and back.  The picture of my baffle is below....it has a shelf on it.  Of course, you could make a separate baffle for say 4 12 inch woofs and next to it another baffle with a line source of planars and then physically time align the two baffles.  Two 12s is plenty of bass for me.  I will, no doubt, make a line source of 4 of the 8 inch planars down the road.....then comes bi-amping and dsp speaker eq.