What Are Speaker Rings Used For? Custom Car Audio Speaker Rings Explained
What Are Speaker Rings Used For?
Speaker rings are one of the most useful pieces in custom car audio fabrication.
They can be used to mount speakers, create additional mounting depth, adapt a speaker to an existing opening, build custom door panels, create fiberglass speaker pods, mount speakers into stuntwalls and chuchero boxes, and provide a strong mounting surface for both speakers and subwoofers.
At Stuntwalls, we CNC cut our speaker rings from quality birch plywood for accurate dimensions, clean cuts, and consistent fitment.
We offer speaker rings in several common sizes and can also produce custom sizes for applications that require something different.
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What Is a Speaker Ring?
A speaker ring is a circular mounting piece that sits between a speaker and the surface it is being installed into.
The center opening is cut to fit the speaker basket while the outside diameter provides additional material around the speaker for mounting screws, fabrication, or spacing.
Speaker rings are commonly made from wood, plastic, acrylic, or other materials.
For custom car audio fabrication, birch plywood is one of our preferred materials because it provides a strong mounting surface and holds screws well.
Speaker Rings for Custom Door Panels
One of the most common uses for speaker rings is building custom car audio door panels.
When adding larger speakers or multiple speakers to a factory door, the original mounting locations are usually not enough.
Speaker rings allow the fabricator to position each speaker exactly where it needs to be and create a solid mounting point around it.
The rings can become part of a custom wood structure, fiberglass door panel, or combination of several different materials.
They can also be stacked when additional depth is needed.
Speaker Rings as Spacers
Speaker rings are often used as speaker spacers.
Sometimes a speaker physically fits the opening but the magnet is too deep.
The back of the speaker may contact a window track, factory door structure, enclosure brace, or another part of the vehicle.
Adding one or more speaker rings moves the speaker outward and creates additional clearance behind the magnet.
The amount of spacing required depends on the speaker and the installation.
This is why stacked speaker rings are common in custom door builds and other tight installations.
Speaker Adapter Rings
Speaker rings can also be used as adapters.
A factory speaker opening may not match the new speaker being installed.
A custom speaker adapter can be designed with an outside shape that fits the factory mounting location and an inside opening that matches the new speaker.
This allows a different speaker to be installed without cutting the factory opening excessively or trying to force a speaker into a location it was never designed to fit.
Custom adapter rings can also be useful when changing from one speaker size to another.
Speaker Rings for Fiberglass Fabrication
Speaker rings are commonly used when building fiberglass door panels, pods, kick panels, dashboards, center consoles, and other custom interior pieces.
The ring determines the final position and angle of the speaker.
Once the ring is positioned correctly, fabric or another material can be stretched around the structure and fiberglass can be used to create the final shape.
Because the speaker mounts directly to the ring, accuracy and strength are important.
A poorly cut ring can create mounting problems later in the build.
Speaker Rings for Stuntwalls
Stuntwalls can contain a large number of professional audio speakers, often using several different speaker sizes in the same enclosure.
CNC cut speaker rings can be used for mounting, spacing, trim work, layered baffles, decorative fabrication, or other parts of the enclosure.
Accurate rings also make it much easier to keep large speaker layouts consistent.
When a wall has ten, twenty, or even more speakers, small differences in hand cut rings can become very noticeable.
CNC cutting makes every ring repeatable.
Subwoofer Mounting Rings
Speaker rings are not limited to mids and door speakers.
Larger rings can be used for subwoofer installation as well.
A subwoofer mounting ring can add additional thickness around the mounting area, create a recessed appearance, provide room for mounting hardware, or strengthen the area around the subwoofer opening.
They can also be stacked to create a deeper mounting surface or decorative trim around the subwoofer.
Why Use Birch Speaker Rings?
There are several materials that can be used for speaker rings, but we prefer birch plywood for many custom car audio applications.
Birch provides a strong mounting surface and holds speaker screws well.
It is also well suited for fabrication where the ring becomes a structural part of the panel or enclosure.
Compared with MDF, quality birch plywood generally handles screws, vibration, and repeated installation better.
This is especially useful in high output systems where speakers and mounting surfaces are subjected to constant vibration.
CNC Cut Speaker Rings Versus Hand Cut Rings
Speaker rings can be cut by hand with a router or jigsaw, but CNC cutting provides much greater consistency.
The inside and outside diameters can be cut accurately based on the required dimensions.
Multiple rings can be made exactly the same.
This is especially important when building matching door panels, large speaker arrays, stuntwalls, chucheros, or any project where several identical rings are needed.
CNC cutting also creates a cleaner starting point for additional sanding, routing, painting, fiberglass work, or finishing.
What Size Speaker Ring Do I Need?
Speaker size alone does not tell you the exact dimensions of the ring you need.
Two different speakers that are both advertised as 10 inch speakers can have different basket diameters and different required cutout dimensions.
The same applies to 6.5 inch, 8 inch, 12 inch, 15 inch, and 18 inch speakers.
Before ordering a ring, check the manufacturer's required mounting cutout for your exact speaker model.
The inside opening of the ring needs to provide enough clearance for the speaker basket without making the opening unnecessarily large.
The outside diameter should provide enough material for the speaker mounting screws and the type of fabrication you are doing.
How Thick Should a Speaker Ring Be?
The correct thickness depends on what you are trying to accomplish.
A thinner ring may be enough when you simply need a mounting surface.
A thicker ring may be required when the speaker needs additional depth or when the ring will become part of a larger structure.
Rings can also be stacked together when more spacing is required.
For custom fabrication, it is usually better to determine the total depth you actually need rather than automatically using the thickest ring possible.
Can Speaker Rings Be Stacked?
Yes.
Stacking speaker rings is a common way to create additional depth.
For example, if a speaker magnet is contacting something behind the mounting surface, adding another ring can move the speaker farther forward.
Stacked rings can also be glued together to create a thicker mounting structure.
This is commonly used in custom door panels, fiberglass builds, subwoofer enclosures, stuntwalls, and chuchero systems.
Do I Need Speaker Rings for Every Installation?
No.
Some factory locations and aftermarket enclosures already provide a suitable mounting surface.
Speaker rings become useful when you need additional mounting strength, more depth, a different opening size, a custom speaker position, or a structure for custom fabrication.
They are especially useful when the installation no longer follows the original factory speaker location.
Common Uses for Car Audio Speaker Rings
CNC speaker rings can be used for custom door panels, a pillars, speaker pods, door speaker spacers, factory speaker adapters, fiberglass fabrication, stuntwalls, chuchero boxes, subwoofer enclosures, custom dashboards, center consoles, speaker trim, layered baffles, custom mounting brackets, and many other audio fabrication projects.
The same basic piece can serve very different purposes depending on how the system is being built.
Custom Speaker Ring Sizes
Not every project uses a standard size.
Some speakers have unusual cutout dimensions, while custom fabrication may require a specific outside diameter or thickness.
If one of our standard CNC speaker rings does not fit your application, contact us with the dimensions you need.
For custom rings, we will normally need the required inside cutout diameter, outside diameter, material thickness, and quantity.
Exact speaker model information can also be helpful when determining the correct dimensions.
Shop CNC Birch Speaker Rings
Stuntwalls CNC speaker rings are precision cut for custom car audio fabrication and are available in several common speaker sizes.
Use them for doors, custom pods, stuntwalls, chucheros, speaker boxes, subwoofer installations, fiberglass fabrication, or any project that needs an accurate and strong speaker mounting ring.
Need a Custom Size?
If your project requires a speaker ring that is not available in our standard sizes, contact Stuntwalls with the dimensions you need.
We can CNC cut custom speaker rings for car audio builders, installers, shops, hobbyists, and custom fabrication projects.
Built in South Florida and available for nationwide shipping.