About Us
DIY Audio Components - How It Started
The adventure began in 2009 when the future DIY Audio Components' founder Artur Fisher was running a small local private recording studio. Look, what he has to say:
It all started with an inspiration from working with the major ribbon microphones. Inspiration have turned into a passion for ribbons, later the passion have turned into research. Being a full time independent studio engineer, I was researching the appliance of ribbon microphones in regular studio works and was impressed with the results very much.
Independence had many advantages (and still does), but one significant disadvantage - I was on a tight budget and could not afford buying several of those great branded products. So, I have asked myself - "can't I make my own?" and that was the moment when a disadvantage have turned into a challenge - "yes, I believe it is possible!".
I had some audio DIY background by that time including making some tube guitar amps, but I didn't have any clue about the microphone design. So, the months of browsing the web and exchanging the e-mails with other enthusiasts began. As a result, in six month from that moment I was holding my own DIY ribbon microphone motor in my hand, the first ever made! I can't deny, my hands were shaking when I plugged it into a preamp the first time, but.. It did produce the sound! Man, I still remember that feeling!
Then there were few more month of experiments, re-designing and improvements. Finally, in the middle of 2010 my first serial RE-154 ribbon motor was introduced. I consider this moment a beginning of DIY Audio Components.
What we do
We, the DIY Audio Components' team, are designing and making the ribbon microphone parts and kits for DIY Audio community. We are constantly working on improving everything we do in order to offer the best possible quality DIY parts and kits to our customers. Serial fabrication of assembly components involves heavy CNC machinery and is mostly done by local contractors for the best supervision and quality control possibilities. The assembly and ribbon tuning works are done in our own workshop by a very skilled and dedicated technician.
Why We Do It
We believe that small studios and home producers can benefit a lot from using quality ribbon microphones. However, the costs of great branded mics are usually prohibitive for these potential users and many of them simply cannot afford spending $1500 on a single microphone, no matter how awesome it is.
That's the main reason why RM-5 was made - we were running a small recording studio and simply didn't have money to buy a quality ribbon mic. Indeed, sometimes the lack of funds can lead to great achievements! The RM-5 is an entirely custom designed and hand-crafted professional ribbon microphone of commercial quality for about the quarter of aforementioned price. Most likely, the RM-5 ribbon microphone is the most affordable model of original design and local manufacturing on the whole world market today. And there is no compromise in sound quality, period.
The other rewarding thing is providing the parts and kits for DIY projects that our customers do themselves. It is such a great feeling when people are sending the photos and audio samples of their creations that were made possible with the help of our hard work.
