Open Baffle. Why are they mostly limited to DIY?


I see a few hybrids from Vandersteen and Spatial Audio, but not much else. 
seanheis1

To your point, seanheis1, OB's are thought of only in terms of having all cone-type drivers, but some of the best actually use at least one ribbon, magnetic-planar, or similar type driver, usually a tweeter of course, in combination with a cone woofer. And many OB enthusiasts are also planar fans, some having a pair of those as well as OB's. I mean, planars are just OB's with non-cone drivers!

And snapsc, you're exactly right, OB ownership places the same demands upon one as do planars---3 to 5 feet minimum from the wall behind them.

One incorrect thing said above is that OB's require a lot of power. Actually, one thing OB users like is the design's generally high sensitivity. Many owners pair them with low-power single-ended amps. One exception is the Linkwitz OB's, which require not a lot of power over-all, but a separate power amp for each driver. A fairly complicated x/o is a big part of his designs.

@kalali  

They are also not very versatile and sound best only with certain type of music and certain upstream gear.
Can you elaborate further? Thanks.
@willemj 

and they need a lot of power
Not necessarily. What makes you say this? Thanks.
Open baffles don't always need a lot of power. I heard the spatial audio turbo m3 in salt lake at their assembly facility through the 25 wpc Rossi integrated.  They easily played at 90+ db 14 feet back. They sounded really good. Very smooth, detailed and huge sound stage.