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New Project - Compact 215 under 50lbs

#43
MrBonex said:
Make that cab sound even better by adding a little front-to-back and side-to-side bracing. The front-to-back will add the most benefit. Just screw and glue a 1" dowel in. It will make a HUGE difference because those magnets are just turning your large side-surfaces into big radiators, creating all kinds of weird resonances and phase issues (and it will add very little weight).

Also don't forget to add padding/insulation to the inside. I just re-padded my two GenzBenz bins and it was astounding how tight those boxes sound now. Damn, I should have done it sooner!

Oh, yes, the 3/4 inch ply will definitely sound better than the 5/8. Congratulations on a nice project!
Click to expand...
I am not sure that I agree that a thick-walled cab will sound better than a well braced thin-walled one, but you might like to think about how you brace it. The bacing does not have to be as thick as the cab wall, so a shelf of eighth or quarter ply will do the job, provided that you can fix it on (glue it into a groove?). Also, the bracing shelf does not have to be the same width across the cab. It can be shallow at the edge, where the other wall adds stiffness, but should be deepest in the middle, where the most cab flexing will occur. You could also drill holes in it to lighten it. If you want to know how to stiffen a flat surface, have a look at a steel bridge. :p
I also agree with the comment on padding. If you check out the HiFi sites, they can give you a steer on that. One designer instrumented his box, and was surprised at how much difference padding made. He said it was more effective than extra bracing.
One point to bear in mind is that the padding material makes a difference to the volume of the box. Fiberglass and natural wool slow down sound waves, so the box appears to be bigger. Polyester just deadens, so its bulk will make the box smaller.
 
#44
Duplicolor worked very well. I paid $15 for the coating, and $10 for a roller. In a couple of hours:

newcab-tolex1.gif

newcab-tolex2.gif


Tomorrow, I will touch up the paint, put the speakers back in, the handles on, and the jackplate on. Then it will be done for a while. All that's left is to add fluffy stuff and corners.

After its all together I will post a sound clip or two also. :D It's looking pretty cool!!
 
#46
bgavin said:
How well did the Duplicolor work at covering the wood? To avoid seeing wood below the finish, should one paint it black first, or just lay down the Duplicolor?
Click to expand...

Bruce, duplicolor needs 2 coats to not see what's below. It also prefers 'roughed-up' bare wood to paint. There is a special roller you need to that uses plastic wire loops instead of fuzzy stuff... Its all available at Wal-Mart and I found it at OSH hardware too.
 
#47
... so good. :)

I am just playing through my small pa, 200w into 4 ohms. It gets loud, that's for sure. It does have a nice bassy thump, but it's not as articlate as my 1540 or my 212. (Not surprising) I didn't have a chance yet to determine the parameteres of the speakers or confirm the box tuning. Hopefully tomorrow.

I still haven't put in the fluffy stuff or the handles also. I decided I didn't like the handles I bought, so I am going to check out some others. The weight is 65lbs with the finish on it, When I put on the new handles, I will lose some wood, do it shouldn't be any more than 65lbs, and maybe 64lbs. Hmm... And maybe I should get another small bass head to use with this one so that I will have a full backup set.

newcab-done.gif

Tomorrow night, band practice. :D
 
#49
I have tried a few different things with my porting, one thing I did was completely cover the port up, although it wasn't air-tight, and i seemed like my higher notes all disapeared. Does that make sense?

Incidently, it seems like what sounds best so far is to cover about 1/2 of the port.
 
#51
bgavin said:
No.

Covering one port tunes the box lower. That has nothing to do with highs.
Click to expand...

Bruce,

While I have been covering the port, I have been cutting cardboard boxes down to certain sizes, then stuffing them into the port. So, I was not just taping it over the front, but actually sticking a 3d object in the hole, the whole depth of the shelf.

But on the other hand, since I am using a soft material, cardboard, I wonder if that has some bearing here?
 
#53
patrickj said:
What was your method for doing the Dupli-Color? I've practiced on some scrap (brush it on then texture w/ the roller), but it's not looking how I expected it to. I'm getting a much smoother result than the coarser/rough texture from your pix. Any tips?

(same duplicolor stuff, goop & kit w/ tray, brush, roller, etc)
Click to expand...

Are you using a 'wire' roller? My roller does not look like a conventional fluffy paint roller. It looks like it has plastic wire loops coming out of it.
 
#56
Standing waves perhaps (for killing the highs but affecting the cone's ability to vibrate)? I don't know for sure, and didn't do any research and don't even know if standing waves would do that.

Perhaps the closed box has a resonant frequency that is high enough and out of phase enough to actually cancel some high freq. radiation of the speakers. Again, I'm just speculating...
 
#57
BillyB_from_LZ said:
Standing waves perhaps (for killing the highs but affecting the cone's ability to vibrate)? I don't know for sure, and didn't do any research and don't even know if standing waves would do that.

Perhaps the closed box has a resonant frequency that is high enough and out of phase enough to actually cancel some high freq. radiation of the speakers. Again, I'm just speculating...
Click to expand...

It is pretty weird. I am betting that once I am able to get the time and stuff setup to actually calculate the proper specs of these speakers I can fine tune the cab and these oddities will go away.

It's playable as it is, but sounds a bit muddy.With about half the port covered it sounds better.

I don't want to add a piece of wood to it though until the speakers are properly measured. Then I am thinking I will glue a piece in that leaves it just a bit too big, and fashion blocks to put in it so that I can easily grow and shrink the port. Why would I want to do this? I have this idea that different box tunings will sound better in different rooms.

I was surprised at how loud it is. I powered it at my last band practice with just a 200w powered mixer, leaving its EQ all flat and it gave me all the volume I could want and then some.
 
#60
Gabu said:
Yep, the same one. Can you post a pic of your sample? I am wondering how different your coating is from mine.
Click to expand...

I figured out what I was doing wrong.. I was using the kit included brush to paint on the black goop, then using the roller to try to score it and get the texture, but by the time it's coated it's already started to set. Didn't work so well.. went back and used the roller to gloop it on then smooth and texture (I read the directions, misunderstood their meaning), looks a lot better and more like I was expecting.

Wonderfully acrid smell this stuff has :hyper: :hyper:
 

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