1x12 cabinet build

[drysideshooter]

I have been wanting to do a rather industrial looking 1x12 speaker cabinet.  I have an Eminence Legend 12" waiting for it.  I had a nice piece of eastern white pine that I've been saving.  I'm just getting started.  I'm using aluminum on the outside corners instead of the more traditional corner protectors, for a bit more beefy, industrial look.  I brushed the aluminum just enough to give it sort of a frosted appearance.  I'm using button head, square drive bolts for a sort of riveted, tough look.  I'm going to install aluminum angle with threaded inserts inside the cabinet for the baffle and back pieces to fasten to, and will use the same bolts.  I'm building it primarily as an open back cabinet, but I'm also going to make an insert for the back with an adjustable baffle so I can mess around and see what sounds best. 

This is what it looks like so far. Still a lot to do. I'm thinking I will probably stain it a dark grey.  I have a heavy duty waffle weave black grill for the speaker instead of using grill cloth. 

 

[drysideshooter]

Had a little time to work on the speaker cabinet today.

All the aluminum is in place for the baffle and back pieces.

A better look at a corner:

The back pieces in place:

A look at the back:

Sorry this is a bit blurry. These are the threaded inserts I'm putting in the aluminum to bolt the baffle and back pieces to:

 

[rgand]

Coming along fine. The industrial look is a good one. I like working with aluminum. There's so much you can do with it.

 

[drysideshooter]

Thanks Rgand.  I recently made some sort of steam punk themed, large light fixtures and have been sort of in the mood for that genre or industrial.

I thought about going with steel corners for the outside, but I'm trying to save a bit of weight.  I have a mill and thought about making some custom corner fittings, but this was pretty easy.  I have the baffle in now (1/2" cabinet grade multi-ply doug fir plywood) and it's a really stout assembly and not too heavy.

 

[Cagey]

Interesting design. I would have used cleats rather than angle stock to mount the front/back panels, but that works, too.

I like working aluminum, too. You can use readily available tools.

I built a couple 112 cabs some years back and used birch ply and all the various aluminum extrusions/mating channels/corners/etc. so they ended up looking like Anvil road cases. Also ended up very heavy, which sorta defeated my original intent.

 

[drysideshooter]

Cagey, light weight was one of my goals.  I have a mill, and thought about making some stout corner pieces out of aluminum that would have been structural, but I had quite a bit of aluminum angle on hand so decided to use it. 

The angle for the front and back pieces has wood screws, but mostly to hold while the West System epoxy sets.  At this point to remove the aluminum angle, even with the screws out, would destroy the wood.  I thought about welding the aluminum backing for the baffle and back pieces at the corners, but one I test fit the back pieces it added so much rigidity to the structure that I didn't see a need.  Now that the baffle is in it's a very stiff assembly. 

Properly done it's amazing how strong rivnuts are.  I've attached all sorts of spoilers and ground effects to race cars utilizing them.  I kind of want to make a speaker cabinet that is a framework of welded square aluminum tube with the plywood skin screwed on using rivnuts.  The resonance with the hollow aluminum tube might be cool, or it might really suck. 

I have a couple nice pieces of hickory.  I think I may build a 2x12 cabinet and finger joint all of the exterior corners, and use traditional wood cleats inside.  I salvaged some great cabinet skins from one of our jobsites. They came in the wrong color, but they're beautiful burled walnut.  I may laminate one to a piece of Baltic birch plywood to use for a baffle. 

 

[Cagey]

One of my brothers and I discuss the gear weight thing all the time, and the topic seems to generating more discussion out in real player world as well. We're waiting on the manufacturers to start catching up to the idea that 80lb amps and 110lb speaker cabinets are less than ideal. There are a helluva lotta guys still playing but getting up in years, and while not exactly decrepit, still don't want to be trying to heave around chunky plus-sized boxes. Hurts too much the next day  :laughing7:

I'd like somebody to come up with some 112 speaker boxes that are rigid enough that they don't color the sound too much with positive/negative resonant points, but still only weigh 20lbs  or so above the speaker's weight. Make the whole thing 30lbs, and even a gimp like me can move it without firing up the fork truck.

 

[pabloman]

Man you're going down the a rabbit hole. I'm in the process of another 1x12 build now. I keep building cabs because they are relatively cheap to build, especially if you already have the drivers. I've converted a couple of low watt combos into heads as well. It's fun for sure. Keep us posted.

 

[drysideshooter]

Cagey, I've been a builder for a long time. We have built wineries, estates, custom homes, etc. that have been featured in magazines. There are a lot of innovative new products hitting the market all of the time.  Some, like newer structural insulated panels are very light weight for the strength they provide.  I'm thinking there must be a way to incorporate a couple fairly light skins laminated to a foam core for building a speaker cabinet.  I think it could utilize a rod with flanges on the inside that rest against the inner skin, and the rod has a threaded end that extends through a hole to the outside of the cabinet and is secured with a nut.  Tightening the nut would draw the cabinet together, against the flanges. Those going both directions in each corner wouldn't weigh much, and would be very light.  Two lightweight panels with some type of structural honeycomb structure inside could work too, but I think it might be a bit boomy sounding for a speaker cabinet. 

Pabloman you're right about the rabbit hole!  To make it worse, my company has a full on cabinet shop full of tools, and my home shop is well equipped for wood and metal working.  My wife calls me the project king. My son and I spend quite a bit of time making custom firearms. 

What Cagey said reminded me why I even started to think about a lightweight cabinet build.  There was a Blues Cube Artist for sale locally.  I called about it and it had sold. The guy was selling it because he was getting a bit older and didn't like lugging it around any more.  I know a fair number of folks that have gone from combo's to heads and cabinets because of the weight being split into two pieces. 

Though it's the standard and fine, I'm also a bit tired of various colors of tolex covering cabinets.  It's really easy to make a structurally sound cabinet if you are covering the exterior so screw heads and other fastening items won't be seen.  I'm intrigued by the idea of a lightweight, welded aluminum square tube frame.  The framework could be foam filled if needed for acoustics.  A 1/2" baffle for mounting the driver and the rest could be  a lightweight, attractive skin on the outside laminated to foam on the inside.  The skin wouldn't even have to be wood. If someone wanted a different look there are all sorts of formica style laminates in a wide variety of patterns and colors. 

The king salmon have started to hit my local rivers, so I will be on the river most days until the run starts to peter out.  Plenty of time to mull over projects.  I'm really anxious to get going on my Warmoth strat. 

 

[drysideshooter]

We've built wineries and winery estates and have friend that own wineries.  I have access to a lot of retired wine barrels.  I would like to find a way to use some barrel staves for building a cabinet. The curvature would require a bit of a different shape, but how cool would it be to have a speaker cab out of an old wine barrel?

This is a pic of a powder bath in a multimillion dollar winery estate home we built. We made a floating vanity out of a retired wine barrel.

 

[Cagey]

Aren't those barrels usually made of hardwood? Not gonna make anything lightweight out of that. Although, technically, Balsa is a hardwood  :laughing7:

 

[drysideshooter]

Depending on the wine being made, many of them are French oak.  Wouldn't be lightweight by any stretch of the imagination. We have made quite a few light fixtures and furniture out of old staves and they are relatively heavy.  Could be a super cool looking cabinet to have setting someplace like a den though. Wouldn't want to move it around much.  Or for the wineries that have music in the tasting rooms to leave set up for musicians to use.

New the barrels are expensive, anywhere from $500-$900 each.  Depending on the winemaker and the wine, some of them only get used once.  Living in the middle of wine country we see folks using them for things like catching rain water from downspouts and things like that.  We have had equipment come in from other countries that we realized was on oak dunnage.  Some of it has been surprisingly nice once it get's cut down and planed. 

 

[rgand]

Those oak wine barrels are quite useful. I have a stool that's made from a small one. The stuff is HEAVY, though. I wouldn't want to make a guitar out of the stuff.

 

[drysideshooter]

Those oak wine barrels are quite useful. I have a stool that's made from a small one. The stuff is HEAVY, though. I wouldn't want to make a guitar out of the stuff.

If you go over to the gear page and tell them you built a guitar out of old wine barrel wood laminated together and it has amazing tone, somewhere between SRV and Clapton, you will create a mad rush to buy wine barrels! Many wouldn't care what it weighs. 

I put the speaker and the stuff yet to mount on the cabinet and weighed it this morning.  It came to 28lbs 8oz.  The empty cabinet without the speaker is right at 20lbs, which is about what I expected.  I know the aluminum for mounting the back pieces and baffle didn't save a bunch of weight over using cleats, but I felt like doing something different.

I was just looking through some laminate samples. There are some great looking laminates. I think I'm going to build a 2x12 cabinet a bit more traditionally using cleats and plywood, and then put laminate on the outside.  Years ago we used to do a lot of things like reception bars out of laminate with an exposed wood edge.  You glue up the desired wood to the front edge, laminate over it both directions, and then use a 45deg chamfer bit in a router to put an edge on it and expose the wood on the edge.  Might be a cool look for a speaker cabinet. Just do it on the front and corners. 

 

[Cagey]

If you go over to the gear page and tell them you built a guitar out of old wine barrel wood laminated together and it has amazing tone, somewhere between SRV and Clapton, you will create a mad rush to buy wine barrels! Many wouldn't care what it weighs. 

Seems appropriate. Corksniffers - wine barrels - yeah, I could see a mad rush  :laughing7:

 

[mayfly]

If you go over to the gear page and tell them you built a guitar out of old wine barrel wood laminated together and it has amazing tone, somewhere between SRV and Clapton, you will create a mad rush to buy wine barrels! Many wouldn't care what it weighs. 

...

You glue up the desired wood to the front edge, laminate over it both directions, and then use a 45deg chamfer bit in a router to put an edge on it and expose the wood on the edge.  Might be a cool look for a speaker cabinet. Just do it on the front and corners.

I don't know which of these ideas I like more!  Quite like the laminate idea.  Would even look good on plywood I imagine...

 

[TonyFlyingSquirrel]

If you go over to the gear page and tell them you built a guitar out of old wine barrel wood laminated together and it has amazing tone, somewhere between SRV and Clapton, you will create a mad rush to buy wine barrels! Many wouldn't care what it weighs. 

Seems appropriate. Corksniffers - wine barrels - yeah, I could see a mad rush  :laughing7:

Speaking of corksniffers, perhaps a bass cab build of a 1x15 on the end of an Oak Barrel will yield that nice cabernet low end that many Napa Valley Bass players aspire to...

 

[drysideshooter]

If you go over to the gear page and tell them you built a guitar out of old wine barrel wood laminated together and it has amazing tone, somewhere between SRV and Clapton, you will create a mad rush to buy wine barrels! Many wouldn't care what it weighs. 

...

You glue up the desired wood to the front edge, laminate over it both directions, and then use a 45deg chamfer bit in a router to put an edge on it and expose the wood on the edge.  Might be a cool look for a speaker cabinet. Just do it on the front and corners.

I don't know which of these ideas I like more!  Quite like the laminate idea.  Would even look good on plywood I imagine...

That's what I was thinking Mayfly.  I think even 1/2" ply with good cleats would work, though I believe 3/4 is probably more common.  There is such a variety of laminate available now, everything from a brushed metal look to about any color imaginable. 

My kids and I race autocross. A product I found out about through that is "dip".  It's a spray on vinyl finish available in a wide variety of colors. If it gets damaged or you get tired of it, it peels off like a facial mask or something.  There are quite a few race cars that get several seasons out of a dip job.  If you look on Youtube there are some folks that have used it for guitar bodies.  I think it might make sense as an amp finish too.  One of the biggest websites is dipyourcar.com. 

I got to thinking about the laminate with the exposed wood chamfer edge.  I've never done it with plywood, but doing a chamfer corner with a plywood substrate might look sort of cool. The plys exposed on a 45 deg angle and then sand it a bit and apply a finish, either clear or tinted a bit might look really cool.  Some times with modern plywood there are small voids in the plys and if one of those was exposed you'd have to fill it.  I'm feeling like we need to have some bumperstickers made that say "just say no to tolex".

 

[drysideshooter]

If you go over to the gear page and tell them you built a guitar out of old wine barrel wood laminated together and it has amazing tone, somewhere between SRV and Clapton, you will create a mad rush to buy wine barrels! Many wouldn't care what it weighs. 

Seems appropriate. Corksniffers - wine barrels - yeah, I could see a mad rush  :laughing7:

I have always gotten a chuckle out of the corksniffers moniker.  It certainly does fit some of those folks at TGP.  The size of some of their pedal boards is almost beyond comprehension.  My wife and I went to a BB King tribute in Seattle last week. The main guitar player, Tim Sherman, has played in quite a few good bands up and down the west coast.  A bit of a solo hog that seems to like his own tone a bit too much, but he is extremely talented.  He had his 335 plugged directly in to his amp.  He sounded great, and it was nice to hear and see no pedals.  The majority of the adjustments he made throughout the night were done on his guitar. 

 

[Seamas]

The curvature would require a bit of a different shape, but how cool would it be to have a speaker cab out of an old wine barrel?

It would be great of you are going for that dry, fruit forward tone, with a nose of gooseberry and assertive, austere finish.