mistermikev Posted July 19, 2020 Report Share Posted July 19, 2020 well... my plan to use a specialized jig for my speaker build had some issues. a fail. If I had setup a longer guide board it would have worked but kept wobbling at the edges so... it would require a trip to the hardware store that I was too impatient to make so I just used a 7' level as a router guide instead... and a giant t square... t so here's a shot of the 'figured baltic birch' I bought... really nice stuff. ========================================================== so got some work done this week despite surgery for a cracked tooth on friday... I'll spare you those gory details but was avoiding the pain meds so I could work with power tools... you know... like a MAN! anywho, got my pile of sides cut up: got some roxel safe n sound while I was at the hardware store... and some polyfil, some handles... other misc crap... decided it'd be smart to do a template for my speaker cutouts since it would help prevent more scratches... so I spent $8 on a 3/4 x 24 x 24 and did a 1/2" rabbet in it, then followed with my jigsaw... then cleaned it up with a pattern bit... unfortunately the 2 7/8" radius called for by the mids is going to require some ingenuity since the pilot hole would be right at my base... may have to just drive a nail into the template and drill a hole in the circle jig. that's all I got few now! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScottR Posted July 20, 2020 Report Share Posted July 20, 2020 14 hours ago, mistermikev said: despite surgery for a cracked tooth on friday... I'll spare you those gory details but was avoiding the pain meds so I could work with power tools... you know... like a MAN! Takin' one for the team! Looking good Mike. SR 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted July 20, 2020 Author Report Share Posted July 20, 2020 41 minutes ago, ScottR said: Takin' one for the team! Looking good Mike. SR thank you sir! that first day was pretty rough, much better now! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted July 22, 2020 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2020 so... laid out my rabbets/dados/grooves... oh my! and started cuttin' some groovey grooves... with dido playing on the radio as I did the dados... and then white rabbits as I did the rabbets. good times. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted July 31, 2020 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2020 so getting pretty close to assembly time... still have to mark-out/drill speaker t-nuts, do my tweeter and lpad cutouts, jack holes, and handle mounts... but getting there... got my crossovers all etched and wired up... got the spade tabs mounted and labels on... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScottR Posted July 31, 2020 Report Share Posted July 31, 2020 I truly admire your electronics acumen. That stuff is a whole 'nuther language to me. SR 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted July 31, 2020 Author Report Share Posted July 31, 2020 1 hour ago, ScottR said: I truly admire your electronics acumen. That stuff is a whole 'nuther language to me. SR well thank you for saying so. honestly these are pretty simple circuits... and I didn't do the hard math of designing the crossover (that was done by greenboy/fearful) I just followed the diagram. that said - thank you all the same! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 5, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 5, 2020 and so it has begun... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 6, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 6, 2020 little dry fitting... front of the box is flush for now and I will apply some 1.75" curly maple frame at front. Thinking I'll just glue it but what do you think? really don't want to do dowels as alignment will be critical to not having to finish the box other than the maple. pretty solid fit for just sitting there dry... about as good as I can do w/o a table saw anyway. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScottR Posted August 6, 2020 Report Share Posted August 6, 2020 Looks good to me. I'm not sure about the glue question, but would say to trust your judgement. It has proven to be solid as long as I've known you. SR 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 6, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 6, 2020 30 minutes ago, ScottR said: Looks good to me. I'm not sure about the glue question, but would say to trust your judgement. It has proven to be solid as long as I've known you. SR very nice of you to say Scott. I'm leaning towards just glue. I've read a number of threads on lumberjocks that suggest that gluing any solid wood to baltic birch... will just explode (sarcasm). I guess the baltic is notoriously rigid and we all know wood changes over time... but given it's only 1 3/4" I think it'll be fine so... going with that. very much appreciate the reply. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted August 6, 2020 Report Share Posted August 6, 2020 By "baltic birch" I suppose you mean the plywood? If so, I can't see any issues. It's made of hardwood veneers combined with glue and it doesn't disintegrate. Why would adding some more hardwood and glue change that? Compared to solid wood plywood is cross laminated which means only half of the wood at the edges is end grain so the sunk glue joints should be plenty strong. Heck, as guitar builders we should know how strong the smallest glue joints can be as they can resist hundreds of lbs of string tension! The acoustic bridge should be one of the seven wonders of the modern world! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 7, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 7, 2020 21 hours ago, Bizman62 said: By "baltic birch" I suppose you mean the plywood? If so, I can't see any issues. It's made of hardwood veneers combined with glue and it doesn't disintegrate. Why would adding some more hardwood and glue change that? Compared to solid wood plywood is cross laminated which means only half of the wood at the edges is end grain so the sunk glue joints should be plenty strong. Heck, as guitar builders we should know how strong the smallest glue joints can be as they can resist hundreds of lbs of string tension! The acoustic bridge should be one of the seven wonders of the modern world! baltic birch is a type of plywood but it's not really equivalent to typical hardware store plywood. generally baltic birch is higher grade but as you've mentioned it is basically sm: layers of hardwood with opposing grain. I agree with your thoughts... as guitar builders we freq glue multi lam pieces to solid pieces w/o issue... apparently in the cabinet world there is a stigma about that. I agree that it shouldn't need any dowels or anything. I very much appreciate the way in biz. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted August 7, 2020 Report Share Posted August 7, 2020 2 hours ago, mistermikev said: baltic birch is a type of plywood but it's not really equivalent to typical hardware store plywood It depends... It took me several decades to figure out that there's other than the high grade birch plywood available. The coarse fir stuff is for house building and it's stored in the backyard barn, the birch can be found indoors. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 7, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 7, 2020 2 minutes ago, Bizman62 said: It depends... It took me several decades to figure out that there's other than the high grade birch plywood available. The coarse fir stuff is for house building and it's stored in the backyard barn, the birch can be found indoors. i dunno if there is a hardware store that sells it... but they sell 'birch plywood' at lowes, home depot, etc here and that is nothing like the baltic birch you get at a lumberyard. https://www.rockler.com/how-to/difference-baltic-veneer-birch-plywood Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted August 7, 2020 Report Share Posted August 7, 2020 Heh, never heard about birch surface plywood before! Our birch version is the baltic, 1 mm/layer. Easy to figure out the thickness by counting the layers! I should buy a film coated piece of 12 mm for my trailer. -The one with thicker veneers is of spruce and holes in the veneers are a norm as long as they don't match on the layers. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 7, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 7, 2020 4 hours ago, Bizman62 said: Heh, never heard about birch surface plywood before! Our birch version is the baltic, 1 mm/layer. Easy to figure out the thickness by counting the layers! I should buy a film coated piece of 12 mm for my trailer. -The one with thicker veneers is of spruce and holes in the veneers are a norm as long as they don't match on the layers. ah, so you are saying that where you are from the ONLY have baltic birch? Must be nice! I should really only do templates with baltic because it's quite nice stuff for sure. Now that I know of my local supply I'mma try to use it more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted August 8, 2020 Report Share Posted August 8, 2020 10 hours ago, mistermikev said: ah, so you are saying that where you are from the ONLY have baltic birch? Must be nice! Basically yes. The other stuff is for professionals who know where and what to buy. But if you go to a hardware store and ask for plywood, they most likely sell you baltic birch, coated or bare. We have a plywood store here and most of their stuff is also baltic birch. Their variations include the textured or smooth brown phenol film coated, the yellow film coated "farm" version or just the bare wood plywood. Plus the coarse dirt cheap construction plywood made of thick fir veneers. They've told me that on occasion they've had some imported special order stuff but it's rare. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 10, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 10, 2020 right on. the only place I know of that I can get it is a lumber yard... all the typical hardware stores have construction grade 'birch plywood' which isn't bad stuff... but is nowhere near as nice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 31, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2020 getting closer... few more steps to go... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScottR Posted August 31, 2020 Report Share Posted August 31, 2020 Looks like very precise work there Mike, and the curls are really nice touch. SR 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 31, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2020 5 minutes ago, ScottR said: Looks like very precise work there Mike, and the curls are really nice touch. SR well, lots of little mistakes here and there but pretty happy w it overall. thank you for the response - I do appreciate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bizman62 Posted August 31, 2020 Report Share Posted August 31, 2020 Just a stoopid question: Since there's two of them, why isn't the speaker layout mirrored? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistermikev Posted August 31, 2020 Author Report Share Posted August 31, 2020 3 hours ago, Bizman62 said: Just a stoopid question: Since there's two of them, why isn't the speaker layout mirrored? I certainly could have mirrored it... but the convention with two cabs like this is to have one upside down so the mids/highs couple better. That's usually done if they aren't in stereo and I will have them in stereo but just stacked on top of each other. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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