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I was curious about guitar cabinet thickness. In the audio world, I know a lot of speakers are made with 3/4" ply. Do guitar speakers benefit from such thick ply? I have a 4x12 cab that's made of 3/8" ply. If there were two versions of this exact same cab, dimensions, speakers. Would one sound better than the other?

Edited by RickBlacker
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This is a question that is more or less impossible to answer. Mostly because you say best and what is best for me may not be best for you. However, here's my take on the different thicknesses. If you have a closed cab, the one made of heavier material is maintain better separation between what is being radiated off the front of the cones relative to what is being radiated off the back of the cones. This means you will have less interference, both constructive and destructive. Also, less energy is going into vibrating the cab, so therefore more will most likely be propagated into the room (and into the box). This is typically good, especially for bass frequencies, since your cab will have structural modes in the lower frequency region (typically).

Here, however, is the wrench in the gears. Guitar cabs violate almost all rules of hi-fi design. The open backs create comb filter effects (in frequency), the speakers are generally not very wide-bandwidth, we drive the speakers into distortion, the box sizes are much smaller than what is typically "optimal" for hi-fi, and the materials used range from ply, to pine, to mdf to who-knows-what.

In short, when it comes to guitars, there is very little about the "audio" (hi-fi) world that carries over well into the guitar world. For example, in college I showed a circuit snippet to my filter design professor and he said "why would you want to do that, it's going to distort like crazy." I said "Well, you see, I play the guitar." His response was "Aaaaahhhhh."

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in college I showed a circuit snippet to my filter design professor and he said "why would you want to do that, it's going to distort like crazy." I said "Well, you see, I play the guitar." His response was "Aaaaahhhhh."

:D:D

Guitar cabs and speakers are made to be part of the final sound you get, wood tones, speaker break up and all that are very important in the final output so yes thickness does matter a thicker less resonate wood cab is gonna change the final output. where hifi cabs and speakers are all about reproducing with out distorting the sound.

oh yeah thicker cabs are much harder to move in and out of gigs.

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So my cab is a 4x12 closed back cab. One of the things I have an issue with, with this amp, is that the speakers feel like they are having a hard time keeping up. To some degree flubby. I changed my preamp tubes and it did clean things up some. But, I wondering if the same cab with thicker material would tighten up that flubby bass response.

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So my cab is a 4x12 closed back cab. One of the things I have an issue with, with this amp, is that the speakers feel like they are having a hard time keeping up. To some degree flubby. I changed my preamp tubes and it did clean things up some. But, I wondering if the same cab with thicker material would tighten up that flubby bass response.

Closed back cabs are usually tight. Perhaps the flubbyness is in the speakers, or maybe the back panel is not resting on a center post?

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The cab is tightly closed. It's a Peavey Valveking cab. I've heard that the stock speakers in those are less than steller. I'm thinking about replacing them with some Warehouse Speakers 50w Reapers. Love the tone of those bad boys.

I didn't say tightly closed - I said that the back panel needs a center post so that it doesn't move too much and cause the woofing sound you're complaining about. At band volumes. that back panel will move a lot if there's no center post.

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It is too heavy to haul. I weighed it a couple years back at 143lb with the 4 T75's loaded.

Sorry for the washout on the tape measure.

randall_cab.jpg

My Randall 4x12 is 1 1/2in thick. Has to be doubled 3/4ply.

Really? You sure its not the edge treatment that makes it look like its 1-1/2 all around.

At 1-1/2", that 4x12 would be way too heavey to haul around to gigs.

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What is that supposed to be a measurement of?

http://www.randallamplifiers.com/Cabinets/MTS-Series-Cabinets/

3/4" birch

http://www.randallamplifiers.com/Cabinets/XL-Series-Cabinets/

3/4" birch

http://www.randallamplifiers.com/Cabinets/RT-Series-Cabinets/

http://www.randallamplifiers.com/Cabinets/G3-Series-Cabs/

All 3/4" birch

You are measuring the face edging,not the cabinet wall.2 layers of 3/4" birch with four of those speakers would weigh closer to 200 pounds...

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It is too heavy to haul. I weighed it a couple years back at 143lb with the 4 T75's loaded.

Sorry for the washout on the tape measure.

randall_cab.jpg

You're showing the outer side of the cab. the 1-1/2" width is most probably achived with a 3/4" trim piece around the edges. The plywood (or whatever they used) is most probably 3/4"

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