Razbo

Sorry. I'll be the first to admit guilt in doing this far too much.

Back on topic: I think that as previous posters have mentioned, using solid woodworking skills (whether dovetails, lap joints or whatever) and using the correct internal volume for the drivers in question you can pretty much use whatever cab design you want. For myself I have wanted a relatively compact angled 2x10 cabinet in the same style as stage monitor for some time. Perhaps starting with the drivers I can work the volume backwards, figure out basic dimensions and from thereonin devise a structurally economical-but-solid structure which houses an amp (like a GK MB-200 for example) carrying handles and connectors. Fun projects I bet, and good for keeping basic woodworking skills sharp.

I thought it was hilarious, actually.

Aside from tonal quality, the restiction I always run into trying to get cabs smaller is making something that will fit a 'full size' head. Too small hurts the bass response, too big gets boomy, so standard width cabs are interesting to design. I find this with both open and closed back, although closed obviously is more affected.

Like everything else, it seems to be a struggle for balance.

Thanks for the replies and links everyone. It's great to know what Cab Calloway is up to as well, 'cause I was wondering that.

"Cab Plans - Where to find them?"

Short answer HERE.

Ack! I feel hijacked!

Ok, terminology. What most people call a speaker is more properly called a "driver." The speaker is the entire assembly, with a driver mounted inside a cabinet. You actually do want to build a speaker.

Not to be contradictory, but I am not so sure about that. Driver is obviously a correct and unambiguous term. If we called it a Loudspeaker instead of 'Speaker, we'd be talking about the driver. However, in context, it's true we could also be talking about the whole cab, altough I consider that a misuse of the term... kinda like a Tremolo. Regardless of what we call it, I have boxes to put things in to make noise! Life is good.

That probably explains why all the kids in their tinny little box "cars" stuffed with subwoofers sound truly awful.

Ha, they always make me think of my little sister playing jumprope: "Lookit me! Lookit me!!"

I built a cab years ago for a speaker only. Some good info found here

I just googled "guitar speaker construction" " speaker construction" and theres quite a lot of info out there

...But I didn't want to build a speaker, I wanted to build a cabinet. I will have to dumb down my searches, or maybe learn to try more terms. That brought up several links I had not found yet.

I cut the 2x12 according to the dimensions I'd planned, plus had plenty left to build a 1x12 in the same dimensions as the Traynor Darkhorse cab. Two cabs from one sheet. Hopefully they turn out ok.

Thanks for all the input, folks!!!

I built a 2x12 cab about two years ago. This is what I based my build on:

http://www.novacron.com/uploads/dc30_212_cabinet_plans.pdf

Only major difference was that I replaced the rear opening on page 2 with a removable panel to make it a closed back cab (preferred the sound of it when I compared it with and without). The dovetail joints shown in those drawings are probably overkill. I used lap joints reinforced with 42x19 rectangular-section braces inside each edge. Once the front baffle and rear panels are installed the whole thing becomes rigid. Based on what I've seen there's nothing particularly special about guitar cab construction. Whatever works to make a box large enough and strong enough to hold a bunch of speakers is pretty much it. Your only major decisions are likely to be open vs closed back, what type of speakers you want to install, the number of speakers, material (plywood will be the weapon of choice nine times out of ten), and how you want to pretty it up.

Now we're talking. Nice job! What is the depth of the cab, did I miss it?

Not that know what I'm doing half the time, but I have built a few cabs and experimented with the size of the 'inner cabinet', plus compared to what other cabs I could pull apart. There seems to be a consistent cubic area that works and it's a little larger (per speaker) for 1 x 12's. There is a minimum before bass response dies, which I assume to be relative to the wave length of the frequency.

I was looking for some kind of confirmation for my 'last cab', and/or a better idea. Assuming the depth of those plans is around 13", it would put it in the same ball park as my current plan (16"H x 26.5W x 13D) and what info I've gleaned. Thanks!

We'll have to agree to disagree on that one. It's a wooden box and it's covered, it's not even fine carpentry. It's a crate. A $1700 crate. I'll just put on my rose coloured glasses and mind my business.

Could not find much there, either. How can there be no plans on the whole friggin' internet?

I guess it's because any box will do? Take away the speakers and there is not much difference between a $200 Kustom cab and a $1700 Koch cab.

The speaker cavity space would be the primary factor, and to a degree, it's relative dimensions, I would think.

Kustom 27.6"H x 27.4"W x 12.8"D = 9679.9 ci; / 2 = 4839.95 ci for a 2 x 12

Koch 29.1H x 28.3W x 13.8D = 11364.7; 5682.35

My Plan for a 2 x 12 was 16H x 26.5W x 13D = 5512 ci. Guess I was on track.

I can actually get a 2 x 12 AND a 1 x 12 cab from a single sheet of ply. And my sheet of 3/4 birch only cost me $70... Someone please help me understand how a cab can be worth $1700?

They appear to require me to register before showing me any info. Might do that later. Thanks for the link. There is not much out there, eh?

Hi. I have not had much success finding plans for a 2x12 cab. I've got outside dimensions for cabs from various ads that I've compared, but I can never be certain the internal chamber is the same (minus the wood thickness). I pulled apart a 4x12 and the internal chamber for 2 speakers is roughly 14x14x26 and this is nowhere close to the dimensions of any 2x12 cab I've seen.

I am planning to build a closed back (removable). If anyone had a suggestion for a site or anything, that would be awesome. I've marked my lines, but haven't ripped anything yet... The material is 3/4 birch if that matters.

Thanks in advance for any help!

Drat, I was hoping to finally feel vindicated. I got the StewMac Schaller based on advice of it being "the best" and I always feel like I ripped myself off. And plus, I had to buy the R4 nut separately, they would not substitute.

I've used band saw, router, and simply standing there with a belt sander. If you don't mind standing there for a bit, a belt sander works fine, but my current method is just a simple jig to get the general depth with a router, then finish with the belt sander. (I have to drive an hour to get to the band saw, so... )

Erlewine had a similar thing happened like what happened to you, in one of his videos.

Now I don't feel so bad.

Thanks for the tip on the gallon jugs. I've got plenty of those.

I have a Yamaha SE 200 with RW fretboard I was practicing techniques on. One thing was a partial refret. I pulled the frets and had minor chip out that I decided I would try my hand at filling before refretting.

I thought I'd read somewhere that playing cards would make a good dam. So I inserted 2 layers into the slots and topped up the chip out with CA glue. That part worked good. Then I tried to pull out the cards.

Well, they were now a permanent part of the fingerboard, so I ended up taking the razor saw and reslotting. Only one slot got away from me (the saw went down beside the card somehow), and it's way too wide.

So, 2 questions. First, what really is a good material to use as a dam? I am now thinking of using thin sheets of metal or plastic and coat it with wax. (I've also read that hard car wax like Turtle Wax prevents CA from sticking.)

Second, what's best to fill that slot with? Assume I get a working dam in there, should I fill the slot with CA? Or a mix of RW dust and carpenter glue? Or something else?

Success!

I tightened the truss rod a little to decrease the relief. There's no buzzing anywhere now and the string height is still super low. I still need to measure it, but I'm guessing it's now more than 1mm-1.1mm!

My old record is 1.2mm. I'm oddly excited about this.

Ok, this makes no sense to me (and hopefully I'm about to be edumacated!)...

You had slight buzzing around 5 - 10th fret on the middle stings, right? How would decreasing relief fix that? By decreasing, we're making the board flatter and that is right in the effective area of the rod, so it would have brought the strings even closer to the board. ......Right??

The part of the question I'm interested to see answered is: will a strat neck joint be strong enough glued with no bolts? Aside from shaping, this IS what we're talking about here, right?

i have looked at the Hwy 1's several times and cant find any thing bad about them. to me they give a little more of a vintage vibe with the nitro finish and 6 screw trem (btw if ya set up a vintage trem right they stay in tune) btw they have a mexican string spacing but and american screw spacing on the trem. as far as i can tell there isnt a diffence in tuners (my mexican tuners apear to be the same as my american tuners) the one big draw back for me is the cbs head stock on the strats it just kills the looks.

Interesting info in the string and screw spacing; I wasn't aware of that. I know some folks don't like the 70's era headstock. Although supposedly the big headstock was to increase visibility of the label, I think there's some theory that more mass in the headstock mass improves sustain? Couldn't say myself, but I'm pretty much unaware of my headstock when I'm playing

Not counting hardware (pick ups, tuners, etc) is there much quality difference between a Fender Highway 1 Strat and a Standard Strat? I'm thinking of quality of fretwork, etc. ...I know, I know, go play one of each and decide for myself, right?

ok dont laugh

I won't. I think it looks great AND gets me thinkin'!

I will just say that on my first build, I eventually chose to build a new neck for it, so I am glad it was bolt on.

I'm nearing completion of my first build, an original design. It's got a maple neck with a rosewood fretboard. I miscalculated when thicknessing the headstock, and it is about 1/16" too thin for the tuners I have. I'm not worried about the strength of it, just wondering the best way to fix it. Has anybody had this happen? My initial thought was try to find thicker washers for the tuners, or double them up, but I also might try gluing a 1/16" slice of maple onto the back of the headstock, and then drilling through the existing holes. Any suggestions? Thank you!

I did that from using my memory to retain measurements. Interestingly, my first thought was also to use washers, but I ended up laminating some 1/4 maple onto it. I put it on the front. Kind of automatically, since that's where I'd cut too much from, but now that you mention putting it on the back, I think that would have worked better. Could have blended the form right into the neck. Rats!

Anyway, the fix worked fine and is almost seamless.

I have SC's from a Godin guitar that are like that. Sealed, 5 wire and made by Schaller. Haven't found anything about them online, though, so not sure if they can be purchased without the guitar.

Has anyone ever removed a fretboard from a 25.5" scale neck and replaced it with a 25" scale fretboard? I have a 25.5 scale neck laying around and would like to build a guitar but would like a 25" scale (just for kicks) So I thought instead of building a neck or buying a new neck (25" scale necks are hard to find and expensive) I could remove the old fretboard and replace it with a 25" fretboard. 25" scale fretboards are cheap to buy and it would give me some experience in building a neck (atleast the fretting etc) without going all out the first time. You think this is possible?? I can't see why it wouldnt be.

I think you could, but you`d need to move the nut down closer to the bridge. The scale length is a nut to bridge thing.

My first ever fret job was reusing frets from an old acoustic to put on the one I played. Didn't know a thing about what I was doing and had no tools other than a knife to pry them out & a file to shape them. I didn't even know one could buy fretwire lol. I'm playing those same frets 25 years later.

Now I save all my old fretwire. Never know when it'll match a small refret job.

I kind of like it either way. In fact I'm tickled. I guess I have a thing for cheap guitars & fast women. ...Or is it fast guitars and cheap women? I'm never sure.

Well, if you don't count inferior wood, shoddy workmanship, and low-quality hardware "structural differences"

I have seen people fill in the swimming pool with wood, but I doubt tonal quality or sustain are going to improve that much from a tiny block of "good" wood.

lol, I was meaning only the wood parts. There are several deficiencies, right down to 8 screws vs. 11 holding the pickguard. (Although I don't really find anything wrong with the tuners per se. Maybe it's special, being 20th anniversary?) Anyway, it's too bad they made such seemingly-to-me small cost cuttings that so significantly affected the guitar. I mean, just that "swimming pool" alone. Sheesh. It's extremely playable with great action; I have this one 3/16 at the 12th and no buzz anywhere. Too bad all the knobs are in the way!

Well, thanks, at least I won't waste my time on that.