Lockdown 1 x 12 Pine Cabinet

Apologies in advance for the long post...

Well, with lockdown in SE QLD extended until Sunday, I'll get a good jump on this project.
The last of my parts arrived today, so the timing couldn't be better.

My motivation for this is to cut down some weight from my existing 1 x 12 that's made out of chipboard and MDF. That weighs in at 14kg. I know it's not that heavy, but I ain't gettin' any younger...

Based on weighing my parts & pieces and whacky calculations, I estimate the whole thing should come in around 9.29kg (loaded). I'm including that very specific number here so I can reference it when I'm done and see how close I was!

So here's a pic of my rough unassembled pieces, and I will elaborate on my scheme below:

Attachment 41158

The 4 panels that will form the main speaker box are actually a unassembled beehive "super" (or brood box?). They come pre-cut with dovetail joints and two ends rebated (which will be the front). I wish I could take credit for the idea, but I pinched it from a guy on YT!
I'm not properly tooled up to cut dovetail joints and I probably lack the patience tbh, so this was a perfect option for me.

The box is made from 20mm solid NZ Pine (whatever that is) and is pretty clear. There are some small knots on one end piece, but I'm fine with that. I'm going for a fairly "rustic" look, so I won't be putting tolex or any covering on, and will stain and poly.

I'm using 12mm premium ply (BGS) for my baffle board and 7mm premium ply for my back panel(s).
Some of the timber I already had and some hardware (jack, jack plate, feet and a 12" Celestion).
The cab will end up costing me about $180+ which is half the price I've seen for unloaded manufactured cabinets.

This cabinet is to be paired with my Quilter Superblock US which is a brilliant little analogue 25w amp the size of a dual overdrive pedal.

I'll post more pics as things progress. Thanks for indulging me!

Nice project! Looking forward to seeing how this goes!

I like the look of that grill cloth. great choice :cool:

Thanks Andy.
It's the Oxblood/Tan from Evatco.

At this stage I’m envisioning a diluted Golden Teak for the pine.
I think that grill cloth will suit that nicely.

Great little project! I saw that vid from Guns n Guitars too a while back.

Here's mine, i knocked up last year.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...b345d1975c.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...fd0d119eab.jpg

This is a great project! Look forward to seeing it come together

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Originally Posted by Bakersdozen

Great little project! I saw that vid from Guns n Guitars too a while back.

Here's mine, i knocked up last year.

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Yeah, I didn't mention the YouTuber by name because I have issues with the "guns" part of channel. I'll leave that there...

Did you tolex yours, or is it painted? I can't tell in the photos.

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Originally Posted by McCreed

Yeah, I didn't mention the YouTuber by name because I have issues with the "guns" part of channel. I'll leave that there...

Did you tolex yours, or is it painted? I can't tell in the photos.

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That's a fair enough call!

I used a cheaper marine leather type stuff. I think from Clark rubber by memory.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...4eab2bce2a.jpg

I've managed to get a fair bit done. Still pretty rough and I have few corrections to make, but all in all, going pretty well.

Day 1 was just gluing up and squaring the box, and I also cut out the baffle board. I have yet to cut the speaker hole (that's on tomorrow's agenda). The speaker box is within <1mm of square, so I'm happy with that. There is an annoying gap on the bottom front right corner that I didn't notice when I did the dry fit... bugger! I can fix it and it will be mostly hidden by the metal corner later.

Day 2 has been cutting and mounting the battens for fixing the baffle board and back panels, as well as cutting the back panels themselves. I think I'll need to redo the top back panel as I cut it a bit too narrow for my liking. It's purely an aesthetic issue.
This what happens when you cut it "near perfect" the first time, then try and get it to "perfect" - D'oh!!!

Tomorrow is cutting the speaker hole in the baffle board; doing the round-over routing; some minor filling and then lots and lots of sanding. I may revisit the larger back panel, but I'm out of 7mm ply and loathe the idea of spending more money! Plus we're in a pretty strict lockdown, so it may have to wait anyway.

Attachment 41163

Attachment 41164

Looks great!

Thanks BD. It's getting there!

If it all goes wrong, you could always keep bees in it.

Ha! Now that could go very wrong... I'm allergic to bee stings!

Looking at last night's to-do list that I posted, I may have been a little over-ambitious...
Especially since I forgot a I had a doctor's appointment this morning, so that broke my stride a bit.
These are the things I did manage to get done:

- Round-over routing (that was a high anxiety activity!)

Attachment 41168

- I was able to satisfactorily fix the top back panel without having to cut a new one. A bit of veneer closed the gap well enough.

Attachment 41169

- The "annoying gap on the bottom front right corner" has been fixed also.

Attachment 41170

Yeah, I could have just whacked some Timbermate in there and called it good, but where's the fun in that???
I sliced a teensy piece of pine and finessed it into the gap with some Titebond.

I know it will covered by a metal corner, but if I left the gap, I'd always know it was there!

Oh, I also realised my baffle board mounting battens were going to clash with the basket frame of the speaker, so I routed a little dip in the centre of each one (see top pic). All sorted now!

Tomorrow shall entail RO sanding likely followed by more sanding...

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Originally Posted by McCreed

Ha! Now that could go very wrong... I'm allergic to bee stings!

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Hope you don't get any buzzing from the cabinet then! ;)

All coming along nicely.

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Originally Posted by McCreed

Ha! Now that could go very wrong... I'm allergic to bee stings!

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My wife wanted a hive but is deathly allergic to bees, so I got the supreme honor of beecoming the family beekeeper. On more than one occasion I've received 20-30 stings within a 2-3 minute period. Bees suck! (save the bees).

I have decided I need to stop posting my "next day's agenda" in my updates...
I either make a list that's just too ambitious, or realise that I actually need to do X before I can do Y, and it becomes more like I've set myself up for failure when I don't accomplish what's on the list. :o

Whilst I don't feel like did much today, there was at least some progress and I tidied up a few things along the way.

I managed to cut the speaker hole in the baffle board and trimmed it up to better accommodate the grill cloth. I took that into consideration when I initially cut it, but I think it would have still been a bit tight.
I was a little anxious about cutting the hole as I did it with the router, but it came out great. I just want to round over the exterior edge a bit and call it good.

Attachment 41198

I also located and drilled the mounting holes for the handle.
However, when I ordered the fixing screws, I miscalculated the length, so have ordered some longer ones to go through the 21mm pine. I could have recessed the T nuts on the inside and use the shorter ones, but chose to wait and go with longer.

The baffle and back panels are just friction-fitted at the moment, but it's starting to look like a speaker cabinet now.
I'm ready to set out their screw locations and drill them (hopefully tomorrow :rolleyes:).
Then it's moving on to some filling, sanding and finishing!

Attachment 41199

...whilst not forgetting to drill a hole for the speaker jack mounting plate.

Can I point out that Fender would normally have some thin strips of wood (about 3mm deep) around the edge of the baffle board to hold the grille cloth away from the board and speaker. Have you left enough depth in the mounting of the baffle to allow for this? Though as you seem to be rear mounting the speaker this may not be necessary (though these may need to be recessed to avoid leaving any small bulges in the cloth).

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Originally Posted by Simon Barden

...whilst not forgetting to drill a hole for the speaker jack mounting plate.

Can I point out that Fender would normally have some thin strips of wood (about 3mm deep) around the edge of the baffle board to hold the grille cloth away from the board and speaker. Have you left enough depth in the mounting of the baffle to allow for this? Though as you seem to be rear mounting the speaker this may not be necessary (though these may need to be recessed to avoid leaving any small bulges in the cloth).

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I have done Fender-style baffle boards in the past, and used the stand-off strips for the grill cloth, however I'm not going that route here.
You are correct that I'm rear-mounting (can I say that here? :o) the speaker and will be applying the grill cloth directly over the baffle board.
I going to recess the T nuts on the front of the baffle so they're flush and mounting the speaker with M4 screws just the right length that won't protrude beyond the T nut so there won't be any bumps in the grill cloth. The board and T nuts will be black also.

And yes, not forgetting the jack hole! (can I say that here???) Pardon my sophomoric humour... I must be extra tired tonight...

Alls good, your making me giggle anyway.

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Originally Posted by Bakersdozen

Alls good, your making me giggle anyway.

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Glad I'm not the only juvenile here...

Still looks pretty much like a box with a hole in it... but there was progress made yesterday and today, though maybe not super obvious.

I set out and drilled the speaker mounting holes and installed the T nuts. I recessed them as I mentioned above in a reply to Simon.
I also did all the holes for fixing the baffle and rear panels to the cabinet. The baffle board and panels are all fixed with raised head countersunk screws and cup washers. FYI, you won't find those screws at the BGS! What a pain in the backside finding those in a lockdown!

The input jack and plate have been installed, but not wired yet. And lastly, I drilled and mounted the feet.
Obviously I will need to disassemble everything to stain and clear coat, but at least put together it looks I've actually made something!

Attachment 41230 Attachment 41231

One thing I did not plan to do but did, was putting veneer on the exposed edge of 7mm plywood that make up the rear panels.
I was just going to round them, stain the edge black and call it good enough, after all, this is supposed to be "rustic", right?

Attachment 41232

I had enough pine veneer left over from some earlier "gap correction", so I figured stuff it, I'll just do it. (that would make a great slogan!) The bottom edge of the top rear panel will likely never be seen by anyone but me, but like I've said before, I'll know it's there, and it's little things like that that make me happy!

Next job is fixing the grill cloth to the baffle board, then it's on the filling & sanding, sanding, sanding... staining... clear coat... metal corners in there somewhere...

Hopefully I'll have it ready for an audition in a couple of weeks (unless covid messes that up!).


Oh, one last thing... the cabinet currently weighs 5.65kg, and the speaker weighs 3.3kg, so I'm tracking pretty well for <10kg target weight! Pretty happy with that.

That's looking really good. I've got a nasty feeling I've got an amp and cab build in my future.

Thanks John.

A cabinet I can handle, don't think I've got amp in me though!

Here’s one I made earlier …

Attachment 41240

No photos today.
I started spraying poly this morning though. Decided to go with satin.
Previous three days have mostly entailed staining, and I applied the grill cloth to the baffle board.

The stain ended up being a combination of Golden Teak and Old Baltic. The Golden Teak alone was too orange/yellow and the Old Baltic was too brown. So a diluted solution of each applied separately was the marriage I was looking for. It was one of those rare times when the colour comes out exactly like what you saw in your head!

I haven't done a baffle board with grill cloth in many years, so it was slow going at first until I remembered my old method. Had a couple of hiccups with my corners but all in all it finished up great. Good thing the wonky corners are completely out of sight though!

FYI, for any of you amp builders, I'll be posting the offcut from my grill cloth in the swap/trade/unload forum if anyone is interested.
It's not huge, but there's enough there to easily do a Blues Junior-size or slightly larger type amp.

LINK to swap/trade/unload

Well I'm calling the clear coat d-u-n...

I got enough coats on yesterday, but had pretty good run on one side and a bit of a rough spot in another. Decided to fix it.
I did a bit of scraping and strip sanding to fix the run, and flat sanding on the rough patch. All good to go.
Then resprayed and got another run in a different spot (much smaller) so I'll just live with it.
On the plus side, the areas I fixed came up good! :o

Also, you'll be shocked and surprised to hear that the bottom side is absolutely flawless!!! D'oh!!!

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Originally Posted by McCreed

Also, you'll be shocked and surprised to hear that the bottom side is absolutely flawless!!! D'oh!!!

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Please excuse us if we don't ask to see pictures of your flawless bottom. ;)

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Originally Posted by Simon Barden

Please excuse us if we don't ask to see pictures of your flawless bottom. ;)

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I post those on a different site :o

Today I got all the hardware on, installed the speaker and wired up the jack.
There are a couple of ill-fitting metal corners, but I think I can live with them. Finished, loaded weight comes in at 9.18kg. I estimated 9.29kg from my pile of parts - pretty bloody close! And that's 4.42 kg lighter than the original chipboard cabinet.

Attachment 41301

I had a bit of time to play it this arvo, and experimented with the lower panel on & off. There is an audible difference (believe it or not) and I think I prefer it on, but will experiment some more. I think I'll knock up another panel that will allow me completely close it up and see what that sounds like too.

Attachment 41302
FWIW, the opening between the two panels isn't totally random, but nor is it completely scientific.
Looking at a few similarly sized semi-open extension cabinets that use the same Celestion G-12 V speaker, and some open-back Fender amps (which is what my Quilter is based on) the opening is approximately 20% of the total area.

Attachment 41303

The last bit of detail I'll put on is a label at the input jack stating the ohm load and wattage. Maybe tomorrow's bit of fun!

Dude, that looks stunning. Glad to hear it's working well too. And the weight relief off your back! Top job

Looks fantastic. Great job.

Thanks guys!

BD, what is the back on your 1x12? And what speaker is it loaded with?

Very nice.

Are you planning to add an ohmage label, just in case you forget, or somebody else uses it?

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Originally Posted by McCreed

Thanks guys!

BD, what is the back on your 1x12? And what speaker is it loaded with?

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Semi open - I'm pretty sure I cut the wood to fit into the gap with the view to cover it and have the option of fully closed as well. But that was before I moved house and setup a new shed etc. I still have some of the covering left so I can always do so down the track if needed. I find open backs fill the room a little more, whereby closed backs project a lot more.

I love your custom plate. How'd you fernangle that one?

Oh it's a celestion seventy 80
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...1e67271d79.jpg

3D printing for your label I presume?

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Originally Posted by Simon Barden

Very nice.

Are you planning to add an ohmage label, just in case you forget, or somebody else uses it?

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Yes. Last line of post #30, under bottom photo:

"The last bit of detail I'll put on is a label at the input jack stating the ohm load and wattage. Maybe tomorrow's bit of fun!"

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I love your custom plate. How'd you fernangle that one?

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3D printing for your label I presume?

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Far lower tech than that!
Created in Publisher; inkjet printed on vinyl sticker sheet; applied to a piece of old black vibrato cover (hand-shaped) and then laminated over the vinyl. I won't be showing any close-ups of that!

However it looks perfect to a blind man on a galloping horse in the dead of night...

Nice work, Mick. Lovely.

Sent from my Pixel 4 using Tapatalk

Looks fantastic!