More DIY - Cab this time

So 3 and a bit guitars and a guitar stand into this DIY thing its starting to take hold. Next Project is a DIY Cab.

At some point I'm going to get myself a small Valve Head, DSL1, Vox or Blackstar probably, only ever muck around at home and its normally so bad I really don't need anyone hearing it.

In prep for that I'm going to attempt to build a 1 x 12 cab, based on the dimensions of a Marshall MX112. Got my big green shed shopping list sorted for the weekend, and think I've decided on a Celestion Vintage 30, would like a blue but can't justify the price.

As I go, if it doesn't turn into a dogs breakfast I'll put a few pics up here.

Cool! I’m super keen to follow this; I’d love to build my own too

I made a 1x12 open back and used a Celstion Green back in it. I've run my beheaded Vox VT20X, an Orange Micro Terror and my Egnator Rebel 20 into it , all sounded good to my untrained ears. :D Also made a huge 1x12 closed back with a Jensen Falcon in it. It has little more bass and mids in it

@ Rossc0 Have you checked out my Valve Amp Head thread?, it's a diy Soldano SLO50 50 Watt amp head build project that I'm going to be working on this year.

Hi Doc, yes I have. Only a cab this time, might get round to a head later if I feel brave.

Big Green Shed shopping done.

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Cool! you'll have to let me know how that Ozito router goes - I had a friend was thinking of getting one

I've had some ozito tools for a dozen years and there still going strong. My Hammer drill ended up sitting in a bucket of water for ages(Don't ask), dried it out and it still works like a charm.

Yeah, I think they're under-rated. The Ozito tools I have have all been great - my little cordless drill gets used literally every week, and has done for years. Didn't want to recommend the router without having tried it though

I've got an Ozito cordless drill, and it does the job for me, lost count of the number of times I've used it, one thing though is I really should buy a few more rechargeable batteries for it so that as one goes flat I can swap it out for a fully-charged one and then put the flat one in the charger to charge-up overnight, nothing is worse than working on something and you've got that one last hole to drill and the battery pooches-out on you, forcing you to wait 24 hours while the battery re-charges.

ha ha ha, yeah that's happened to me so many times when I'm drilling pedal enclosures. It's so frustrating

Nice project.
I have a Vox 1x12 with a vintage 30 in it - nice compact cab

I also have two unused vintage 30’s in boxes ready to become a 2x12, so watching with interest

Managed to get stuck in at the weekend, with my limited tools and woodworking skills.

A start, the 4 main pieces and batons cut to size. And yes I do have serious workshop envy looking at the post of a lot of your sheds. My workbench, the top of the chest freezer in the garage :-)

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I don't have the tools to do finger joints so basic butt joints with glued and screwed batons for support

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I used a router for the first time to round over the edges, wanted to get a 20mm bit so as I could do a full radius cut on the 19mm pine, but the Big Green Shed didn't have any, and I was too impatient to wait and order one, so a 10mm would have to do. The routing wasn't great, but nothing a bit of sanding and tidying up could fix.

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To be continued
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Being continued....

a first sand and the corners cleaned up.

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Took 2 attempts to get the baffle cut, first time tried the dremel with the circle cutter, was a disaster. Second time with the jig saw a bit better, again a bit of a sand will tidy it up.

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And after all my judicious measuring and using a guide block I cut, seems its still a bit out on the fit of the back panels, will need to sort that out. planning on cutting a 3rd section that can go in or out so I can try both open and closed back.

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A bit more timbermating and sanding to do, and in the meantime will order some Tolex and other bits an pieces to finish it off. Probably a while till I can get hold of a speaker, unless something pops up on ebay cheap.

Are you planning to front or rear mount the speaker? If rear, then remember that those rear panels need to be removable if you ever want to swap the speaker, or get to it for some bolt tightening. So screw them. but don;t glue them. If front mounting, then whatever grille you fit needs to be removable as well.

A friend is making me a small bass cab for a 10" speaker I provided for the build (300W Celestion with a neo magnet) as I gave him some speakers and bits. He's bringing it over tomorrow. for some testing and tuning.

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That speaker is front mounted using 5mm barrel headed hex bolts and T-nuts for a fixed nut installation. As it's a sealed tuned port design, it had to be front mounted. I'll be making a metal grille for the front

It may depend on the speaker as to what bolt size fits best, but Celestion seem to use 5mm in all their suggested cab construction details, and although 6mm can be made to fit with a very small amount of filing, 6mm T-nuts then get very close to the edge of the circular cut-out.

The bass amp I have is a small TC BH250 Mk 1. The speaker is a 4 ohm one so I can get the full 250W from the amp if I ever want to. :D It's only really designed for home use and it won't have a huge amount of bass end, and above around 60W the ports are probably going to chuff quite loudly.

You may notice that the top-mounted handle has had the corners cut away, so the TC's feet sit in the cut-outs. The handle is around 6mm thick in the centre of the cut-outs and this is enough to stop the lightweight amp from moving under vibration, the weight of the speaker cable and the instrument cable. There were various other methods in the pipeline to stop the amp moving but still leave it easily removable, such as adding an extra plywood surround on the top of the cab that the amp sat in, but in the end this was the simplest method.

Hi Simon, I'll be rear mounting the speaker and the baffle will also be attached from the rear to avoid seeing any screws on the front so yes, the rear panels will be removable. I'll need to re cut them as there currently isn't enough space for them to fit once I've wrapped them and the cab.

Cheers

Good thing you remembered to adjust for the covering before you wrapped it!

For reference, here's the back of my old Marshall 1x12" cab.

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Hole cut in the top panel for a handle, jack connection in the bottom panel. The rear panels are just painted black with no covering on them.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by stan

Nice project.
I have a Vox 1x12 with a vintage 30 in it - nice compact cab

I also have two unused vintage 30’s in boxes ready to become a 2x12, so watching with interest

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When I started looking into a basic cab build, I often found known brand speakers popping up on ebay and gumtree, eventualy found a Vox 1x12 also, which had a celestion GB 25 - 8ohm and couldnt resist given price.
Still like to have a crack at building one after seeing Dedmans and now yours. best of luck with an interesting project !

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EDIT: interested in any pics Stan of your cab

Celestion Creamback - $130 - still available at time of post

https://www.gumtree.com.au/s-view-de...dId=1173901782

[QUOTE=Guvna19;160229]When I started looking into a basic cab build, I often found known brand speakers popping up on ebay and gumtree, eventualy found a Vox 1x12 also, which had a celestion GB 25 - 8ohm and couldnt resist given price.
Still like to have a crack at building one after seeing Dedmans and now yours. best of luck with an interesting project !


Its worth having a go, Think this is going pretty well considering I have no particular skills in this area, I think you have to start this by acknowledging you could probably just go and buy something pretty reasonable for the $'s you end up spending on building it, but at the end of the day don't think that comes into it, more about having something you know you made yourself. Same with the kits, of the 3 I've built/started sure none of them have come in under $600 - $700 bucks, Just don't let the wife you that :-)

Time to go buy the speaker. Thinking of a celestion Vintage 30.

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Looks good. What do you have for a head?

Probably two eyes, a nose, mouth, ears, hair etc...

You forgot to mention how many teeth!

Ooops, sorry, that is an Ipswich or Gympie joke and didn't mean to offend anyone in the lovely city of Newcastle.

It's pretty hard to find a better general purpose speaker than the Vintage 30. Very popular with the metal music guys too.

I've built two cabs, one is a 2x12" and the other is a oversize 1x12". Both were made with 19mm formply (the same that concrete'rs use) and came already with a durable Black coating.

The 2x12" (on the Left) is a vented port design with a V30 and a G12H75 Creamback both 16ohms in parallel to give an 8ohm load to the amp. As the formply came in 600mm x 2400mm sheets that set the depth of the cab to 300mm. The width of the cab was set by the width of my JVM210c combo amp as I originally had intended for it to sit on top of the cab, so the only parameter that the speaker enclosure design software could change was the height of the cab which came out to be about 950mm. Internal screws via glued ribbing allowed a fairly clean outside finish. A dowel frame with some Grey speaker cloth stretched over the front hides the two front loaded 12" speakers. The choice to make it a vented/ported cab was to try and find a mid point between open back and sealed enclosure sounds, and it does this quite well... and having two different 12" speakers loaded sounds awesome and allows for more tonal options when recording.

The 1x12" (on the right) is the same dimensions as the 2x12 but instead of the port vent has only half the back panel. The old (antique) 4 ohm Washburn 160W speaker has an interesting tonal flavour that doesn't suit all ears, and is much better suited to an open cab than a closed or vented cab. Again a frame was made and Grey speaker grill cloth stretched over it, which clips into place over the front loaded 12" speaker. The clips used are the same as those that hold doors open, or cupboards shut, four of them, one in each corner, the white patch in the top right of the Grey is one I didn't paint Black. Having the larger cabinet volume does increase bass response slightly.

Both cabs have castors and side handles for easy relocation and handling.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by wazkelly

Looks good. What do you have for a head?

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Not 100% sure yet, something low wattage and valve, Marshall DSL possibly.

AC 15 heads aren't terribly expensive either, $100 more than the Marshals if you shop around. The Boss Katana heads are getting rave reviews, not valve but I've been tempted to go try one. There is also those tiny Vox micro tube amps, could be worth a listen. And lastly Orange Micro Terror. I have one and love it, it's actually serving as a bass amp atm.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rossc0

Time to go buy the speaker. Thinking of a celestion Vintage 30.

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cheers for sharing this project Rossco. learnings allround- i had previously considered somthin similar. got me pondereing again

regards Guv

Box arrived yesterday with all the bits and pieces needed to finish this, Vintage 30 speaker, cloth, pipping, handle etc. Been hidden away and can't get my hands on it till my birthday.

Only have to wait till mid next week, and its been sitting half finished for months, but frustrating now I know everything is here and I can't touch...

Just like a kid waiting for xmas....

Done. Well except the corners, ordered the wrong ones.

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Happy Birthday ...!!

The box is certainly looking the part....

Looking classy!

Looks just like a bought one.

Only been 3 months since I finished the cab, but my MONSTER Marshall stack is complete :rolleyes:

A Massive 1 or 0.1 of a watt of power. Its actually surprisingly loud, probably still need to use headphones to avoid pissing everyone off.

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First day I've managed to get the house to myself since Christmas.

Well bugger me for 1 watt, this thing seems LOUD! :-)

Being a Marshall wanted to use the LP for the christening, and wouldn't you know it, bust a string tuning it.

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Don't forget that the amp wattage figure refers to the clean volume. You're probably getting a whole crazy 2W with the gain turned right up.

Very cool, and appears well-done. Inspirational as well. I've been thinking about building a powered 112 cab for my home studio. I have a Digitech RP-7 that I'm thinking of replacing with a Helix, but I'd still like to have a cab for that live interaction (less impressed than I'd hoped with the Carvin V3MC, and now it's just an expensive powered cab).

Cheers, yes, I'm happy with the way it turned out, only issue I have is I cant seem to find any corners that fit the radius I have routed. Oh well, its not going anywhere so doesn't need a lot of protection.

I know its only a baby amp, but I'm happy the cab sounds nice and clean, not rattles or buzzing.