KILLER CHEAP and EASY DIY BASS CAB! (1x10 Custom Bass Guitar Cabinet)
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ก.ย. 2024
- I've been told a thousand reasons why I shouldn't try to build my own bass cabinet. Mostly it's just way more complicated than the average person is willing to learn to do properly, but I found some cool tricks and hacks that make this possible for the average DIYer!
Here are the resources I used:
Box design: subbox.pro
Exact box design I used: subbox.pro/en/...
I used the editor to change material thickness to 0.75 (to match my wood) and subwoofer mounting depth to 4.25 (to match my speaker)
Materials:
3/4 inch MDF (usually $55, but i found a damaged piece and got it discounted for $17!):
www.homedepot....
10" Speaker (Eminence Legend BP102): amzn.to/3k99WY7
Poly-fil: amzn.to/3Etaz6p (this is king size, I got twin at walmart for $10)
Stackable Cabinet Corners: amzn.to/3w4hrEf
10 in Speaker Grill Cover: amzn.to/3pQ7CsA
Paint:
Gray Primer: amzn.to/3Eu58UU (cheaper at walmart)
Truck Bed Liner: amzn.to/3mq9oyg
Adhesive: amzn.to/3EsBsaG
*Prices mentioned in this video are subject to change without notice, please check the links for current pricing.
Full disclosure: I am an Amazon Associate, and the links in this description are affiliate links, which means that if you make a purchase, it doesn't cost you any more money, but I will earn a commission.
Want a Guns and Guitars shirt? buy one here: gunsandguitars...
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Background music made by Jordan Rowan of iMakeMusic
Audiojungle: audiojungle.ne...
Radio Shack used to sell a book called "Building speaker enclosures" that tells you more than you'll ever want to know about the subject. Might find it used online still.
I actually have that book ! I'd be happy to scan or take pictures of the pages of the book for you
@@boyroyal4522 if you could do that for me, that'd be awesome.
@@boyroyal4522 I missed it so much, I got another copy on Ebay. pretty cheap as I recall, un the $10 - $20 range. They had perhaps a dozen copies for sale total.
RadioShack back in the day had some gems. I built my first distortion pedal using just RadioShack components.
There are quite a few editions. Later versions drop some subjects, and add newer concepts.
As an engineer, electrical, not acoustic, I don't believe the air could warm to a level that would significantly affect the density and sound. As best I can tell, tamping a speaker box absorbs high frequencies and stops echoes that would in effect sound counsel. As I said, I'm an electronics guy, not acoustics. I love your channel and your builds. I don't play but my son does. You and a few others have inspired me to build my own les paul knockoff and learn to play. Thanks!
You’re honestly probably correct. Like I said, people disagree on whether is true. But people don’t disagree that it helps increase the low end response!
What I had always read is the fill material ( poly, fiberglass, etc.) effectively increases the internal surface area creating the effect of a larger enclosure.
Synthetic fibers don’t actually do much. Packing with long fiber wool can increase the effective volume 10-20%.
@@MichaelEdelman1954 and the physics behind that is just a lowered speed of sound. no warming up air lol
From my experience a closed box traps the worst harmonics of the ugliest mids but that’s from building iso chambers not speaker enclosures. Hope you’re shredding up that Les Paul, Rob!
I''ve built 3 bass cabs and loved every minute of it. The last two were tuned specifically to some Eminence neo speakers that are rated for 250 watts. Problem with commercial cabs is you never know if they actually did the right engineering or just built them to look good. Thiel parameters are a must for double checking the internal volume and tuning the ports. I purchased plans all 3 times but from reputable sources to ensure the math was right. Using the right materials I now have tuned port 10" 250 watt speaker that comes in at less than 30 lbs. I don't know too many commercial cabs that do that.
Were did you get plans from? And at what price range?
There is a completely underrated aspect here. The skill to assemble, measure, cut and fasten this all together. your end result looks easy. and that's a gift.... thanks for sharing. Can't wait to see the matching partner.
I build probably 20 1x12 Tweet cabs a year and maybe 5 12-8-tweet cabs in my shop, I love doing cabs. Thiele/Small parameters are your friend when tuning a ported or sealed cabinet to a particular speaker. You did a good job for your limitations Dan 🍻🤘🏼
Hi! I'm not so into the cabs building yet. Could you please tell what are the dimensions for 1x12 cabs you've built and which speakers do you use? Just to have a reference for future builds. Thanks!
@@MrFedoss 18x16x16 eminence
I've fantasized about fabricating a V4B because you can't find one.
Why? Everyone needs to own their own howitzer.
@@carpediemarts705 Agreed👍🏼
Another home builder here. I wanted a box for a 12". Bought the speaker and used freeware design program + Thiele-Small parameters to get box that goes down to 30 Hz. I used best 3/4" plywood and PVC pipe for a port. Cost about $75 above the price of the speaker. Because it's plywood, it's heavy but I can move it without fear. i use a hand truck. I would recommend T-Nuts to attach the speaker. If you play at all loud those screws will work out causing first, a buzz and later causing the speaker to detach!
Gr8 vid Dan! I did this back in the early 90's when I was touring and couldn't afford buying a bunch of cabs! Back then, I was running 2x Peavey 4x10 tx's and built 2 1x15 bass cabs based on the Carvin 1 x 15 tuned cab. I was doing a job in the LA area and stopped by a Carvin store and they let me measure one of their cabs! I had gotten a pair of Altec Lansing 15" raw frames and they worked perfectly! Those things lasted 12 yrs of hard touring and are still doing it today! I can pull them out anytime and go pound out the low end! They were built exactly as your cab is! I ran a Trace Elliot GPX 12 pre bi-amped thru Yamaha P2200 power amps. This rig POWERED the low end for any venue plus running a direct out thru the PA! Loved seeing you do this! Brought back GREAT memories!!!
Who did you tour with?
Third post, Dan you are the man... the 906, and not the 609, you know your quality!
Bod Gless!
Hey Dan, love your channel as well as your boldness in Christ. Many many years ago, I decided I wanted to build a cabinet of my own. My dad and I worked on it together and built it around an old Peavey Black Widow speaker. As one of the other comments mentioned, I referenced an old Radio Shack book on building speaker enclosures. However, when it came to porting the cabinet, I couldn't port it conventionally as the cabinet was just barely bigger than the speaker itself. I found some JBL spec sheets and did some calculations resulting in small port at the bottom of the cab which met the JBL spec for area, but not for shape or placement. We got very lucky and to this day (30 years later) it is still my favorite cab to run. Great bottom end and the upper mid is amazing! It is super efficient and although I have more amp horsepower, there hasn't been a venue yet I couldn't fill with a 200w amp. (except for a stadium). The Black Widow is still going strong. For me, building the cab saved tons of money and was a great memory of building something with my dad who is no longer with us.
Great job! I'm listening with good headphones and the sound is PHAT. Definitely build a second one!
Love the double the volume and phase cancellation hand dolphins.
Thanks for the content Dan! Nothing like opening with "I wanted to try somenthing I've never done" to gran intetest!
At least your honest when you said you can buy a speaker cab for less used online, of course you don’t get the satisfaction of doing it yourself or learn anything, I’ve tried building a bass cab and I was disappointed with the volume it puts out. There is a gentleman by the name of Thiele that figured out the precise dimensions of building a bass cab while not phasing out the speaker, really smart guy.
May not be practical, but for some of the hands-on diy folks, then something like this is perfect. It's part of the reason your channel is so interesting, Dan. Thanks - good vid.
There's an old old saying
"Every Jedi must craft their own lightsaber".
I guess the challenging life experience separates the master from the stormtroopers.
Very practical for someone in a country where weight dictates high shipping costs.
As far as I know from playing bass is that if bass is just low end, it will sound muddy and boomy. Bringing up the high frequencies on your amp it brings clarity to your sound and tone. Some amps also have a presence that helps bring clarity to the bass tone. Some bass cabnitss and amps also have a tweeter in them. You could get a piezo tweeter to test on this setup as they are cheap. You can just wire them off the main speaker you can add a capacitor so only the high frequencies are heard out the tweeter. A dome tweeter, often sounding nicer, depending on the use and sound etc, uses a crossover. You can find videos on TH-cam where people have done tests adding different tweeters to there bass cabinets and amps.
When gigging if you are also going into a pa system with good bass, your amp is a monitor so the band can hear you on stage. Your main bass comes out the PA system. If you have too much bass coming from your amp on stage then the sound person can't controll the bass and its messy. If you don't go out the PA system then a bigger amp is needed so you can be heard.
Put some Tolex on it, your last name - and then sell it as a boutique cabinet like others do and charge $1199.00. Also, you can charge $150 extra for having a custom holster on the side, like for my Glock 17 :-)
Americans have to mention guns every chance. 🙄 I hope you are 12. 😆🤣😂
@@deanaf this whole channel is built around the bs patriotism. Guitars have nothing to do with guitars unless you count dimebag getting murdered. That good guy with a gun took way too long
Well done Dan. When your recording with mic place mic right in front of grill finger thickness away. Pointing just Where dust cap meets speaker .
May need moving depending which bass you use or song you record enjoy
Get some glazing putty to fill the gaps of the MDF. You can use bondo, but I found the putty to be much more user friendly and gives better results.
Great video. You're spot on with it being more practical to buy a cabinet. My only home built cab is actually just a modification to a bass combo. I blew a speaker in a Sunn Beta bass 1-15 ported combo years back (early 90s). I converted it to a 2-10 sealed combo and still use it. The conversion was easy and the results were perfect. I was lucky. The cabinet was solid and the mod was not difficult. I only needed new tolex, 2 speakers and front board for the speakers. I reused the bottom.
Everyone I've know that tried building a cab from scratch regretted it. The high cost and time 8nvolved are bad enough, most were very heavy and structurally not as good as manufactured cabs. And ported cabs get complicated mathematically and structurally depending on design.
Again cool video.
Can’t wait for the bass amp vid!
What you're describing re the backwave coming out of the port is more like a large open baffle or transmission line.
Resonant frequency is based around mass. The mass of the air in the port couples with the speaker cone to offer mechanical resistance which reduces cone travel* and adds mass which lowers the resonant frequency. Look up Helmholtz resonator.
(*until you go below the tuning frequency then it all falls over where a sealed box rolls off).
A transmission line bass cab would be cool!
The port couples to cabinet air mass, which couples to the driver.
That construction adhesive also prevents the panels from rattling against each other.
polyfill only dampens frequencies above 300hz so for a bass guitar pollyfill can squash the spicy tones which make the bass sound interesting.
The reason for porting a box is it tune it to a specific frequency 32 Hertz 40 Hertz 46 Hertz certain size subs and Brands work better at certain frequencies. I don't know how that will relate to a bass guitar sub. On another note if you're going to use poly fill you have to calculate the amount of air space it uses up in your enclosure size. otherwise you could be using less cubic air space than you needed. I would think whatever brand you bought the sub from should have specs for what enclosures work best with that Wolford sealed and ported
Sounds great. Always glad to see content for us bassists👍
Diggin’ it DAN! You’ve done it yet again!⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Warmer air takes up more space not less, the the air being warmer inside would actually reduce its effective internal volume, not increase it.
The padding is more to dampen any standing waves bouncing around in the cab.
DAN! THIS amp sounds KIIIIIIIIIIILLLLLLLLER! I am NOT at all surprised?
You are so capable of proving you can do just about anything my friend!
God bless as always, stay safe through the holidays. Hope all keeps going
well for you & the fam? Until next time, keep those fingers-a-pluckin'!!!!
I am aware of the dimensions vs frequencies.
For that reason, I bought a pre made car sub speaker 12" in box. Then, bought amplifier of some 1000W RMS. Then, added an alternate current transformer, and used this box, as an extension to a basic cheap 35w base combo.
With some line out, I ended up with the best bass amp experience, in my life..
The 35w can enhance the highs, and details the notes.
The 1000w sub, creates this ground shaking overtone..
Addictive..🙂
Great job buddy!! That Fretless sounded awesome!!
Well done. Me personally, I like the idea of a solid wood cabinet with a light purple stain and sealant. Unique aesthetics showing wood grain.
So true. I can't imagine building my own box just to have it look like something I can buy.
Jordan Rowan killed it on the background track
Hi Dan,
That thing looks and sounds great for recording as you said. I really like it. For a gigable version a tweeter can be an option. A tweeter with a level control is preferable actually. I have a combo without a tweeter. I'm not using it for a while because of this. In live situations a tweeter can be a life saver I think.
Yes! Make the second cab! Hahaha ;D Love it! I've always preferred running my tone at 4 ohms rather than 8. You'll get even more of the juicy low end! Great job here, brother! Really nice indeed! The only way to improve on what you did would be to spend the extra money for a quality section of birch plywood instead of the MDF. However, I've used several MDF cabs over the years and they maintain a great low end. They are just heavy as all get out! The day I had my heart attack was from hoisting my old Peavey 4x10 beast into my Intrepid... yeah... MDF is freaking heavy... but, that cab weighed around 150 pounds. This 1X10 design should be much easier to hoist.
Adventure ever on brother, Phat
PS: I'm currently the proud owner of two Acoustic brand 1X12 cabs that are around 25 pounds each with neodymium magnets and light plywood construction. My Acoustic head has around 200 digital watts at 8 ohms but jumps to 350 watts at 4 ohms. So yeah... build the second cab XD
Running your tone at 4 ohms? That makes no sense. You don't run tone.
@@JC-11111 Always a critic in the crowd. If you can't say something positive then please keep that sh** to yourself. Now that I read this again, maybe I should've said, "I prefer to obtain my tone using a 4 ohm load." But, I recently sustained a head injury that has left me a bit scrambled. Apologies if I offended you in any way. Adventure on, Phat
just finished building the same model, and let me tell it sounds killer
I bought that Sonicake Boom for bass you did a demo on quite a while back and I don't need my amp at all.
Has the DI out to house for live and using in-ear monitors so extra noise on stage is not useful.
Even fits nicely in my bass case.
Build turned out nice!
I designed my own ported pa subwoofers and they sound rather good!
One box had 1/2 inch ply and the other was 3/8 inch but proper Baltic birch. I could get away with thin wood because the ports were triangles in the corners and extra bracing at the back
Sounds great! I've been thinking of building a cab myself but you're right about the cost. Regardless, thanks for the build!
8:55 the perfect metaphor for guitar work sanding. Looks fun edited and in high speed but in reality boring. Cool job.
Great video man. You kept it honest and even asked your audience to correct you. Love how you brought up he point of not being practical, I was gonna build one but I will defer to wisdom and knowledge kind sir.
Thanks, i love your playing!!!
Nice job. I'm having fun putting a new celestion pulse12 in an old guitar combo cab. I took out the amp and can use that slot as a big port, and will cover the back with a ply board. Costs me very little and if it sounds bad, I can just move the nice speaker to a proper cabinet some day 😁
i have a 1960's Gibson Thor Bass combo amp ive had for years... The amp and speakers have been shot since the 80's. I replaced the 2 10" drivers with a pair of Eminance 10's that are used for both guitar and bass cabs. Sealed Cabinet in the way that guitar and bass cabs are sealed, meaning screwed tight,but not sealed with silicone caulk. This cab is an absolutely perfect Motown/Stax/Credence etc sound with an old tube PA head, and has tight and focused bass response for rock guitar when running a Marshall or Hot Fender type into it! using an actual Bass amp, it gets everything you want, unless you feel the need for a tweeter. Ive run it with a subwoofer before, but subs make a huge sonic mess on stage and in studio. Any sub 60hz freqencies are generally captured in the recording process from a D.I. Box
Long post short, a 2x10' "Sealed" cab is easy to build and sounds spectacular in live and recording contexts, unless you're looking for a slap/pop bass soloist sound.. absolely top notch for 99% of bands, including upright bass
Thank you Dan! I am considering making this and putting it in the truck of my '64 Oldsmobile. :-D Be blessed, Dan!
Awesome build job, excellent work integrity
You can seal the seams on the inside of the box with silicon for an air tight box.
Hey Dan, love your guitars and your guns LOL! I'm 64 and have been building them since I was twelve. Sealed equals lower Bass (tone) (tighter) but also lower Volume (loudness). For great bass and don't take my word for it, try a Peavy 2 way Crossover. Even though I don't really care for slap bass, you need that Bass and a High Compression Tweeter/Horn. The sweetest thing I've heard is a Rickosound with a Sub on one side and a Woofer and Tweeter on the other side I know you will know what I'm talking about. It seems like you know more than you let us think LOL!
The fill makes it sound like a larger box because it forces soundwaves to take a longer path BUT your box dimensions are way below the long / big bass notes. The fill in yours is good for quieting any rattles or buzzing / higher frequency noises
I'm with you on the cost. I picked up a 115 Ampeg SVT cab (20 something year old model but perfect shape) for under $250 Canadian (approx $200 USD). At those kinds of prices, doesn't make sense to build it myself.
as far as the thermal effects of the insulation goes, it's not a large time scale like air is heating up and getting less dense, it's air motion being converted into heat, and released in every cycle. It essentially slows the waves down, so it takes more time for them to bounce back, much the same as having a larger box.
Dude this was pretty cool. I would love to see a 2x12 bass cab. Also, you’re a great bass player!
You're good on the bracing! You wouldn't need extra bracing unless you want to drive the subwoofer with about 650 or more watts of power
That's cool Dan, and yes it sounds good. It's always interesting what one can pull off, and yes, it's probably not all that practical at $100. But hey I found a piece of 3/4 inch particle board in the garage that I'm not going to use for what I bought it for, so maybe a speaker cabinet is a good idea. At least it get it out of the way... and puts something else in my wife's way. :)
And that still looks like a beach ball to me!
For bass instrument amps you don't usually need a whole lot of extra channels. For car subwoofer boxes you need the extra channels because they are trying to build low-frequencies in a tiny space, the inside of a car is just really small for the longer waves to develop. 112Hz is about 10Ft of wavelength, longer than the inside of the vehicle and lower frequencies just get even longer. Frequencies below about 120 to 160Hz are omnidirectional but they can be longer than the space you want to listen in. So, if you're in a small room the long channels help the bass frequencies develop before they exit the cabinet and in larger spaces the channels really aren't necessary. This is why you don't see those channels in larger professional bass instrument cabinets, you just don't need that on a large stage. But put a small 1x10 or even a 1x12 or 1x15 in a small room ad you will need a bit of extra channels to help those lower frequencies develop and resonate.
Wow, sounds surprisingly good. Congrats!
I built myself a cab over lockdown, would 100% say to anyone doing this to do exactly as you do and utilise a CAD programme for the design, means you save a lot of headache down the line both in material sizing and getting it to assemble and sound right.
I actually went a step further with mine, the speaker I used had dimensions on the manufacturer's site so I used this to design the speaker baffle and then got it laser cut by a buddy. Could have just used a circle cutting jig on a router, but this allowed for the speaker to be rear mounted, a perfect fit, and the front to be neatly cloth covered.
The best cabinet would be like the Bag End with the coaxial in one woofer and a second just for volume.. But they should have a higher resonant frequency. Then the porting would be also at a higher tone and punchier. I think they call them Brazilian Punch often enough.
it''s nice, i was twelve and built one too, didn't split as much wood, but nothing you could do
Good job on doing the research, but with the left over materials, you may wish to consider either a 12 or 15 inch speaker in order to accommodate more low end. I would go with a 12 if the amount of material allowed for such in the math. 10s do really well for a practice amp or really small venues, but I have found that 12 is a minimum for anything bass. Consider that in the 60s, Fender used 12s religiously for Bassmans and other Fender bass amps.
Speaker tech has also changed a lot since the 60s though! Speakers have gotten a lot better, especially on the bass end. There’s a reason you’ll never see bass players playing through old bassmans professionally (unless you’re really into that) and you’ll see a bunch of 4x10 or 6x10 bass cabs!
I've done a lot of diy speaker builds since the early 2000s. I'll argue that there are a lot of resources for design and build. Partsexpress has a great community.
As you started, I was concerned about some technique - what? He's not going to glue it? - but lo and behold, that comes later.
I'm glad you tweaked the sub box design. As I understand, sub boxes are optimized for the general size and shape of a vehicle interior, which will provide some natural reinforcement of lower frequencies. That allows sub boxes to be built smaller than would be optimal for other applications.
For a 1*10 of that size you probably don't need bracing. BUT, next time use a good quality plywood. It's lighter and more durable/roadworthy than MDF.
Speaker selection is a really big deal. The cabinet and the speaker are a symbiotic system. A great driver in the wrong cab will not be good. There are electrical and mechanical properties of the driver that can be used to determine the proper box size and port dimensions.
You implied that you tuned to the resonant frequency of the speaker. I am a novice, really, but I have heard you really don't want to tune that low. I believe it can have some bad effects on the speaker. *I might be wrong on this!*
There is a lot more. It has been a fun hobby but you are correct that you've gotta dig in if you want to get it right, it close to.
My current vanity rig is a rejigged Warwick 4*10 now modified and loaded with a Peavey lowrider 15 and a self-designed and built ported 2*10 with some eminence bass speakers. I don't recall their model number but they are great. The only brand new thing in it is the lowrider. The eminence I got slightly used, if at all, for $50-60 maybe. The Warwick cab i got at a music shop used for $95. Side note - it had 4 eminence gamma 10 speakers that were great at low volume but farted out at higher volume. Not a great driver design for bass guitar, IMO.
I have driven the rig in different ways. I start with a zoom b3 for preamp and have used an Ashley or Behringer crossover to drive PA amps (currently QSC) or (again currently) full range to both cabs. Note that the Ashley crossover offered phenomenal flexibility of sound allowing different crossover points between the 15 and 10s, and also different levels for each of the two cabs.
Nuff Of that for now.
I’m looking forward to hearing about your amp! My bassist is super interested in the portaflex and we do DIY pedal kits so tell me all about it, man :)
1:15 is the music in my head whenever I'm working on projects, now, and it's all your fault lol... And as far as I know, yeah, all the maths required stuff checks out. T/S numbers, etc. I've actually been able to have a chat with the guy from Genz Benz (now Genzler) that designed/engineered my Genz Benz Focus LT bass cab. I can't remember if it's Celestion or Eminence, but one of them (or both) also have some bass cab designs to use for their speakers. WinSID is an old Windows program that can be used for the maths, too.
Do not get me started on the dark sorcery of adding a crossover/tweeter setup to the cab (because I don't know it)😬
Thanks for sharing!
I have some old cabs that are covered in some sort of black carpet. It's coming off and looks like hell, and the spray cans of truck bed paint look like a great way to get them looking good again. Thanks!
Dude, As Always, You Rock..!! Keep Shining..!!
if you use birch it helps move air to the port with less turbulance
I absolutely love that Basecab man and you should build another one just like it really nice and it sounds good
A couple points:
1. Did you use Philips headed screws throughout this build? I'm broke, and an old timer, but I've recently been converted to torq/star headed screws. SO much easier to use, requires much less strength, so much less fatigue/pain at the end of the day, the bit doesn't slip at the end when you really have to drive it home, you don't strip heads like you do with Philips... the torx, or whatever they're called, the star bits are just so much better. Like Philips were an advancement over flat heads 100 years ago, or whatever it was, but Philips held over into power drills because it was the best tech we had when the cordless drills were invented, but now, Philips is long in the tooth, and star bits are what should be used with the current state of the tech, power drills. They're worth the extra price for me, and not all builds require that level of torque, but it's just easier to have your whole eco system set up around torq bits/heads. The change over is a beach, using up your supply of Philips, as you switch over to torq/star, you'll have to switch bits a lot, and it'll be annoying... but that little Makita impact drill... I can shoot 3 inch torq screws into rock hard, high desert dried, 30 year old 2x4's with my arm stretched all the way out to the side, and drilling forward... where with a Philips bit, I'd use my full 200+ pound body weight, both arms, both legs braced, drilling directly forward, and I'd still strip the bit attempting to drive the last 1/2" in, all with a pilot hole already drilled in!
2. WTF did you do to your soldering iron, man? That is some alien level blue tape tech! What's the idea?
Philips were chosen in the early car production lines to prevent untrained workers from over torquing fasteners and stripping them out.
Yes, their poorer performance is why for a century we have ten of those in every toolbox instead of a couple sizes of torque bits.
My understanding of ports: the volume of the port, whether slot or round acts like a trombone horn, the air inside it resonates at a certain pitch range. Speaker cones drop their sound pressure (volume) rapidly below a different frequency. Knowing the specs (Thiele Small parameters) of your speaker cone allows you to to choose your port to make up for the frequencies the speaker lacks hopefully. Bass has such a wide range of frequencies with harmonics that one cone can't do it all.
That is not correct. A trombone horn amplifies the sound, and has to be made like a horn. That was used much in the ´70s, but they are big and heavy and very impractical.
The port delays the sound as he said.
Love how heavy the background tracks got!
Can't believe you ruined that nice beach ball! LOL Sounds good.
JBL 10" sub, 4 cubic foot box (2x2x1), 6 inch PVC pipe port. 3/4" MDF. no bracing required. I put acoustic foam in my home stereo speaker cabs, but not in the JBL boxes in my Chevelle. It does make a difference, but I don't remember why - get the book (building speaker enclosures).
I built a 1X12 ported with 3/4" birch plywood and used an Eminence Beta 12CX concentric. I sprayed Plastidip for the finish.
It looks cool and sounds great. Nice work.
Having a ported cab controls the degree to which air moves and the cone is free to push air - this is a plus and a minus. Yes you can tune the cab to the desired response - you can also allow the cab to move enough air to let the driver destroy itself. Feed sparingly at first and add power gradually. Sealed cabs are more forgiving in this regard, and the response from them can be compensated for with a reasonably cheap DSP that can correct to the desired response. Good on ya for giving it a go!
Speaker catalogs usually list whether a specific cone was engineered to be in a ported or sealed cabinet. The xmax is engineered short for "tight" sealed cabinets and long for ported cabinets to flow more air.
Greater xmax often allows more cooling of the voicecoils from the airflow. Speaker engineering is a degree ya can get in engineering college.
@@carpediemarts705 Devil is in the TS's. There are very good reasons for long X-max in a sealed cab - especially if your intent is pushing accurately, and to extremes.
Speakerbox2: isothermal.
You can't just pick those up used for a Benji because they're so rare.
Plus it's a unique design to explore.
The big companies toyed with this design decades back but only a couple smaller companies have run with it recently.
Great project well done. Sounds fab.
Warming the air would increase its bulk modulus, this increasing the speed of sound in the air. This allows waves to lose less energy and they travel more efficiently. Im not convinced the insulation is losing energy to heat and if it was the source of energy is the sound so entropically I don't think this would be a net increase. Its probably just absorbing brash sounding higher tones that the hard surface would reflect more.
Warmer air would just raise the tuning but i am not sure how significant the effect would be. The bulk modulus would be similar at the same altitude but the density would reduce, meaning the resonant frequency would go up.
It's not quite right assuming that port tuning is entirely just to align the back wave with 180 degrees so it ends up in phase. That is one of the effects, but it has more to do with the resonance and mass of the air in the vent. Because of that mass, well above the tuning frequency of the box, the port does almost nothing and it acts almost like it's sealed. (To simplify, at high frequencies, you're not pushing in one direction long enough for the pressure to get down the vent before you pull it back)
near resonance, most of the sound comes from the port, and the pressure waves actually bounce back and reduce the speaker's movement allowing lots of sound, without a lot of speaker excursion.
below the tuning frequency is where the waves do get out of phase (not in the midrange, like you're guessing). What's even worse about that isn't the fact that the sound is cancelling, but that the pressure waves are actually unloading the speaker, which causes it to deal with huge mechanical excursion without actually making much useful sound.
Ideally, if there's any very low frequencies in your sound (below what the box is tuned for) you filter them out.
If there's excessive low frequency content (octave down pedal on bass, etc), and no low-cut on the amp, a sealed cabinet is a lot safer for the speaker since their motion is more constrained by the air pressure at low frequencies and doesn't unload.
Haha, in 5'19" i see your MDF board cracked when you put the screw common problem.
I personally make my cases of so called baltic birch plywood. It is quite heavy and expensive but look nice and it is very durable.
For more ambitious projects I would recommend to use some CAD software there are many from free to expensive. Some good (and expensive) you can find at Parts Express.
(I am not affiliated with them in any way and even rarely use them as my supplier, because I am in Canada).
Finishing is the most difficult part. Tolex (vinyl) is expensive and difficult to apply nicely. Easy and very nice finishing you can get with special acrylic paint Duratex or other similar.
Man...that sound was pretty nice 👍👍
It's not practical building speaker boxes but it sure is fun
Very cool. Top notch work, as always my friend :)
Cool video, Dan. That cab sounds nice. The passive bass you played looks like across between a fender mustang and a Jackson spectra. Other than that, the other basses sound great with the bass cab.
Hell I figured it’s was just a box with a speaker thrown in it. But that shows how much I know about playing the bas
Your theory on poly fill and how it works is backwards. The theory is, the fill itself is a heat sink, preventing the air from getting hotter.
Think of the tires on your car for a second. As they heat up from rolling down the road, the pressure increases.
This same increase in pressure, due to heat, in the enclosure would increase damping on the driver; same as it would putting the driver in a smaller enclosure.
The poly fill vibrates in the enclosure, absorbing energy, thus keeping the air in the enclosure from getting warmer and increasing pressure/damping.
I built my own cab once.
It was fun-ish?
In the end I would have been better served just buying one.
If willing to go used I could have gotten a pretty nice one.
There is not really "wrong" designs in a bass cabinet, it's mainly choices. Usually manufacturer tends to build bass cabs with higher tuning frequency (45hz-65hz), that way you can reduce the internal volume, port lenght, air delay, and weight.
Sometimes a high tuning gives a few more dbs at around 100zh-125hz, this frequency bump adds up presence, and "roudness" that some bass players like, but of course it comes at a cost : it tights off the bottom end, bass won't go as low.
It's all about compromises.
Well that sounded pretty darn good to my ears
One of these days I wanna build a ridiculous, 4x3 micro bass cab with mini subwoofer drivers and a big passive radiator, but until then I'm just gonna watch this repeatedly
You should always round off all the sharp edges of the interior.
Interesting build. Nicely done
Dan, we missed you!
I think the experience/lessons learned far outweigh the cost.
Hi Dan, I love your channel, but your understanding of the science is off. Ported speakers work on a concept called Helmholtz resonanance. Pretty well the same principle as blowing on the top of a bottle to make a noise. Check out the Wikipedia page on bass reflex.
The right way, the wrong way…have you never heard of the Dan Thompson way?
So what's your explanation for back ported speakers? The wall needs more whistle? 😁
Brilliant video! Thank you!
Bought a Hartke 4x10 cabinet at a pawn shop for $100 and wound up blowing all the Hartke speakers. Kept the box and replaced the speakers with 4 ohm Eminense speakers. Paired it with a 200 watt Ampeg Micro SVT, this thing thumps! To your point, just buy a box. It's much more cost effective.
About how much does this puppy weigh? And where did you source your corners and grill?
While I'm thinking about it, the cabinet isn't going to be an arena cabinet. But this driver will take a lot more power than your amp is dishing out. It is actually more possible to melt a voice coil by overdriving an underpowered amp. Clipped waveforms can overhead a voice coil in a hurry.
The biggest thing I learned from this video is that I'd rather buy a speaker cab than build one! Lol
Thanks for your effort though!
Cool project! How about sometime trying to build a diy bass preamp pedal?
Can you do a diy hard shell case tutorial?