It's been quite a while since I built that little box. It works reasonably well, but could definitely be better.
The box now belongs to a buddy of mine who lives in a small flat. I don't know how much use it's been put to, but it couldn't come with me to the new property.
While reserching methods for building a studio, I realised that I could have done the iso-cab so mch better.
The box was made with 9mm ply, glued to a pine frame and some earth wool was placed inside.
Performance was ok, but it could still be heard and was only any good for a small amp.
I think maybe even the 15 watt Fender Princeton was too hot for it.
Something like a 5 watt Valve Jr, Black Heart, Tiny Terror is more suitable.
This is due to two factors, the size of the cabinet and the density of the walls.
The cabinet I built was basically a 600mm cube. This was due to size restrictions with the flat I was living in.
What I've read is that the small volume of air can lead to speaker and output transformer damage, due to back voltages being generated in the voice coil.
Indeed on one test of a 10" driver, I was alarmed to find that the magnet was quite warm to the touch.
This is not something I have ever noticed before. I stopped that test fairly quickly. Every other test I did was at a lower volume and on a speaker with a larger magnet (better heat dissipation, among other properties).
Despite the small sound however, the sound was pretty good, no "boxiness" was present, but I think that was likely due to the mic being pressed right up against the speaker grille (no room for ambient sound).
A better design would be to double the length of the box, leave out the rock wool (it really did nothing in terms of blocking the sound path), use 18mm ply and a couple of layers of plaster board (with an air gap between the inner and outer layer). Essentially building a tiny version of a room within a room. Plaster boards properties lend itself to be quite the good little insulator. Not what I expected when I started my research.
Making a sound proof box it seems, is entirely dependent on just a few factors. Density, Mechanical Isolation and a Perfect Seal.
That means Thick Walls, Rubber & Air isolation between inner & outer boxes, and Blocking the movement of air through any gaps that may appear during assembly.
Anywhere air goes, sound goes.
Showing posts with label DIY. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DIY. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Monday, February 6, 2012
A little DIY - How to make your own Sustainer
I've received a request for a better explanation on how the sustainer works.
Well it's pretty simple really. At leas my version is at any rate.
All you need is a handful of parts and it can be made for less than $20
Ideally you'll have a strong magnet. I've used old strat pickups, but Alnico Bar Magnets are available on Ebay pretty frequently.
The Bar magnet will probably give you a better result.
Apart from the pickup, my sustainer was built from stuff readily available from the local electronics store.
The thinnest enamel coated wire that I found is .25mm, a bit smaller would be better (tighter coil), but this was all I had to work with. On the strat pickup with the orignial wire removed I wound a coil to 8 ohms. I think it was 160 turns of the pickup. There is a handy turn calculator online here where you input your wire gauge, magnet size and desired resistance.
Incidentally the 33awg roll from Jaycar is 16 ohms +- an ohm.
To power it all I used a simple 386 chip based circuit that can deliver 1/4watt at 8 ohms.
It comes in kit form and usually costs less than $9
Simply connect the tip of your guitar jack to the input of the circuit and the sustainer coil to the speaker terminals.
If it doesn't do anything, try reversing the speaker wires as there may be a humbucking effect.
Every coil I've made has been different, some strings will feedback more than others depending on how sloppy the wire wrapping has been done.
Unfretted Forum Thread
Jagmaster Sustainer Guitar
Gretsch Sustainer Project
Well it's pretty simple really. At leas my version is at any rate.
All you need is a handful of parts and it can be made for less than $20
Ideally you'll have a strong magnet. I've used old strat pickups, but Alnico Bar Magnets are available on Ebay pretty frequently.
The Bar magnet will probably give you a better result.
Apart from the pickup, my sustainer was built from stuff readily available from the local electronics store.
The thinnest enamel coated wire that I found is .25mm, a bit smaller would be better (tighter coil), but this was all I had to work with. On the strat pickup with the orignial wire removed I wound a coil to 8 ohms. I think it was 160 turns of the pickup. There is a handy turn calculator online here where you input your wire gauge, magnet size and desired resistance.
Incidentally the 33awg roll from Jaycar is 16 ohms +- an ohm.
To power it all I used a simple 386 chip based circuit that can deliver 1/4watt at 8 ohms.
It comes in kit form and usually costs less than $9
Simply connect the tip of your guitar jack to the input of the circuit and the sustainer coil to the speaker terminals.
If it doesn't do anything, try reversing the speaker wires as there may be a humbucking effect.
Every coil I've made has been different, some strings will feedback more than others depending on how sloppy the wire wrapping has been done.
Unfretted Forum Thread
Jagmaster Sustainer Guitar
Gretsch Sustainer Project
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| Original |
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| Updated |
2nd half of this song shows my first sustainer in action.
Monday, November 14, 2011
DIY Scratch plates
The weather was kind to me, this past weekend. I managed to finally start making router templates.
Plywood and a Coping saw make for fairly easy work. I made three in two days.
Well not two full days, but over two days. Maybe 8 hours all up.
This is all as part of my summer projects, which I started late last summer. There are currently four guitars in various stages of reconstruction littering the house. It may appear as though I'm rather lazy when it comes to finishing projects (actually that's largely true), but last summer I did finish a number of large projects which got in the way of finishing these guitars. Also the parts I ordered from the U.S.A took their sweet time to arrive.
First up is a revisit of my first electric guitar The La Grange Strat Copy. Back in the day it had one horn cut off and the frets pulled. Some of the fretboard came up with the frets and the guitar was rendered unplayable.
I decided to try to rescue it, and the only sensible option seemed to be to turn it into a Lap Steel. I cut off the other horn and rounded it out a bit. The dark P90 shaped slab of wood is a piece of Jarrah which was probably the hardest thing to cut, ever. The Jarrah slab is actually going to be sitting on top of two piezoelectric elements that I pulled from a couple of cheap buzzers. The bridge will sit on top of the Jarrah biscuit, so that the pressure from the strings push down on the elements to create an acoustic like tone. For more traditional tones, I'll also add a humbucker pulled from my buddies' Gretsch. In addition to the body mod, I'm considering reshaping the headstock to more of a square sort of shape. We'll see....
This is an oldie. Bought way back in the 90's for $60. I think it's a Kay, but there are many guitars from the 60's that look like it. When I bought it, the guitar was in terrible condition. Almost unplayable. It ended up sitting in a cupboard at my mother's house for more than a decade. I retrieved it around 18 months ago and slowly began working on it. The original scratch plate was split into two segments. Not elegant in my opinion, but hey, that's the way it was. I've never really been much of a fan of the traditional SG plates and thought that I'd have a crack at making my own design. It's borrowed some aesthetics of Airline guitars with a hint of Mosrite thrown in by chance (dictated by the routing actually).
The real hard part is cutting these into pickguard material, which is a nightmare to work as the plastic curls and catches on the blade and gums up the router attachments.
Plywood and a Coping saw make for fairly easy work. I made three in two days.
Well not two full days, but over two days. Maybe 8 hours all up.
This is all as part of my summer projects, which I started late last summer. There are currently four guitars in various stages of reconstruction littering the house. It may appear as though I'm rather lazy when it comes to finishing projects (actually that's largely true), but last summer I did finish a number of large projects which got in the way of finishing these guitars. Also the parts I ordered from the U.S.A took their sweet time to arrive.
First up is a revisit of my first electric guitar The La Grange Strat Copy. Back in the day it had one horn cut off and the frets pulled. Some of the fretboard came up with the frets and the guitar was rendered unplayable.
I decided to try to rescue it, and the only sensible option seemed to be to turn it into a Lap Steel. I cut off the other horn and rounded it out a bit. The dark P90 shaped slab of wood is a piece of Jarrah which was probably the hardest thing to cut, ever. The Jarrah slab is actually going to be sitting on top of two piezoelectric elements that I pulled from a couple of cheap buzzers. The bridge will sit on top of the Jarrah biscuit, so that the pressure from the strings push down on the elements to create an acoustic like tone. For more traditional tones, I'll also add a humbucker pulled from my buddies' Gretsch. In addition to the body mod, I'm considering reshaping the headstock to more of a square sort of shape. We'll see....
Next up is the new template for my Tokai Hummingbird. The plate that came with the guitar was too pointy, too skinny and not nearly Mosrite enough. I thought about this for most of the last year. As the guitar has quite large routing holes, it was a case fill in some or work out how to cover them. It seemed simpler just to cover them up. The plate I have in mind is tortoise shell, but am considering a half an half of cream and tortoise shell, to give the illusion of half a pick guard. Time will tell if I am off my rocker.
This is an oldie. Bought way back in the 90's for $60. I think it's a Kay, but there are many guitars from the 60's that look like it. When I bought it, the guitar was in terrible condition. Almost unplayable. It ended up sitting in a cupboard at my mother's house for more than a decade. I retrieved it around 18 months ago and slowly began working on it. The original scratch plate was split into two segments. Not elegant in my opinion, but hey, that's the way it was. I've never really been much of a fan of the traditional SG plates and thought that I'd have a crack at making my own design. It's borrowed some aesthetics of Airline guitars with a hint of Mosrite thrown in by chance (dictated by the routing actually).
The real hard part is cutting these into pickguard material, which is a nightmare to work as the plastic curls and catches on the blade and gums up the router attachments.
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