Aluminum For Chassis'

[vdi_nenna]

Can you guys tell me where you purchase the aluminum sheets for your amp boxes? Some of you guys have the coolest looking amps! I just need 4 pieces for my amp. The heat sinks make up the side well enough, but I need a sturdy front, back, top & bottom.

I haven't been able to find anything locally. Is there anywhere nationally where I can order from?

Thanks!

Vince

[Peter Daniel]

I'm buying locally from metal store.

[pmkap]

FYI -

http://www.onlinemetals.com/

[vdi_nenna]

That's great, they'll even cut it for you.

Do you guys think 3/16ths of an inch is sturdy?

Thanks,

Vince

[BrianGT]

I bought 1/8" 6061 aluminum and it is suprisingly thick and rigid. It should be enough for all of your case needs.

I found a place that sold it by the pound, and it cost me $50 for all the aluminum sides/tops/bottoms for my two aleph 2 chassis.

--
Brian

[vdi_nenna]

I'm making a Rollins Micro-Aleph 10 watter. It will be a small foot print, e.i., taller then it is wide. I don't need much material.

Online metals will do the trick.

[BrianGT]

Online metals seems quite expensive. It would cost me at least twice as much as I found the metal locally in Atlanta, GA. I would suggest looking around and calling places from your phonebook. I call sheet metal places, and none of them sold aluminum sheet metal, but they referred me to a few places.

--
Brian
gte619j@prism.gatech.edu

[jackinnj]

In my youth I removed a "No Parking" sign from its perch and used same to craft a chasis for a ham radio rig. Wonderful stuff.

[Jocko Homo]

Yep, knew you were a real ham radio type. Keep up the good work.

1/8" is strong enough. Never hurt Threshold any.

Jocko

[mrfeedback]

Just some comment based on my observations.

In my experience, an amplifier using an aluminium cabinet will sound like it has an aluminium cabinet.
Ditto an amplifier using an iron cabinet.
Ditto an amplifier using a timber top cover.

For the experiment it is revealing for example to run an amp with top covering removed and take note of the sound.
Now place an aluminium, or steel, or timber top cover on the amp and note three different sounds.

What does this say ? - That there are field effects involved and they are not subtle.
IME this applies to heatsinks also.
My favorite amp has an iron cabinet and COPPER heatsinks.
I find this amp to be rather more pleasing over long term usage than an aluminium one.

Experiment two - take similarly sized sheets of AL, Fe, and Cu and tap them and note the character of the resulting sound.
I find that universally nobody likes the sound of aluminium.

To my ears an aluminium constructed amplifier gives a false, irritating and fatiguing characteristic to the highs, wrong mids, and diminished lows.

Experiment three - Take a piece of aluminium cooking foil and wrap it around the speaker leads - sonic results as above.

Years ago, I read an interview with Kostas Metaxus where he explained that he uses a particular non-magnetic grade of stainless steel because of these effects.
Stainless contains Nickel, so this is also out according to my ears.

It is worth noting that aluminium has no bio-chemical function in the human body, and is not used in the human body, and is indeed implicated in the causation of CRAFT* disease.

These are observations from long experience, both in experiment and servicing of all manner of audio equipment - maybe this is food for thought for a lot of us here.

Regards, Eric.

* - Can't Remember A F...... Thing disease - aka Alzheimers.