cabinets made from 'Hi tech' materials

[sippy]

Hi Tech materials......
Im a Surfboard shaper/glasser and while down at the surfboard foam shop a frend who works there showed me some interesting foam. The chemical composition is slighty different to other foams made for surfboard blanks, The big difference is that it can be ordered in 120kg/m3 or 200kg/m3.
REALY DENSE STUFF!!!!!
Can ya tell what it is yet?
(the question)
At the moment i can get 200kg/m3 foam cut into sheets any thickness from 1/4inch upwards, ive made fins from this with a single layer of 4oz glass laminated on and they are damn stiff and dead (for a fin)!
Bat (blown block of foam) size is restricted at 200kg cos of mold integrity, bat size yeilds a sheet size of 50 x 28 inches. But ive been told if i make the blowing mold i could maybe get 84 x 28.
Does anyone think that a sheet of this foam, bag laminated with say 11oz glass cloth and maybe some carbon would work as a cabinet material?
Its possible to cut this foam to profile useing 'Hot Wire' cutting, sanded / modeled to any shape ectpannels can be flat, curved inside and out and / or have a disruptive pattern modeled inside (or out) for wave dispersion and vaccume bag or hand laminated.
Price, £10 inc vat (aprox $15) a kg (2.2lbs).
Any thoughts?

[stoc005]

Composites can and will work for speaker cabinets. But the cost may get a bit more than MDF w/ veneer/paint. Epoxy, glass and carbon fiber are not cheap. Cross bracing can be an issue and you may need to do some, I think. Having the freedom to create almost any shape is great, too.

My personal favorite cabinets are MDF covered with Corian. I have not built any yet... Also would like to try MDF with marble tile on the 4 sides. Front/back will be MDF.

[sippy]

Well, ive only built one pair of enclosures useing mdf and thought thet were quite good......... then a freind dragged me down the wood shop and bought me some half decent plywood, got the sheet cut and we glued them up without half the braceing and constrained layer damping.
Difference was astounding and i still have these 'speakers 14yrs on.
mdf is evil stuff plain and simple and ever since its been ply.
Ive also looked at marble, got a freind who works at a stone working shop....... even at 'mates rates' a pair of front baffles 24 x 7 x 3/4, with driver cutout and back beveled was like car insurance for two years money!!!
(about $750)

So, what to do?
when i went to bed i realised the answer was sitting in the corner stareing at me, a pair of little warfdale 2ways with shot enclosure that have plastic moulded front and rears. I could re-model in foam/glass or even laminate useing cotton cloth an just see what happens.
Not quite the same as a re-arranged Daleck horn in terms of panel size and resonances but a start. Ive been outside and cut a bit of ply up, glued and screwed it together to match a sample of this foam i have.... drop the ply on the concrete and it rings slightly, the foam goes 'clonk'.
foam sample is 1 x 6 x 11 and the ply is 3lams off 1/2 x 6 x 11
I have only seen the Wilson Bensch (sp.) very high end enclosures that used carbon in the curved sides/rear baffle combine with ply/mdf inner structure/front baffle.
the costings for: carbon 8oz weave $150 40inchsq, glass 11oz weave $4 40inch sq, chopstrand $2.50, standard pink resin $30 gal, sexy laminating specific resin $50 a gal
compare to - marine ply 3/4in x 8ft x 4ft $120+tax+ delivery+$25 cutting per sheet.
And add in the cost of nice veneer and getting it put onto the cabinets......
the guy who glasses my boards can do the most amazing layered resin tints for finnish..........
am going down the foam shop, run my idea past the nutters that reside and get a price for a bit of foam.
It's be great if there was more imput from the peeps on here, i dont post often but the answers i get are a real boon to my thoughts.

[j.michael droke]

Hi there: Since you did not mention the type of enclosure or driver your interested in, I'm proposing, you use carbon fiber foam composite construction, which should work well for constructing a diy version of the "Replikon" minihorn found in another post. The curved, layered horn sections could be wire cut from foam, sanded to finish size, carbon fiber encapsulated and bondrd to side walls (either BB ply or more foam composite). Others seem to be working on the diy design proceedures for this enclosure? ...regards, Michael

[sippy]

hi michael,
ive got some foam to to reproduce a smallish 2way, But was looking at doing something like the Daleck horn if i can get hold of the fostex drive units. i chatted with the guys at Home Blown (foam systems/board blanks) and in reality for smaller creations foam isnt the way to go. Too much waste in the cutting process - ie pay for waste and cut sheet. In reality its cheaper to set up for mass panel production than 'cut off the block' and make say 20 pairs of enclosures. H.B. have said they would blow foam to a lighter density for me and it could be reinforced with hd, the foam can be butt-jointed together from smaller bits and glassed up with with no consiquence to finnished pannel integrity - prob the way to go because in the joining process glass or carbon tape could be included to make the 'ideal' pannel. It just struck me as being a 'good idea' because i spend quite alot of time working this stuff into surfboards and dealing with trying to get the flex in and out of a board with glass lay-up, resonance control is a major part of a 'custom' made board.......
I did do a cursory search on this forum and didnt come up with anything obvious, maybe if i could find the posts you talk of i could finaly make a worth while contribution to this exlent meeting place of minds.