I've got quite a lot of plastic in the backyard, and I'm tempted to melt it in a kind of cauldron and pour it over a cardboard box covered with aluminium foil/ some similar mould. Insanity? The way forward? It should be easy to research plastic recycling and melting, the advantage would be 1 inch thick plastic cabinets
For moulding, you need to use casting resin but it will work out (very) expensive for items like loudspeaker cabinets!
There is also a 'coating' resin that you can pour over horizontal surfaces to produce a hard plastic finish.
But if you want to try something different, polystyrene sheet makes excellent loudspeaker housings!
There is also a 'coating' resin that you can pour over horizontal surfaces to produce a hard plastic finish.
But if you want to try something different, polystyrene sheet makes excellent loudspeaker housings!
That wasn't my intention Cal!
Yes, paper or foil can be laminated to the polystyrene. If you make a paper mache covering, it will be quite hard and can then be painted too.
I have heard of people using kitchen foil between two thin layers of polystyrene but not tried it myself (yet).
One of the best pairs of speakers that I have yet heard were made from polystyrene/paper. The sound was absolutely fantastic, with some of the qualities that I get from OB's now. I intend to explore that avenue again when I get time.
Hey!!!!!
You gotta get a grip before you hurt yourself.
1) Polystyrene will produce hefty gasses when heated in open air, which might burn or worse.
2) the result would be useless, in particular because polystyrene needs to be dried before molten to not end up like a brittle sponge (potentially explosive).
3) Sorting plastics by category is fairly easy, but within each category, say polystyrene or whatever, there are several sub categories, which are in no way compatible.
Molten thermo-plastics are in no way a DIY topic, it takes a lot of knowledge and experience to get anything usefull even if injection molded, let alone other methods
Magura
You gotta get a grip before you hurt yourself.
1) Polystyrene will produce hefty gasses when heated in open air, which might burn or worse.
2) the result would be useless, in particular because polystyrene needs to be dried before molten to not end up like a brittle sponge (potentially explosive).
3) Sorting plastics by category is fairly easy, but within each category, say polystyrene or whatever, there are several sub categories, which are in no way compatible.
Molten thermo-plastics are in no way a DIY topic, it takes a lot of knowledge and experience to get anything usefull even if injection molded, let alone other methods
Magura
Along the lines of what Nuuk mentioned above, I made a pair of cabinets from molded polyester casting resin. The design was similar to the dynaudio gemini. I used 2 morel MW 142 drivers with vifa D26AG35 tweeters.
Martin Columns wrote about the potential of plastic cabinets which gave me the impetus to try it.
Some comments about moulding plastic and DIY speakers:
1. It's all about the mould. Every second spent on the mould is worth hours later
2. You must use casting resin if there is any thickness to your cabinet walls. The heat of regular resin curing can generate a lot of heat and can interfere with the chemical processes involved in curing plastic. If the problem is too severe it can cause the finished plastic to be too brittle and weak.
3. Load up the resin with a filler - it reduces the amout of resin needed and depending on the choice of filler can increase strength, or damping or reduce weight
4. you can put tint in the resin to make finishing a snap
5. buy the resin in large quantities from an industrial supplier - I bought a 5 gallon bucket of resin for a little more than the cost of one gallon of resin from Canadian tire. Your yellow pages (subject indexed) phone book should have several suppliers listed.
6. Make your baffle out of some other material, as plastic doesn't have the necessary strength to hold threads under pressure
7. Do it outside - I made the speakers in a garage, and even with the garage door closed and new weather stripping on the door to the house, the smell came right in and lingered for months.
8. If you play your cards right you can create a pair of skins of another material and simply use the plastic to fill the void. If done right you can side step the mould, but then you need to worry about finishing.
Just my .02 I hope the above is useful to you guys
Martin Columns wrote about the potential of plastic cabinets which gave me the impetus to try it.
Some comments about moulding plastic and DIY speakers:
1. It's all about the mould. Every second spent on the mould is worth hours later
2. You must use casting resin if there is any thickness to your cabinet walls. The heat of regular resin curing can generate a lot of heat and can interfere with the chemical processes involved in curing plastic. If the problem is too severe it can cause the finished plastic to be too brittle and weak.
3. Load up the resin with a filler - it reduces the amout of resin needed and depending on the choice of filler can increase strength, or damping or reduce weight
4. you can put tint in the resin to make finishing a snap
5. buy the resin in large quantities from an industrial supplier - I bought a 5 gallon bucket of resin for a little more than the cost of one gallon of resin from Canadian tire. Your yellow pages (subject indexed) phone book should have several suppliers listed.
6. Make your baffle out of some other material, as plastic doesn't have the necessary strength to hold threads under pressure
7. Do it outside - I made the speakers in a garage, and even with the garage door closed and new weather stripping on the door to the house, the smell came right in and lingered for months.
8. If you play your cards right you can create a pair of skins of another material and simply use the plastic to fill the void. If done right you can side step the mould, but then you need to worry about finishing.
Just my .02 I hope the above is useful to you guys
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