Please do not use MDF. MDF is crap. Its strength to weight ratio is absurdly low. The best plywood to use is without a doubt the furniture/cabinet grade Baltic Birch. That's not the cheap 'grade C' birch from China that you might find easily. BB is very dense, is not warped and cuts beautifully. It's hard to find, though. Your local Loewe's or Home Depot do not carry it. And please, do not cut the braces shorter than what is listed in the plans. Also, when setting your braces... DO NOT use brads to secure them to the panels. Use screws for those, along with the poly glue. Brads will work at first just fine, but will loosen over time and the cab will develop an awful rattle at resonance later on that is probably going to be impossible to repair.
You are constructing the cabinet yourself. Do not get cheap on the plywood as it directly effects all your hard work.
You are constructing the cabinet yourself. Do not get cheap on the plywood as it directly effects all your hard work.
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For test cabs, pretty much anything with low amount of voids. Any grade B ought to do. But grading is really about the surface veneer mostly.
the beauty of baltic birch plywood
the beauty of baltic birch plywood
Good birch plywood is expensive everywhere.
For testing and builds that are not visible, I use high quality OSB. It is far better than the cheap plywood I can get around here, and it is less than $20 a sheet for 3/4" X 4 X 8. It is also nicer on the lungs than MDF, it smells like wood when you cut it. Hurricane nuts tent to spin out in OSB, the old-style spiky tee-nuts work much better. I make my baffles out of MDF which eliminates the problem completely, and provides a smooth, void-free mounting surface.
Finally, if the build does not work out, OSB burns a lot better than MDF.
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Lads, forget all the nonsense. Band roadies prefer BB because it´s tougher and lighter, but they don´t have to lug subwoomphers around. If you cut off below 100Hz, which you wnt to do anyway, the only issue is weight - and you want that anyway. Making them look nice can be a problem with roughest particle board or (if you can get it) OSB, but build them really stiff and you´re OK.
Yea, that Arauco plywood does not seem too bad. I looked at it the other day when I was at Home Depot.
My horn sub built out of 1/2" MDF (table tuba) is almost unmanageably heavy for one person to handle
. Never again will I build horns out of MDF.If you build a Tuba HT out of MDF (about 3 times bigger), you will definitely have something seriously unwieldy.
My horn sub built out of 1/2" MDF (table tuba) is almost unmanageably heavy for one person to handle
If you build a Tuba HT out of MDF (about 3 times bigger), you will definitely have something seriously unwieldy.
Yes, but I am strong like bull!
j/k Im currently trying to locate BB in my area, but seems as though most of my local lumber yards have no idea what I'm talking about lol.
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You might also look for ApplePly or other similar hardwood plywoods. Try looking at hardwood lumber suppliers.
Appleply is very nice, machines very well too. I belive it is 99% void free, 3/4" is 15 ply. B2 skin on 1 side ~ $90+ for a 4x8 sheet.
I picked mine up locally from Higgins Hardwoods. Higgins Hardwoods
** used on this project **
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/subwoofers/143714-lab12-tapped-horn.html
I picked mine up locally from Higgins Hardwoods. Higgins Hardwoods
** used on this project **
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/subwoofers/143714-lab12-tapped-horn.html
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lol!
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