7 ply birch

[oachalon]

I am about to build a diy sub with a titanic mkIII 15 and i have some sheets of 3/4 inch 7 ply birch laying around and I am out of mdf. I was wondering if you guys think the 7 ply birch would be good enough for the enclosure. I wanna try a little different or should i head over to home depot and get the good ol mdf.

[pinkmouse]

The ply will be fine.

[simon5]

It will be even better than MDF, just work a bit slower.

[mazeroth]

The 7-ply birch ($39/sheet) they sell at the local Lowes seems less dense and weighs less than the MDF they sell so I've been relunctant to try it. I did notice that the brand new Home Depot near us has 11-ply birch, no counting the 2 layers of "veneer" birch on the outsides, making it 13-ply, essentially. They sell it for the same $39/sheet that Lowes does and it does seem a little more dense and weighs a little more.

What do you guys think? Is the 11-ply close to baltic/marine birch?

Sorry if I'm jumping in your thread

[simon5]

Birch ply is lighter than MDF most of the time, that's just the way it is. That's one reason why birch ply is used. The other one is increased stiffness in theory.

11 ply is better than 7 ply, but the 7 ply is probably not that bad.

[morbo]

the 12 ply is proper 'baltic' or 'russian' birch. You can usually tell because the 'proper' BB ply comes only in 5x5 or 2x4 sheets. The weight/density is not an issue for a sub cabinet, and it is stiffer than MDF which IS an issue. It is generally considered superior than MDF for <100hz enclosures.

I have been building a sub box out of it, after using MDF exclusively, and it does seem quite a bit stiffer and a touch lighter than an equivalent MDF box. But - its harder to machine nicely, especially if you want to stain the 'veneeer' side. If find it prone to splintering in some situations, for example when evening out edges using a flush trim bit. It also costs more than MDF, at least around here. I will use it for sub enclosures from now on, and for fullrange enclosures stick to 1"mdf.