Hello, All:
Here's a photo of a two-way design of mine with a ribbon tweeter. The front panel is made from an engineered composite, Richlite Stratum with a birch plywood core.
Richlite was developed during WWII for parachute "drop boxes" to airdrop weapons to partisans behind Nazi lines in Europe.
Today, Gibson Guitars uses Richlite for most of its fretboards; you can find precut fretboard blanks on Richlite's website https://www.richlite.com/
Richlite is so tough that it is certified as Kosher for food-cutting boards.
The faces of the panel are 1/8ths inch phenolic-resin impregnated paper. It takes a very nice finish, such as Osmo Polyx-Oil. The only caveat is that it is so tough, that it is tough on tools such as router bits.
Richlite sells "Partial Sheets" of all its products in 12 x 12 and 24 x 24 inch sizes. IIRC, the 12 x 12 sample for this project was $40 plus shipping.
NB1: That cabinet is my design, but the execution was by Corwin Butterworth, who was trained at the Rhode Island School of Design.
NB2: My relationship to Richlite is one of respect. I pay retail for my boards.
ciao,
john marks
Here's a photo of a two-way design of mine with a ribbon tweeter. The front panel is made from an engineered composite, Richlite Stratum with a birch plywood core.
Richlite was developed during WWII for parachute "drop boxes" to airdrop weapons to partisans behind Nazi lines in Europe.
Today, Gibson Guitars uses Richlite for most of its fretboards; you can find precut fretboard blanks on Richlite's website https://www.richlite.com/
Richlite is so tough that it is certified as Kosher for food-cutting boards.
The faces of the panel are 1/8ths inch phenolic-resin impregnated paper. It takes a very nice finish, such as Osmo Polyx-Oil. The only caveat is that it is so tough, that it is tough on tools such as router bits.
Richlite sells "Partial Sheets" of all its products in 12 x 12 and 24 x 24 inch sizes. IIRC, the 12 x 12 sample for this project was $40 plus shipping.
NB1: That cabinet is my design, but the execution was by Corwin Butterworth, who was trained at the Rhode Island School of Design.
NB2: My relationship to Richlite is one of respect. I pay retail for my boards.
ciao,
john marks
Attachments
Wow, thanks. Are all the boards Richlite? That box must weigh a ton. How much would a pair cost?
Please send a link, I can't seem to find it on your websites.
ciao,
john
Please send a link, I can't seem to find it on your websites.
ciao,
john
AFAIK the entire box, althou i suggested that it would be no hardship using good ply for the bracing matrix.
dave
dave
There isn’t one. The one design so far where i was paid enuff for him to own the design.
He has no intention at this time to commercialize them.
dave
I grabbed it and put it inot my websapce to make easier to find.
dave
dave
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From 40 plus years ago I remember sheets of plywood with a phenolic resin and it was used for moulds for concrete pouring on building sites and for bridges. Don't know if it is still available. The only way to machine it was to use tungsten tipped blades.
Lucky you! This goes a long ways towards why 'we' hear speakers in general and floor-standers in particular so differently, what with my stick/pine planks built 'floating' floor. 🙁
I remember the phenolic plywood very well. It’s called „Siebdruckplatten“. I used it to make desktops. Want to use it for my faital3wc-12…
But… I never used special tools to work it, and they seem to be of inferior quality than the naked multiplex-Plywood (D/D vs. A+/B). I don’t know if this is surface-quality only or could be a sign of structural weaknesses.
https://www.herzog-elmiger.ch/holzwerkstoffe/sperrholzplatten/schalungs-und-siebdruckplatten.html
https://www.herzog-elmiger.ch/sperrholz-birke-decklage-birke-a-b.html
But… I never used special tools to work it, and they seem to be of inferior quality than the naked multiplex-Plywood (D/D vs. A+/B). I don’t know if this is surface-quality only or could be a sign of structural weaknesses.
https://www.herzog-elmiger.ch/holzwerkstoffe/sperrholzplatten/schalungs-und-siebdruckplatten.html
https://www.herzog-elmiger.ch/sperrholz-birke-decklage-birke-a-b.html
theres a stockist here in the uk,ive requested a sample,im interested in it for turntable plinths as it could be a rival to panzerholzThese are being made of richllite:
dave
Great! The US distributor actually asked me for my opinion on that, because they had an inquiry. Trying to be helpful here, there are actually three possibilities. There's 100% Richlite, which is the product used for guitar fretboards. It's rigid as all get-out, but as far as I can tell, doesn't have much self-damping, so I would use Black Hole Mat ca. 5mm dampening material on the back side.
There are two wood-core panel options. The PlyBoo bamboo plywood core, which is .75-in furniture quality vertical fillets with black Richlite 1/8ths cladding front and back; and, the Stratum series which is birch plywood clad in Richlite in various colors, as show above. There's more info here: https://www.ecosupplycenter.com/products/richlite/
If I had to choose one option for a TT plinth, I'd go with the PlyBoo core, in that you can do a round-over for edge reveal. Here's a design of mine with seven coats of violin varnish on the perimeter of the front panel. Applied by a master violin maker. The colorant in the varnish was gemstone quality amber dissolved in poppyseed oil, which costs $90 a teaspoon.
amb,
john
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