Thanks Eric! I have been experimenting with different finishes that I have available. A few oils, nitrocellulose lacquer, waxes, shellac and so on. Tried some pigment as well, but it didn't really flatter the wood. My treatment of choice is (at least at the moment) tung oil followed by shellac. The tung oil really brings out the grain wonderfully, and the shellac adds a bit of further luster as well as protection. You can see an example from my experiments on the previous page, message #966. Both finishes darken the wood with each coat, so I will have to be careful not to overdo it. When applied with moderation the warm tone looks quite pleasing to my eye. Please tell me what you think!
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Tung Oil is nice to bring out the grain. As I'm sure you know, Tung Oil never really "dries" it just soaks into the wood, thus it limits what can go on top of it. Give the Tung Oil a few weeks (months?) to fully absorb before you top coat it. It will change the color of the wood and the grain a little during this time as well, so patience is key (this is the part I'm not very good at).
Interesting, thanks for your input! It is indeed not a very big procedure to do that, even with the cabinets sealed. I will do it if it is deemed beneficial, but I'm still a bit worried about leaving a rigid enough flange for driver mounting.
Yeah, patience is not exactly my forté either. =) Thanks for the warning, I am aware of the long curing time of Tung Oil. I was expecting to see some ill effects in my experimentation pieces, as I applied the shellac on the same day as the oil. I haven't seen any problems with the surface at least yet. I will probably give it a few weeks anyway after applying the oil to the cabinets, and do some listening in the meantime. =)
Yeah, mine is pure tung oil. You say you would put the shellac between the oile and top coat? What would you use as a top coat then?
Tung oil applied! The speakers are now basically complete, and I will now spend some time listening and perhaps adjusting with the fillings before taking further finishing steps. There were some glue marks that had gone unnoticed before, so some way still to go before the surface is actually finished.
I was able to make some brief listening tests yesterday. First impression is a bit underwhelming, honestly. Sound seems a bit muffled to me, like the singer would be positioned behind the furniture you see in the picture, instead of in front of it. The drivers are not really properly broken in yet, so hopefully things will improve as they get more use.
I was able to make some brief listening tests yesterday. First impression is a bit underwhelming, honestly. Sound seems a bit muffled to me, like the singer would be positioned behind the furniture you see in the picture, instead of in front of it. The drivers are not really properly broken in yet, so hopefully things will improve as they get more use.
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Looking gorgeous - yes, often those glue marks only show up after finish is applied, which is why I test with lacquer thinners first. Since I veneer with iron on yellow glue, the solvent won't affect the adhesion, and it vapes off fairly quickly.
As for the muffled sound - how may hours playing time on them?
Maybe get them out from the wall a bit -I like at least a foot myself.
As for the muffled sound - how may hours playing time on them?
Maybe get them out from the wall a bit -I like at least a foot myself.
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LOVE that grain down the front baffle! Just awesome! Since your finish is only oil right now, you *might* get away with gently sanding down the glue spot and then carefully applying oil to the freshly sanded area to blend it back in. I would recommend practicing this on a left over scrap first to see how things go.
Looking at your images, I can't see the spots you are referring to, so maybe they are not as bad as you think...
Looking at your images, I can't see the spots you are referring to, so maybe they are not as bad as you think...
Thank you for the compliments! It really does feel great to have gotten this far with the build, and visually I'm quite stoked about how the speakers turned out, glue marks or not. =)
As for the sound, I already experimented with the placement a bit and giving the speakers a bit of breathing room both from the wall and the cupboard did improve things. I wonder how they would sound in a larger room... The drivers have been used with moderate volume for 30-40 hours so far, so they are still in early phases of the break-in period. That is why I'm not terribly worried about their performance yet. It is certainly not only negative impressions about the sound so far anyway, on occasion they sound quite fabulous actually. Yet I can't help but notice the singers being very often a bit buried in the mix (I would have expected a change to the opposite direction), and a "tin box" - type of overall restrained sound that is more obvious on some recordings than others.
I think I will be able to sand out the glue marks, and re-apply oil without leaving visible blemishes. You have to give them a moderately close inspection to notice them, as Eric kindly pointed out. =) The marks are in fact visible in the first photo on the vertical front baffle seam, as light streaks. I'll let some time pass and keep track of how many guests notice them. =) On the other hand, the fact that I notice every time I look will probably motivate me to fix it at some point...
As for the sound, I already experimented with the placement a bit and giving the speakers a bit of breathing room both from the wall and the cupboard did improve things. I wonder how they would sound in a larger room... The drivers have been used with moderate volume for 30-40 hours so far, so they are still in early phases of the break-in period. That is why I'm not terribly worried about their performance yet. It is certainly not only negative impressions about the sound so far anyway, on occasion they sound quite fabulous actually. Yet I can't help but notice the singers being very often a bit buried in the mix (I would have expected a change to the opposite direction), and a "tin box" - type of overall restrained sound that is more obvious on some recordings than others.
I think I will be able to sand out the glue marks, and re-apply oil without leaving visible blemishes. You have to give them a moderately close inspection to notice them, as Eric kindly pointed out. =) The marks are in fact visible in the first photo on the vertical front baffle seam, as light streaks. I'll let some time pass and keep track of how many guests notice them. =) On the other hand, the fact that I notice every time I look will probably motivate me to fix it at some point...
I have a very similair experience with my Alpairs 7.3 in CGR onkens. When I've first listened to them (drivers had around 100 hours break in out of the box already), some of the albums had unexpectedly low amount of voice in them. For example Diana Krall's Stepping out (until new speakers one of my best sounding albums). Weird thing is, that some albums sounded just fine from the start. Anyway I now have around 6 more weeks of normal use burn in and it's much better. It's getting better very slowly, so they probably realy need long burn in and best performance is still ahead of us;-)
Niko i personally would not put anything over raw oil but if it where polmerized oil you could use shellac alone, or top it with wax, varnish, urathane etc. What ever you like
But the oil should be left to cure for a week or so.
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Formby's Tung Oil can be applied on top of 100% pure tung oil, though I would allow a few weeks before applying Formby's. Pure Tung Oil will "soak in" rather than "dry" and Formby's will both penetrate and form a hard shell on top of the wood after several applications. Formby's will also be glossy, even the "low gloss" formulation.
Very interesting Lukyk, thanks for sharing! This describes quite well what I'm experiencing, too. I'm glad to hear that things are improving, albeit slowly. I wonder if I should connect the speakers temporarily to a cheapo amp to let them run in during the day. I wouldn't like to leave my tube amp running unattended for extended periods of time. Maybe I'm just paranoid.
Thanks also to others for the advice regarding surface treatment and placement! I will continue to report my experiences and findings as time passes.
Paul - ever used the Howard brand finishing / restoring products? Among their line up is an Orange Oil/Bees-wax polish that I've successfully used to tune-up old 70s vintage walnut etc veneered speakers that had nothing wrong other than lack of polishing. Full Line of Quality Products | Howard Products
I don't think you are paranoid. I'm also afraid of leaving tubes unattended. Speeding up break-in with cheap amp is good idea -I've also done it that way for first 100 hours. Remember to use recommended way of break-in. Idealy bassless music with reasonable loudness for first 100 hours. Also it's better not to run them nonstop -I've achieved this with looped playlist with silence in it.