Another Encore...

[Kevin K.]

Man, you scored again on the veneer, beautiful stuff for sure!! Can't wait to see how the leather baffles turn out, should make a killer combination!

You didn't really say why, I'm guessing the set for your friend with the nut inserts are going to be wall mounted?? Thanks for sharing the tip/trick again on installing the nut inserts, never would have thought of that. Will you be doing blind fasteners on the leather covered baffles? Do you plan on stapling the wrap to the back side of the baffle or just using glue? How will you seal the baffles to the enclosures? Should probably just wait, I'm sure you'll explain everything as clearly as you always do once you get to it. Good luck!

[tomzarbo]

Man, you scored again on the veneer, beautiful stuff for sure!! Can't wait to see how the leather baffles turn out, should make a killer combination!

You didn't really say why, I'm guessing the set for your friend with the nut inserts are going to be wall mounted?? Thanks for sharing the tip/trick again on installing the nut inserts, never would have thought of that. Will you be doing blind fasteners on the leather covered baffles? Do you plan on stapling the wrap to the back side of the baffle or just using glue? How will you seal the baffles to the enclosures? Should probably just wait, I'm sure you'll explain everything as clearly as you always do once you get to it. Good luck!

Oh yeah, forgot to mention, but my friend is going to use them in his enclosed patio for part of the year and they will probably be on little shelves or be hanging somehow... I'm not clear on that. When he told me that, I asked him if he wanted me to put some anchors in the back and he thought that would be a good idea. I got the idea on how to put them in from someone or someones on tech talk... few good ideas are really mine!

For the baffle, I'll be covering them (3/4" MDF) with the leather and securing the leather to the baffle with leather cement. I've watched a bunch of videos on how to glue leather to wood/plastic and it doesn't look too awful difficult to do. You can even glue the major areas first, and then glue the edges as you go. Should be fun I think. The leather is actually really stretchy and flexible, now that I got the right (thin, 2-3 oz.) stuff.

I'll likely locate each baffle with four dowels near the corners pre-glued into the baffle and inserted into the cabinet itself during final mating of the two. I'm planning on using construction adhesive as it works fine thicker and I've used it before with no issues. The dowels and adhesive will keep the baffle in place fine I think...

...I'm also planning on using a thin foam 'gasket' of sorts glued to the edge of the cabinet which will compress slightly and make up for any differences between the thickness of the leather around corners for example. The baffle will have a portion machined off of the back around the edge around 1/16" or a bit more deep, and maybe 1/2" wide to allow for the leather to wrap around and seal firmly without causing the baffle to raise up. I'll adjust this as I play around with scraps before tackling it for real of course. The corners will be the toughest to pull off. I've seen some slice the backing of the leather to make it thinner and easier to fold up and conform to the curve, but I shouldn't have to do that. I'll wrap around the back slightly and then slice out triangles of the leather on the back to allow for everything to sit nice. This is all in my head of course. I'm not too worried, I'll practice anything I try first on scraps.

I'm glad you asked about this Kevin... it gave me a chance to really think about it and get a good game plan in place. Gracias!

TomZ

[tomzarbo]

Got a little more done on these today...

Driver recess and openings... breathing room for woofer with 1" roundover bit and some work with the drum sander.



Since the baffles will just be glued to the cabinets, I thought I'd use a few 1/4" dowels to keep things lined up and to add strength. I'll probably be using construction adhesive to join the two as I've done in the past.

I used part of a 1 1/4' roundover on the baffles. The woofer frame is ever-so-slightly proud of the raw MDF... should be even once primer and black texture paint is applied. These baffles are 1 1/4" thick

Yup, not much to see, but it's something!

TomZ

[tomzarbo]

Very strange, I posted an update on this thread last night at 7 pm, but it didn't push the thread to the top of the list, had to do a search for it.
TomZ

[tomzarbo]

Test...

[tomzarbo]

Very strange... I'm posting, but it's not showing up.
Ahh, there it goes finally, that was weird!
TomZ

[tomzarbo]

I don't really know why these things are taking so long to finish but...

Baffles are done. That's really the hard part for me... I hate doing baffles.



I know I said up there

/\

that I was going to cover them with leather, but I changed my mind. I'm pretty sure I'll goof that up, so I went with a glue up of 3/4" and 1/2" MDF. I did a 25 degree bevel on the front with the seam ending up on the seam between the two boards. That should hide any 'funny business' going on where the two boards meet. It's worked in the past anyway.

Four dowels in the corners to secure it and some construction adhesive should hold her in place.

Probably end up just doing a texture black baffle and calling it a day. But... part of me wants to give a piano black lacquer finish a try. I've done one before with pretty decent results. Either way, I'll be priming with BIN shellac primer to seal it up well... lots of coats, love that stuff!

I haven't been able to get my rear in gear after this years MWAF in July... this is the first time I've touched a tool speaker-wise since then... if felt good to get at it again, if only for a few hours.

After I finish these, the No Ears Have Died's are next!

TomZ

[jhollander]

Looking good Tom. I have a similar lack of motivation, just cut wood last week. It feels like it's been a year. Made some bone head mistakes by over sizing some rough cuts. Glued some MDF back together. It's getting more fun as I'm working through the some details.

[dlneubec]

Looking good Tom. I have a similar lack of motivation, just cut wood last week. It feels like it's been a year. Made some bone head mistakes by over sizing some rough cuts. Glued some MDF back together. It's getting more fun as I'm working through the some details.

Hah, I finally started on a project a month or so ago after 2 years of not building anything! I just had some supreme burnout after the year on the design team. Just too much building in one year for me, I guess.

[jhollander]

Yay Dan. I'm guessing it's not a simple box?

[dlneubec]

Just a box.............. with 10 sides!

[tomzarbo]

Well, after more than two years... finally calling these done.



I went for a gloss black lacquer finish on these and overall I'm happy with them, though they are not perfectly smooth. This is the third time I've painted them and I just finally said "good enough" and left it there. I may touch up a few duller spots carefully with some polish and a terry cloth... or not... but for the most part, I'm happy with them.

I ended up using Wolf's idea of a one-screw anchoring system for the crossovers and love that setup. They sound fine now, but after I screwed in the second woofer, I heard a scraping sound when I flexed the cone. Oh no... these are NLA shielded woofers!... but somehow the exposed end of the voice coil was slightly bent and touching the phase plug making an awful scraping noise... for all the world it sounded like a buggered up voice coil. It was so loud... but I just moved the end of the voice coil cylinder away from the phase plug with a tiny flat edge screwdriver and all is well. I got these woofers from the PE tent sale several years ago and I guess I forgot to check each one to make sure they were in working order. Glad that was a quick fix.

I did end up using a 1/16" by 3/16" neoprene gasket material between the baffle and cabinet to keep any squeeze-out from the PL Premium from... uh... squeezing out. Worked perfectly, looks good too. I'll do that again if I ever do a two-piece cabinet/baffle again.

They sound really nice... these use Jeff Bagby's tweaked crossover and I'm happy with the midrange smoothness. I keep being amazed how good the RS series drivers still are even though they're kind of older drivers at this point.

I like them, but I'm done with Encores I think. 4 pair is enough. We finally have a good, reference quality pair of stand mount two-ways to compare everything else too, and that's what I wanted after all.

TomZ

[Wolf]

RS180S?

https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-rs180s-8-7-reference-shielded-woofer-8-ohm--295-364

Still available,
Wolf

[tomzarbo]

RS180S?

https://www.parts-express.com/dayton-audio-rs180s-8-7-reference-shielded-woofer-8-ohm--295-364

Still available,
Wolf

Nope, these use the RS150S. I didn't actually realize that PE still sold shielded RS drivers anymore though.
TomZ

[Wolf]

The only one is the RS180S.
Wolf