Translam Subwoofers with 18" Passive Radiators - The Jedi Mind Tricks

[KEtheredge87]

Tonight's update will be brief, as I only got about 20 minutes of quality work time in the garage today. I made time to epoxy the bottom of cabinet one's vertical dowel braces into place and fix the walnut dowel pins that I cut clear through on the top. Tomorrow I should be in a good spot to finally glue the two pieces of cabinet one together and epoxy the top of those vertical dowels into place.

I also made some pencil lines on the front of the cabinet that will true up my edges without removing too much material. Cabinet one didn't turn out too crooked after all!

[KEtheredge87]

Hi Guys,

Whew! This weekend was incredibly full on the social calendar. I didn't have time to do much major work, so I wiggled in a few smaller tasks here and there. First, I managed to glue and epoxy the top of the first cabinet to the base, so now one cabinet is 100% rough together! The top for the second cabinet has been placed in the curve cutting jig, so that's ready for tomorrow. Outside of those items, I mixed a few small batches of 5 minute epoxy and filled in some of the support dowel holes on the horizontal braces from the first cabinet, so no weaknesses exist there anymore.

Lastly, I took Tom's suggestion either from earlier or from a recent PM and made some great big 80 and 120 grit sanding blocks. I used the handles from super cheap grout trowels as the handles for these guys, and used 3M super 77 spray adhesive to glue Norton belt sander sections to 1/2" plywood. These should help me knock down the high spots on the sides of the cabinet and get things smoothed out!

[donradick]

K - sorry, I was busy and didn't read this thread for a week.
I recently made a router sled (for flattening translam, of all things), and found that paste wax really helped
the router sliding left to right, but what really made the difference was some HDPE feet on the router sled.
Now the sled slides like an ice cube on a hot skillet.
Ok, too late, future needs maybe.

[jhollander]

I'd reach for my Stanley 80 scraper plane before the sand paper...(it's a hand tool)

[KEtheredge87]

K - sorry, I was busy and didn't read this thread for a week.
I recently made a router sled (for flattening translam, of all things), and found that paste wax really helped
the router sliding left to right, but what really made the difference was some HDPE feet on the router sled.
Now the sled slides like an ice cube on a hot skillet.
Ok, too late, future needs maybe.

Thanks Don! The HDPE feet are a great idea for future sleds. I'll definetly keep that one in the idea bank!

I'd reach for my Stanley 80 scraper plane before the sand paper...(it's a hand tool)

Hey John, after some youtube research, I'd agree that's an interesting idea. Never used one before, but I'm not opposed. How do you think that would work with these plywood surfaces? I'm most concerned with the slight variation I get from the side layer stack-up. Some of them are slightly more proud than others. Would I have to start shaving them all down until i reach the lowest layer?

The sanding board idea appealed to me since It seemed like i could knock down the tall points faster without somehow digging the lower spots deeper by accident. Think this method would simply be more work than the Stanley #80 approach, or is it riskier?

[jhollander]

After I learned how to sharpen the Stanley 80 it really excels at shaving off wood without gouging.

My favorite power tool if you have a big air compressor would be http://www.eastwood.com/straight-lin...der-27143.html. I loan mine out and forgot who has it

Kevin showed a long sanding block on the Black Widow (?) project which would be narrow enough to work well http://www.eastwood.com/contour-rigi...n-x-17-in.html

A few more there as well http://search.eastwood.com/search?w=...anding%20board

[KEtheredge87]

Good Evening Everyone,

Tonight, we're doing things Vlog style! I've cut the second subwoofer cabinet top curve, and documented the whole process on YouTube.

Enjoy!

[filmslayer]

nice vid !

[Kevin K.]

Great video Keith! Thanks for sharing.

At least when I meet you at MWAF, I'll know who I'm talking to now that I've seen this video. Your Avatar leaves a lot to the imagination.

[jhollander]

Thanks, very nice for a cell phone. What was the editing software?

[scottvalentin]

Great video - thanks for taking the time to show us and nice job on the editing.

[KEtheredge87]

Great video Keith! Thanks for sharing.

At least when I meet you at MWAF, I'll know who I'm talking to now that I've seen this video. Your Avatar leaves a lot to the imagination.

Why whatever do you mean??? I think the resemblance is striking!



... the things I do just to psych myself up to mow the lawn...

[KEtheredge87]

nice vid !

Thanks, very nice for a cell phone. What was the editing software?

Great video - thanks for taking the time to show us and nice job on the editing.

Thanks guys! I was pleasantly surprised at the video quality. My 2012 Samsung Galaxy Note 3 is still rocking and doing everything I need it to do. The editing was all done on my macbook air with the basic iMovie software. I was going out on a limb and guessing that iMovie could speed up the video. The whole length of the video clip was over 1.5 hours before I sped up and cut out parts! Finding the royalty free music site added a bit of background where I stripped out the router and shop-vac noises. I honestly thought I was going to need a GoPro to do this decently. Score one for "Tech You Already Have"!

[6thplanet]

Funny, when I read Javads topic I see Trans-lam, but yours being a subwoofer I see it as Tran-slam! 😀 I like the router sled trick, I used it on the base pieces of my latest build. Looking good dude!

[KEtheredge87]

Funny, when I read Javads topic I see Trans-lam, but yours being a subwoofer I see it as Tran-slam! 😀 I like the router sled trick, I used it on the base pieces of my latest build. Looking good dude!

Thanks 6th! I feel like someone else already used the "TranSLAM" name, but I couldn't find any projects on the forum that mention it when I looked. Maybe it was on a different forum... anyway, I suppose there's nothing stopping me from using it, even if "unofficially".