Larry;
I did not know when Fisher began to use speakers other than Bill Hecht's units. At least they are Fishers. They sound pretty good with the 490-T and 440-A amp combo. In years to come if my granddaughter wants better speakers, that is always an option. There are lots of choices available.
Today I cut the 1/2 inch birch plywood pieces for the sides and the front of the cabinet. I do not have a table saw, so what I did was use a T-square that is normally made for use with sheetrock to make nice straight scores through the surface paper layer and then a sharp pop with the hand and sheetrock snaps along the scored lines. The T-square has a knob that allows the right angle short piece to be removed from the long straight edge. It is an all aluminum tool and I used the long piece to mark off and draw a straight edge for the dimensions of the panel pieces I needed. Then I measured the distance from my saber saw blade to the straight edge at both ends of the panels I was cutting. I set it up to cut the pieces at least 3/32 beyond where the actual final dimension would be. All the initial measurements were done from the factory cut straight edges of the plywood. I was using 2' X 4' pieces from the hardware store. I clamped the straight edge and double checked the blade landing point at both ends before I began to cut. The left edge of the saber saw foot was kept snugly against the straight edge as I cut. The resulting cut is almost as perfectly straight as a table saw can do. Using a relatively fine tooth blade in the saw helps a great deal to eliminate chipping and fuzziness of the cut.
After each piece was cut, I moved it to my belt & disc sander and carefully sanded the edge down until I had the edge at the pencil line I had drawn for the piece. A bit of final sanding with my hand held orbital sander allowed me to get a good fit between the sides and the front. It took me all morning just to get to the point of placing and fitting the front to the sides on the cabinet frame. Even the cabinet frame needed some final sanding to eliminate some errors in shape. Nothing I ever do is perfect anyway. I can cover up the remaining minor errors with some mitered trim on the front to cover the edges of the sides. I am gradually getting better at this as I go. I figured the best approach overall was to work from the inside out, making good use of tools set up for right angles instead of trusting just measurements with my tape measure and rulers.
I reached a stopping point about noon and came in to eat lunch and feed Mr. Leo, our cat. He is now lying across my legs as I write this from my recliner. I may not get up for an hour or so of nap-time. Standing on my feet all morning was a bit much, and now I need a rest. I will take pictures once I get the pieces attached to the cabinet frame, stained and ready to add front trim.
I ordered a new AC switch for my 500-C from Mark Oppat, which came in the mail yesterday. The switch failed open and although I could just change to using the accessory contacts to turn the 500-C on, I decided to get a new switch while they are still available. Even though the old switch has one section bad, the other is still good and I will not throw the old one away. Mark includes an instruction sheet with the switches which is helpful in the installation of the new switch on the old volume control assembly.
Joe