Woodworking and the tools you use and projects and wood porn.

[bhairavi]

Got a pair of 810s with one having a very large ring on it - doesn't look like tannins that oxalic acid would take care of, though I guess it could be. Doesn't look like a burned area on closeup. I think it's quite literally a ring of ink stain. Xylene, Restorafinish and GooGone could not take it off.

I'm going to strip these with DCM so I'll also be sanding them, but I think it'll take a lot of sanding to make the ring less prominent. Any ideas? Once I have the finish off I'll definitely try oxalic acid...

 

[Cubdriver]

Ouch!! Hope it comes out! Mine were sold with some cabinet damage, but were then packed poorly and got further buggered up in transit. They work, but eventually I want to find time to do some surgery on them.

-Pat

 

[bhairavi]

@Cubdriver I've seen someone, either here on AK or on FB, who converted their 520s with square corners to rounded corners. Basically they ran em through a tablesaw, taking off a 3/4x3/4 piece off all four corners, then glued in solid wood. I'm seriously considering it...



EDIT: Found the post:

https://m.facebook.com/groups/584755595036678/permalink/3000512166794330/?mibextid=Nif5oz

 

[bhairavi]

Well that didn't help...

 

[RickeyM]

I do look forward to seeing your setups and what you can do with them.
I have extremely limited space for wood working - no basement space, and no garage, so anything I do winds up happening under a large magnolia tree out back.
But I do have a Shopmate folding workbench I bought from an estate sale a number of years ago, and have turned it into a flexible but primitive base for some simple woodworking tools. It lives in the shed at the far end of our 1/4 acre lot, so I have to haul it to this workspace out back behind the kitchen to do things.

I have mounted a compound Mitre saw on a wooden base I can clamp down on the Shopmate, to allow me to make simple boxes and such for crossover networks.
I do have a plunge router and a circular saw for occasional use - I would love to have more, but I am realistic about what I can use and what can be stored.

View attachment 3631225

I have a generic Shopmate clone that I modded a bit and it's been useful. The legs are square tubular steel with flimsy plastic feet. I replaced the worn, damaged feet with square wood stock with compound bevel cuts so they sit flat on the floor. The wood (MDF) tops, with water damage and a few stray cuts have been replaced with 1X wood stock. A few holes drilled to secure a miter saw or a plywood panel that can serve as a platform for a benchtop table saw or project assembly. Those portable workbenches are pretty handy.

 

[sanford12]

Almost finished just a few minor things to set right.

 

[tourmax]

Nothing special lately. Made a few shelves/cubbyholes for the cheap wall unit I use for curio's and some audio gear.

Before:



After:



Still needs a little stain/paint. Much more organized though,

All done with just leftover scraps from other projects. Jointer, Glue up, planer, table saw, router, miter saw and drill press work was involved.

I think people who don't do woodworking would be surprised at the amount of work involved for something seen as so basic and simple.

Sometimes, I find it's easier to just do a "scratch build" rather than modifying something pre-existing.....

 

[knotscott]

My woodworking endeavors started around 2001, and stemmed largely from the passion of my cabinet makers when I was building speakers under the name Sterling Acoustics. I put together nearly a full shop in half of our garage - 3hp table saw, dust collection, jointer, planer, sanders, router table, bench and hand planes. Most of what I made was furniture for around the house and stuff for the family. Ironically, I never did actually build a speaker cabinet, as the business was long dissolved by the time I got started, but I could!

Here's the shop and some of the things I built:

 

[MegaHurts]

Recently picked up a pair of near mint JBL L88 Plus and pulled out the Heathkit AS-38 clones for comparison. Figured it was time to refresh the AS-38s. Pulled drivers and recapped. I did a spray of distilled water and iron over paper towel to try raise the grain on the scratched parts and did a light sanding with ROS 320g followed by hand 320g on the cabinets and new oil. Always worried about sanding down too much so went light.
The top of one was showing some scratches coming through accentuated by the oil so out comes the handy cabinet scraper for some surgical precision followed up with another light round of 320 grit by hand and another coat of boiled linseed oil.
I think I'm happy now. Onto the grills.
Edit: grills done now waiting for everything to dry before a beeswax polish and reassembly. Curious about moving tweeter placement to match JBL that I've resurrected an old post to ask.

 

[KeithTr]

Nice job. Next time take a hot iron over a damp cloth to those scratches. Steam will usually quickly raise any minor scratches so they can be sanded flush.

 

[MegaHurts]

Nice job. Next time take a hot iron over a damp cloth to those scratches. Steam will usually quickly raise any minor scratches so they can be sanded flush.

If you check the post I did indeed do that with distilled water.

 

[KeithTr]

If you check the post I did indeed do that with distilled water.

I saw the distilled water, but didn't see the hot iron. Makes a big difference. I did the same with a pair of KLH 6s that way back I did a restoration thread for ....

Either way, nice job.

 

[KeithTr]

I saw the distilled water, but didn't see the hot iron. Makes a big difference. I did the same with a pair of KLH 6s that way back I did a restoration thread for ....

Either way, nice job.

If curious, here's the thread I did way back on the KLHs...

Thread 'KLH Model 6 Restore'

Nov 11, 2020

So I promised to update when I restored the pair of KLH Model 6 speakers that I purchased as a student back in 1975 or 1976 (still have the receipt somewhere). Pictures are all from phone and not ideal as from time to time I forgot to document part of the process. But they should give a pretty good idea of what occurred.

First, I should mention that there's always a surprise of some kind when you do these types of things. I am the only owner of these, so I'll get to the factory screw-ups later. But first, I decided to refinish the cabinets. From the pictures below, you can get a...

• KeithTr
• Replies: 45
• Forum: Speakers

• 

 

[elcoholic]

Working Title - Koa KAOS ver 2.0 op
This bowed, bellied and twisted slab has to used as is or stored. I am the third owner including the guy who brought it over to the mainland in the sixties. I stored it in plain sight for the last twenty five years above our bed. Wifey wants an upholstered headboard so - what if I used it for the living room system? So I Kreg-screwed together a pair of 2x2 Japanese style sawhorses instead of hitting the old drafting table. There’s a strong connection there I’m trying to tap into. Ditto with the Great Wave of Kanagawa painting on the TV. I’d be a sacrilege to put this on the wood rack and not at least look at.

 

[TwoCat]

I made these in early 2017...
Used a Hitachi bevel RAS, Bosch plunge router, Skil table saw and a lot of precision (measure thrice then cut) machining of wood.
Blades were mega-tooth for smooth cuts and small kerfs.
Wished I had a 3 meter SS scale w/1mm graduations, but okay.
Found the designs on the web. Done in 3/4" birch veneer plywood. Back horn loaded using a single 10" speaker. Fostex something or other.
Did not like the comparative performance to my Cornwalls and Heresy's tho' -k

 

[KeithTr]

My latest effort - two way open baffle speakers. Walnut plywood, walnut edging, aluminum angle and various hardware. Tools used include table saw, router, sander, hand planes, drill, spokeshaves, Did a lot of reading and modeled roughly after the duet, but my dimensions, driver selection, and crossover build.

Currently running off vintage Hitachi HCA 7500 preamp and HMA 7500 mosfet amplifier, both of which I restored. A fun project and my second effort at open baffles.

 

[MegaHurts]

Decided to enhance the AS-38s by adding walnut veneer to the front and black velour to cover the particle board to look a little more refined with the grills off. The tweeters have a thin aluminum cover hiding the screws that comes off easy enough with a heat gun and razor blade.

 

[peterp1]

Decided to enhance the AS-38s by adding walnut veneer to the front and black velour to cover the particle board to look a little more refined with the grills off. The tweeters have a thin aluminum cover hiding the screws that comes off easy enough with a heat gun and razor blade.

Nice work. I wonder what it would look like if you put walnut veneer on the fronts instead of the black velour. Can't quite picture it in my head.

 

[MegaHurts]

Nice work. I wonder what it would look like if you put walnut veneer on the fronts instead of the black velour. Can't quite picture it in my head.

It would look very nice but a lot more work.
I did the fronts of my CV D7s that way

Thread 'Full restore of Cerwin Vega D7s completed' https://audiokarma.org/forums/threads/full-restore-of-cerwin-vega-d7s-completed.1033278/

 

[peterp1]

I'm making a small kitchen dinette table out of Birch 3/4" plywood -- with 2 sheets stacked using Titebond Blue, and using wood screws mainly for even clamping pressure,m since the Titebond is stronger than wood.

One issue I've run into is that it's almost impossible to find 1 1/2" x 1/4" x 48" wood planks to trim the edges. I prefer it just be plain wood planks that I can round off by hand with a sanding block. I'd prefer pine or a softer wood for sanding, but they are almost impossible to find. This might work (https://www.homedepot.com/p/Woodgra...lp_rr-_-n/a-_-0-_-n/a-_-n/a-_-n/a-_-n/a-_-n/a) but I'm not sure how quality the wood is.

If anybody knows of a good source for 1 1/2" x 1/4" x 48" trim -- I'd love to hear it.