BillFitzmaurice.info

After doing the test fit I felt like I should be able to pass the parts over to other members of our group for construction. After doing that and nothing happening for a few weeks I organized a workday to get things going. Well that turned into quite the fun afternoon with five guys. After a good amount of me convincing everybody to follow the build plans we got going and made some progress. Too many cooks in the kitchen!

In installing panel one we tried using just brads on the joint in the dado (between panel one and the side panel) but ended up putting screws in the pilot holes made for transferring the plan to the second side panel in order to hold the first panel in place properly. I think this all would have been easier to keep things in place and square if I had made my right angle jigs like 3 or 4 inches tall instead of 2.

In this first session we also got the mounting the blocks glued to the baffle as you can see in the pic.

I didn't take pictures of it but the next day we pulled the screws holding the mounting blocks from the baffle and test fitted the driver using 2" #10 hex/slot head screws. They are a bit long and poke through the mounting blocks but all that will be covered so no big deal I think. Right now the driver is humming away with a 30hz test tone at 9.4V. As far as I can tell it's not rubbing.

Actually I have a questions about this test. What's the purpose of running it for 12 hours? Is the idea that the driver will loosen up a bit and could start running later in the break-in period?
Also, there is a gasket on both the front and back of the Kappalite 3012LF which the specifications say are both sealing. In your experience will I have to run caulking around the edge of the basket to get a good seal or is the one in there good enough? Do I need to apply gasket tape?

Hopefully later this week we'll be adding some more panels!

chrisj360 wrote:I am curious how the braces turn out. For both my builds, they seem to take the most time & adjusting to fit without bowing or pulling things out of square. Please keep me posted.

Cheers,

Chris

Will do. In the test fitting everything seemed to fit okay but we shall see when they are installed!

Hello all,

Here's a cumulative update on the progress we've made on this cab. For a whole slew of reasons we've had to take this slow but the unit is finally assembled and ready to be wired up. It's going to get a fancy paint job but more on that another time.

So the build itself was pretty easy if time consuming (if you want it done right). We had two groups of people working on this (how many dj's does it take to screw in a light bulb?) who had different philosophies about how to go about the assembly and it shows. One team used brads and was jig phobic, the other screws and jig philic. Needless to say this means that there are a couple of places where the inside panels aren't exactly 90 degrees to the sides but since the cab is made of wood it's pliable enough to come together comfortably. I had used the router to cut dados for the panels but did this only for one side. This turned out to be a wise move as the second side had no problem fitting despite the slight wonkiness. You'll notice from the photos we also had different philosophies about spreading glue. We were both guilty of spreading it, just one of us went hog wild . Lesson learned - it was a major pain to clean up.

By and large the CNC pieces themselves fit like a dream with a few exceptions. The major issue was pieces 9, 11, and 13 - the angular pieces that fit into the corners of the cab. I had to re-cut these an 8th of an inch smaller as they didn't fit my dados - the tolerance where the sides come together is tight. Next time I'll ditch the dados at these points and just let the pieces slide in and rest where they may. Even though making these pieces smaller allowed them to fit, I never did get the angles quite right. Gaps between say panel 7 and 9 were up to a 16th of an inch in places but PL glue filled them in without issue. The only other problem I had with the cuts was the one @chrisj360 predicted: the 1/10 braces needed to be adjusted some to fit. I suspect this had to do with panel one not being quite square. A little planing and elbow grease made them fit fine. The 6/12 braces were installed in a similar manner minus the planing . As a result panel 12 bows a bit at the bottom but seems to sit flat enough with rubber feet.

The installation of panel 10 and 1/10 braces.
You can see the dado for piece 13 that was giving me trouble here. Those will go away on the next one.
Here's panel 12 and the 6/12 braces installed. That big clamp was a godsend. I don't think we could have done it without it.

The biggest challenge we had was with the drive access panel hatches. Programing the CNC is finicky business. With so many cuts it's easy to make a mistake. In my case I missed that the curves that defined the access hatch openings were programed to cut on the wrong side of the curve. As a result the openings are an 1/4 of an inch larger than they should be (I used a 1/4" spiral flute plunge down-cut bit for these). This made installing the flanges difficult as there wasn't much of a lip to hold them in. We ended up using some wood screws through the end grain of the pieces to affix them to the cab while the glue dried. This took a pile of time to assemble because there's little room in the opening for a drill once one flange piece is installed. Everything had to be pre-drilled and then the screws tightened by hand. In the end it came together fine but it was certainly a pain to fix.
Jigs in place before the second side went on
Finally coming together!

You'll notice in that last picture that we didn't install the second flange until after the second side was on. After this picture was taken and the glue dried the excess glue was cut and sanded away, gaps filled with PL and/or Spackle (no bondo handy) and sanded a second time. The edges were also rounded to fit protective hardware. We elected to use cabinet corners with an internal radius of 1/4". They won't be as strong as the 1/2" ones we originally got with our kit but we were worried that grinding the edges down 1/2" would weaken the structural integrity of the unit because of all the handholds we put in the cab.

I can't seem to add more pictures to this post so I'll follow up with another. Almost there!

Here it is filled, sanded, and primed. Looking pretty good considering all that glue nonsense!

Next we mount and test the driver and listen for leaks.

Looking good tactix! I'm excited for you... the first time you fire one of these up is a memory you won't soon forget

commander_dan wrote: ↑Thu Jun 07, 2018 4:19 am Looking good tactix! I'm excited for you... the first time you fire one of these up is a memory you won't soon forget

Thank you! Yeah I can't wait

Tactix,

I am considering a T30 build, and am also considering the translation of the plans for use by a CNC using CamBam. This thread has been fascinating, and among the best I have read. A few questions:

1. How did the story end?
2. Did you update your plans and code based on your discoveries with the first cab?
3. Did you build more? What was the experience?
4. It looks like you used 4x8 stock. Was this baltic birch? I can only find 5x5.

I am looking forward to the epilogue.

CDM