GlamBass74

its a really thin aluminium sheet I got from EBay for another cab I was building (that failed dismally - basslite 10 with corner ports - sounded awful) Light as a feather, but man enough to protect the little fane. Makes me laugh how the strap handle is almost as wide as the cab! Spend a good hour or two having a noodle through it yesterday. It's a little gem.

One more pic.... I has finished it. Came out well... Apart from a router incident but I somehow managed to salvage it. 7.2kg. Now off to give it a spanking 😁

So.... Just finished tuning the cab to 60hz using a frequency generator app and some rice.... With the 75mm blue aran port at "supplied" length we were tuned to about 57hz. A quick snippy snip with the tin snips (superb for trimming plastic ports) and the rice stopped dancing on the cone at 60hz. How does it sound? Sweet! Let's be realistic here. You're not going to tear faces off at the dog & duck with a single 8" cab, but for it's teeny tiny size it puts out a good chunk of thunk. I could definitely see two of these doing a pub gig with a tame drummer. Surprising amount of top end given there isn't a tweeter in sight. My old bass is well overdue a string change and it still chimed quite pleasantly. I will just repeat THIS IS NOT PHILS DESIGN! I was an impatient s*d and wanted to crack on. Am I pleased? Yep. I will definitely carry on and finish this little beast off cosmetically. There's some 9mm ply in the garage too 😉 Radio silence from me for a little while now as I don't want to tread on Phil's toes when his design gets uploaded. I feel as though I've posted too much already, but I had his blessing and wanted to get the old juices going out there in bass chat land... If you're contemplating building one then go for it! It's good fun, pretty cheap and very rewarding 👍

this was made from ply offcuts from a building site. i'm cheap 😁

I have a bit of an addiction John. I just enjoy putting ideas together and seeing how they work. I guess it's adult Lego/Meccano 😁 Fortunately, Mrs Glambass is wonderful and tolerates my interest with only an occasional roll of her eyes.

Thanks Phil Looks quite boring with the lid on... Next up is sander, router for radiused edges and a bit of filler here and there. Driver should arrive Monday, so it'll be fun to try it out and tune it before painting/covering, handle, corners etc etc. Cover or paint? Hmmm....

They are indeed

Baffle holes cut and bracing fitted this morning. It's coming on nicely 👍

Whilst waiting for Phil's design to appear, I had a bit of a virtual chinwag with him and he was kind enough to share some info on the new 8" cab we're all chatting about. I'm an impatient beggar, so i've gone off piste and drawn my own on CAD. I had the 12mm ply panels to make a third BC110T in my shed, so I ripped them down with a saw and sled last night and got busy. I've air nailed and glued a side and the back to the base and marked up the holes for cutting out this evening. I've then got to make up my bracing parts and fit them before fitting the baffle, other side and top. I've also gone a bit rogue with the porting. I've opted to go a bit bigger, but still tune to phils intentions. THIS IS NOT PHILS DESIGN - His (undoubtedly better) design will be along soon. Mrs Glambass kindly delivered me a cup of tea last night and exclaimed "It's tiny!" - not the first time i've heard her say that..... Looking forward to seeing how it turns out visually and sonically Cheers!

in such a small cab Phil, I would doubt that the 18mm ply would cause any carrying issues.... If it results in a simpler build, then i guess more people would be inclined to have a go (hopefully) I, for one cant wait to see whats produced in sheds up and down the country!

Fugly though innit? 😁 Thanks for the info Baloney

thanks everybody - some food for thought I love the idea of using the crown, but I just need to find the correct pedal or unit to suit my needs I have placed an order for something today - i'll report back with my findings....

Given the size, could you fit a top hat in the bottom panel and have it on a speaker stand? Near ear monitor 😁

This is all I can find spec wise I have the 1002 and 2002 I thought a decent preamp pedal would drive them, but they seem lacking (even bridged!) Maybe my bass output is low? I'd hoped the MXR M80 would do it, but nay

Bear with me on this one... I love my little B1 Four. It's cheap and has some features such as HPF that I really like. Tuner is useful and battery life is pretty good. I have a couple of crown drivecore xls power amps. I'd love to drive the crown with the zoom, but as hard as I try the zoom just hasn't got the grunt to act as a powerful preamp. (even on the crown's 0.775v setting) Is there a simple/small/"cost effective" way of splicing another "device" into the output of the zoom pedal and boosting it to a level that the crown would deal with? I'd been tempted by an MXR M81 preamp pedal. I've read that it "will drive a power amp", but I wondered if there were other options? How does the M81 do that with only a 9v supply? It seems that to get any kind of headroom, then higher input voltages seem more common (aguilar tonehammer di pedal runs on 18v for example) Ive got quite a few other preamp pedals, but they all seem to run out of puff output wise. Am I missing something? Thanks

2 x Sovereigns purchased This looks like fun!

Thank you Tradfusion. I'm sure you'll love your new purchase! 👍

I’ve been lucky enough to be approached again by LFSys to take their latest offering out for a spin. (that’s a lie, but sounds more professional – I begged via private message) Having tried the 12” Monaco earlier this year, I was looking forward to comparing the Monza. The Monza is a 10” woofer/compression driver combination mounted in an enclosure only 53x36x30cm. Yep, that’s small. It certainly looked lost in the boot of my car! The cab is internally braced to dampen resonances. Whilst small in stature, the cabinet weighs in at 11kg. It’s built to last and built well from quality materials. The enclosures are finished in a grey paint with a green baffle. It utilises a Faital Pro neodymium driver rated at 600w / 8 ohms with a hefty vd measurement of 251.5cc for all you Thiele Small fans out there. Compare this with the Celestion Pulse 10 used in the 10” bass chat design cab that a few of us have built @ 138.5cc and you begin to see that this is one serious piece of kit output wise. The design uses an in house designed, developed, and built crossover sending all the mid and high frequency goodness above 2khz to a Celestion neodymium compression driver which is coupled to a rather large vertically aligned CD horn. No token “el cheapo” tweeter spitting out some hissy stuff here for sure. A front mounted, single round port is used. I heard no chuffing whatsoever when giving the cab the beans at gig levels. A heavy-duty grille and corner protectors take care of your investment. Bespoke covers are also available at a sensible price. A single handle on the top of the cabinet makes carrying this little wonder a cinch. It’s a comfortable and dare I say “good looking” handle. The handle has also been recessed to allow for bass amps with low height feet to sit on top with no issues. LFSys listened to their reviewers and made changes to their design. Brilliant! Two parallel wired speakon sockets on the rear of the cab take care of connections. They’re mounted on a bespoke lightweight aluminium plate that really does look professional. And that’s it – all you need in a dinky package! So… to the main event. How does it sound? Good. Very good. I had a gig at a club on the Norfolk Coast and took the Monza along for a workout. It’s a strange building, as its almost three rooms joined together. We play in one room facing into another with yet another room off to our left-hand side. I would estimate the crowd was 120 or so people. It has a low ceiling and it’s probably 70% carpeted floors. I walked in with my kit (one trip – result!) and felt as though I was missing something. I placed the cab in my limited amount of stage space. With my TC electronics BH800 perched on top my rig looked, well, a little lost if I’m honest. The drummers 12” monitor beside it dwarfed the Monza. A couple of comments about the size (or lack of it) and we were ready to go. I play Glam and 70’s Rock covers. I dress up and look like a potato in a pair of flares. I don’t care. I’ve reached that age where most of my self-respect has gone out of the window. We have a drummer that is rather deaf. He sets the volume for us as a band. As hard as I try to tame him a bit, the adrenaline takes over and we creep up until its quite loud. It’s hard to describe a band’s volume, but we’re definitely not “sit and have a nice chat 20 ft from the stage” material. His monitor seems generally almost as loud as the PA, so stage volumes are high to say the least. No in ears or technical wizardry in this band, just old kit gaffa taped and tie wrapped together working very hard. Setup wise, I use a Yamaha BB734A bass in passive mode as it eats batteries, a lead, a TC electronics BH800 head and the Monza. I run a little bit of compression via one of the onboard tone print slots. I play with fingers. The EQ section of the amp was bass, low mid @ 12 o’clock and high mid and high around 2 o’clock. I find the TC heads (or at least the 2 I own) are a little lacking on the top end side of things. I recently compared it to an old Genz Shuttle 6.0 and this seems to have much more sparkle. I set my amp to where I’d normally be, and my glamorous assistant said I was a little lost in the mix. I would estimate I had to ramp up about 15% on the master volume to get myself where I like to be in the mix. I set the gain so only the heaviest of playing would occasionally wake the peak LED up. There I was. In the mix. Playing at gig levels with a 10” driver carrying the whole room. It didn’t feel “right”, but sure enough the little Monza pumped out a most enjoyable tone for three (hot and sweaty) hour long sets. I didn’t tweak the amp. I could hear all I need to hear, and I play with 20dB attenuating moulded ear plugs (due to aforementioned tub thumper) If I was doing a blind test, I would be confident that I was playing with a 12” driver behind me. The bass was very prominent without being boomy or harsh. My only concern was having to drive the Monza harder to be sat where I’d normally be in our mix. Don’t get me wrong, it didn’t complain in the least, but I knew I was working it quite hard. Gig over and gear packed away (one trip again. Brilliant) I reflected on my test. This shouldn’t be “right”. A 10” equipped cab shouldn’t be punting out this level of bassy goodness. But it did. It did it well. I still believe that you must be realistic about your expectations. For example, I have a gig this weekend outdoors for a bunch of Harley Davidson riders. Would I expect the Monza to perform as well all by itself? No, I don’t… But given the opportunity of a little assistance through the PA then it’d be fine. BUT – on this occasion I’ll take my 2 bass chat 112’s and cover all eventualities. Big sound equals big enclosures, right? Well, not always. The Monza is living proof that good things really do come in small packages. I’d like to thank Stevie of LFSys for trusting this idiot with one of his products. I’d recommend heading over to www.lfsys.co.uk to read more. Jon

Bought an amp from Andres recently Good communication, swift despatch Buy with confidence

Do it! 😁 Stevie is ace - a proper gent and very approachable if you have any questions. I'm sure you won't be disappointed. (i get nothing from this by the way...)

Recessed handle! Good move....👍

I daren't calculate it in total, but the painful bits are the LF and HF driver. I dare say if I calculate all other hardware, paint, grille material, wadding, etc etc etc it'd shock me, but I know for sure it'd be a darn sight cheaper than some of the daylight robbers out there (and perform as well, if not better!) I guess the project can be as cheap or expensive as you want really. Not sure on weight. They're no featherweights as they're braced well inside and made from 15mm ply, but the shape and handle positioning make carrying easy. I managed one in each hand for 100 ish yards dash to a car park (probably looked like a poor attempt at a world's strongest man challenge)

Took both cabs to a show on the back of a trailer in Aylsham, Norfolk on Sunday. Playing to a pub courtyard about 60' x 40' Coupled to a TC BH800 Yamaha BB734A in passive mode No PA support. Just my cabs and amp. Did the job well. I was very pleased.

Thanks all. I do enjoy making cabs and would recommend it to anyone thinking of having a go. @chyc and I chat regularly about "home brew" cabs. His builds are looking really good. He's got the bug 😂 The sheer joy of hearing something you've built come to life is very rewarding I'm still not 100 percent happy with the grille (picky s*d), but sonically they're bang on. I think my other very expensive cabs could be gathering dust from now on.... 😁

In an ideal world I guess they probably would. I've opted to have them portrait as I'll probably use one most of the time. There's plenty of mid/high regardless of orientation.