nekomatic

One other thing to be aware of is that there’s no guarantee that the current generation of free or cheap to use generative AI tools will stay available forever, let alone get better and better for the same free or cheap price. All the companies providing them are running on vast amounts of venture capital based on hypothetical vast future profits, which nobody can explain how free or cheap AI models will actually deliver. A lot of people are predicting that this business model has to fall apart sooner or later.

I’ve re-read this and it might be confusing - what I mean is, the cross-section area of the square port should be the same as for the cylindrical port, and the length of the square port should be the same as the length of the cylindrical port. As I understand it the straightforward calculation for port dimensions assumes that the inside end of the port is in free space inside the cabinet, not next to the cabinet wall, so that’s why calculating the right size for an end slot (or triangular corner port, etc) isn’t so easy.

If you want to use a port with a square cross-section rather than a round one, I think you just need to make the length and the cross-section area the same. So if the area of the circle (pi * r^2) was say 25 cm^2 then a 5 x 5 cm square port of the same length should give you the same tuning. By ‘slot port’ I understand a slot in the baffle with no extra depth behind it and I believe the dimensions of that are harder to calculate correctly, especially if the slot is at one end of the baffle. Can you sketch what you had in mind, and is there a particular reason not to use a cylindrical port? Personally I’d just go with the latter, I found it easy enough to construct.

Do your soloists generally turn up with one tune that they simply must play, or are they flexible about playing on any tune that they know? The organiser of the jam I go to seems pretty good about sorting people out so everyone gets to play on something, even if it’s not always their first choice. That and not letting anyone drag a solo out for too many choruses. Still, being too popular is a good problem for a jazz jam to have!

I assume you’ve thought of politely suggesting that if they don’t like the bucket going round then they could always just pay you, out of the extra bar takings that the jam brings in.

Haha, I also need to do this. There is one Project Of Doom in particular that I need to either get done or finally abandon. Stop starting, start finishing, as the maxim goes.

Didn’t see this thread before but it’s great to hear about all your goals. Good luck with them all! I want to make a jazz trio happen this year - I’ve got a good pianist lined up, who I also get on well with, but no leads on any half decent (but not so decent that they’re fully occupied doing paid gigs) drummers. I’ve heard you can sometimes find one under a big pile of hen’s teeth.

Yeah, ‘too much power’ shouldn’t be a problem if the iron is temperature controlled.

I’ve not used one myself but I might look at this one - the handle size might be a bit cumbersome for the tiniest jobs but it’ll have enough power to deal with pots and connectors even with lead-free (and I do think we should all be going lead-free nowadays). I’d get this tip with it.

The thing I like about the Antex irons is that it’s very easy to change the tips - they just slide on and off over the element - which means you can easily use the right size one for the job, and for soldering larger parts like connectors with lead free that can make the difference between impossible and straightforward. I’m not sure if anyone else has a similar design or if it’s an Antex patent.

A thing that would make me practice enough.

From the fact that the cabs are secondhand and one socket is worse than the other, I’m very inclined to suspect that it’s those sockets that are bad. Maybe they’ve been repeatedly used with a non-genuine Speakon plug that has damaged them. The obvious thing to test would be whether you see any problem with a different cab. The good news is that it looks like it should be easy to remove the connector panels and replace the faulty connectors on the cabs. If you don’t fancy doing it yourself it shouldn’t be too expensive to have a tech do it.

Did you buy the amp, cabs and cables together or did you already have the cabs?

Can’t remember exactly but I’m pretty sure I just squeezed mine flat between a couple of pieces of wood and a couple of clamps.

Ooh, nice!

May not be what you had in mind by ‘funky’, but as a ’90s indie kid (and adoptive Manc) I couldn’t not post this.

Get an observatory, you lot - this is the cab design thread! 😉

Tuff Cab has very little odour, fwiw, so hopefully your equivalent one is the same.

If you're banned from even painting indoors I don't think anodising is going to be on the cards!

A few weeks back we happened into a pub in Didsbury, not that far from us, and found it full of flyers for a forthcoming Jazz Jam - which isn't something you see that often. So on the day of the Jazz Jam I turned up and found an excellent young guitar-led trio going by the name of Fisherman Dice, and… no jammers except me! But they were dead friendly and let me sit in for three tunes, and mentioned that they run a bi-weekly jam over in Chorlton, of which I got the impression that it was well attended, and last night I went along to that and found the same bassist and drummer but a different guitarist and… no jammers except me. But they were dead friendly and let me sit in for three tunes Anyway the Didsbury one was a new venture by the manager of the pub, which changed hands not long ago, and despite the low attendance he said he was keen to repeat it, and I've let the Fisherman Dice guys know that if he does and they can bring a keyboard next time (which the Didsbury venue has space for but the Chorlton one absolutely doesn't) then I can pretty much guarantee a couple of pianists who go to the other jam I've been going to, and possibly some soloists too. So it would be nice if that could become a thing. But my ulterior motive of finding a drummer who'd be interested in getting together with one of the aforementioned pianists to do some occasional trio stuff is no further forward…

CPC sell them so if you can think of sixteen quid’s worth of other stuff you need from CPC (and who amongst us can’t do that?) then you can get free delivery. To be honest even if you have to pay delivery I’d struggle to find a cheaper way of making a decent grille, as long as you have the means to cut it (I used a Dremel but am sure hacksaw or tinsnips would do). Note that the plastic edging is just a stretch fit around the round grille so you can re-use it (with glue) for the rectangular version.

The speaker specs will tell you the maximum cone excursion, Xmax, which for this driver is 5.5 mm. Sometimes they give a separate larger figure for the excursion where damage will occur, but I think if we go past Xmax that means we’re into the realm of abusing the speaker anyway. So the cone should move at most 5.5 mm forward (or backward) from its rest position, add a couple of mm for (waves hands) stuff, and I guess that should be fine. I don’t think the size of the holes matters acoustically, but guess the percentage that is hole rather than not hole might do? I’d say picture what a speaker grille usually looks like and go for something not too different from that. You want to avoid the grille vibrating too much at an annoying frequency, so I would probably mount it as rigidly as you can. I screwed mine to blocks round the edge of the baffle and one in between the speaker and port and that seems fine.

6 A twin core mains cable would also be fine.

The phenomenal Rioghnach Connolly and Honeyfeet, finishing their UK tour on home turf at Manchester Academy 3. If there’s a band out there that’s more fun live I want to know about it.

Also because the plastic corners do need a rounded edge, or at least the ones I’ve used did.