An adventure in batting (cab treatments)

[CTN]

I went and picked up some polyester quilt batting sheets to treat my cabs. $20 at the fabric/upholstery store.

Gonna be attempting two things:

1) make my 2x12 less woofy, tighten up the low end and improve the midrange projection.
2) make my 1x10 sound bigger and less thin.

I'm gonna record some before/after samples. Hold on to your butts, this could get interesting!

[idsnowdog]

At first I thought the title was and adventure in battling crabs.

[CTN]

lol that could be very fun too. probably messy tho. and itchy, if it's THOSE kinda crabs.

[lreese]

If that fails, you can try ash or alu-mini-mum

[CTN]

Achievement unlocked: objective #1 completed.

I put a thick layer of batting on the back wall of the cab, and thinner layers on the top and on one side. The bass is considerably tighter, the cab sounds more immediate and lively, the midrange is much clearer and less congested, and the highs jump out much better than they used to. the low end is firm and punchy, but controlled, not bloated like it was before.

see if you can hear it in these clips. I went from medium gain blues rock to 80s cock rock JCM800ish gain to death metal. Each gain level has a before/after and I was playing the same guitar with the same settings on my amp (blackstar HT metal 5), and the same riffs. Used just a room mic to get as close as possible to what I could hear, but overall the recording is a bit brighter and crunchier than what it sounds like in the room. Excuse the shitty playing and ugly fumbles all over the place.

https://soundcloud.com/blakkwater/batting-comparison


Also, for anyone who cares, this was the RCA3 hex-pole JB. Now that the cab is tightened up, I think I actually like the RCA3 just fine in the JB.

[kinnikuman]

What colour?

[CTN]

does it matter? it's going inside a closed back cab where nobody will see it.

but it's just plain white polyester fiber fill sheets.

[GoldenVulture]

That definitely sounds tighter.
Was that a bare inside with sound waves bouncing all over the place, prior to this improvement ?

Padding/Damping is standard stuff in HiFi/Audio speaker boxes. You'll even find it in some PC speakers.

Rockwool is a popular one. Fireproof your cabinet at the same time.
It's probably denser than the polyester and damps even more.
Ha! Check out this. It's a demonstration of Rockwools properties.
- http://www.rockwool.com/stone+wool+benefits/acoustics -

[CTN]

Yup it was just bare birch inside.

I'm gonna work on the 1x10" cab later today. I suspect it's gonna be a bit harder to get it sounding good though, cuz the speaker isn't all that great. Lots of harsh unmusical highs and a boxy, stiff midrange together with thin, undefined bass...

Will report back later.

[youngthrasher9]

It sounds great dude.


Where was the gain knob at during the death metal section of that demo if you don't mind me asking?