Jimbo wants to play the gui-tar

So as I approach my 30th birthday, suddenly I want to learn to play the guitar. As I listen to the music I love, I find it painfully obvious that I really don't know what I'm listening to, because I don't have any familiarity with the instruments that they are using, nor do I understand the structure of the music. I really feel like I'm missing out on a huge part of the music, and I'm also severely limiting myself in my abilities to properly evaluate the sound of the audio equipment. This is why I want to learn the play the guitar. Well, plus, who doesn't want to be able to pick up a 'strat, crank the gain on the amp, and whail out some ZZ Top riffs? It's in my "man" gene. I also think it'll be fun to get into building my own guitar amps.

I've started looking at guitars, and given myself a crash-course on how they operate and what I should be looking for. I've found a couple that I like, including a couple used ones that I'm waiting for a price for from an online buddy. Kristin has an inexpensive acoustic and she's adament that I learn on that before spending money on a new toy. I'm indecisive at this point. Kristin makes a very good point... learn first, then buy the toys. On the other hand, everything that I've read says that if you learn on junk, you'll lose interest much faster than on something that you like. I suppose that makes sense. The other issue is that her guitar is a very inexpensive model, which is likely to constantly come out of tune, which will make the whole experience very frustrating. But, I may at least try a couple lessons with it before I buy my own. I think it'll depend on the price that the guy gives me on those guitars online. If I buy a modestly priced used guitar, I could get most or all of my money back if I decided to sell it, although honestly, I kind of like the idea of having one around, even if I don't wind up getting good. On the other hand, there was a more expensive guitar that I really preferred the sound of, so it may benefit me to put up with the acoustic for a while, then if I find myself getting good enough to stay interested in it, then just buy the better guitar.

Who knows.

Right now the biggest unknown is whether or not I'll actually stick with it. I have a gut feeling that unless I completely suck and never show any signs of improvement, that I'll be likely to stick with it a bit longer than some of my other passing interests. Ultimately, my desire to learn the instrument stems from my strong interest in audio and my desire to learn more about audio. Maybe the benefits gained from this experience will keep me interested even if my playing skill doesn't progress as rapidly as I hope for. Then again, maybe there's already an Eric Clapton inside of me waiting to show himself. :)

Twas the 2nd day after Christmas...

...and all through the house, Christmas is over, now get it out of the house.

blah blah blah. I had the play-by-play for the entire holiday typed out, but who really gives a shit. Or maybe it's just me that doesn't give a shit. As much as I like the whole festive season between Thanksgiving and Christmas, once it's over, it's done. I don't carry the Christmas spirit past Christmas. When I was a kid, I never wanted Christmas to end, and watching my mother take down the Christmas tree was a traumatic experience, but now I'm the same way she is. Once it's done, get it out. I guess this has evolved from how it was when I was a kid. When I was a kid, I had the same extreme excitement that every kid had for Christmas. I didn't sleep the night before, and I woke up way too early and dragged my parents out of their beds so that we could open presents. I'd rip open the presents as fast as humanly possible to quickly reveal that toy that I had lusted after since Sears sent out the toy catalog back in November. The only thing more exciting than that was the next present. It was like an endless roll of scratch tickets, with every one being a winner. When I finally got to that last present, my excitement shifted from the rush of opening toys, to the joy of playing with them all. What one do I play with first!? In my manic state, I'd quickly play a little bit with each one. And then it set in... Post Christmas Depression. I opened everything, and I played with all of my toys. There was nothing left to do. This was the dose of reality that it was all over, and all I had left was the crashdown from all that adreneline that had run its course and dissipated from my veins. I think this is why I hated to see the Christmas tree go away... it was the last remaining symbol of that sheer excitement and jubilation. It remained long after the extitement was gone, but stood as a reminder of just how great it was.

As I grew up, my interests in Christmas matured and the aspect of Family and giving was what I looked forward to more than the receiving. While I still like getting presents as much as everybody else, I take greater pleasure in giving to my family, which is why I put so much effort into making sure that everybody gets at least one or two things that puts a genuine smile on their face as they open it. Seeing that smile, along with spending that valuable time with my family is what interests me the most in Christmas now, but just like when I was a kid, there's that Post-Christmas Depression. Now it occurs after everything is opened, the smiles have subsided, and the people have gone home. So now, it's over, and it's time to get rid of Christmas. That's the part that changed... now I no longer want the Christmas tree to stick around and remind me of the great holiday gone by.

Then again, maybe there's another reason. When I was a kid, putting up the Christmas tree was a grand event. We spent the whole day putting the tree together, decorating it, and having a great time.

Now Kristin and I have a real tree instead of a fake one. I have to freeze my ass off looking at 200 trees until we find the "Right" one. Then I have to tie it to the roof of the vehice, get it home, untie it, break my back getting it into the house and into the tree stand, only to find that it's got to be trimmed, so I break my back getting it back outside. I cut it, usually freezing through the entire process. I break my back getting it back inside. By now I'm sticky with pine sap from head to toe, I have needles all over the house, and Kristin is bitching at me because I've been complaining and swearing the whole time. Of course, she can't understand why it's a pain in the ass, because all she has to do is hold it upright while I lay on my stomach, fighting with the tree stand and getting whipped in the face with tree branches. By the time we finally get the piece of shit standing somewhat vertical, I've had enough frustration to completely ruin the whole event, and Kristin is pissed off because of my swearing and complaining. So now that we're both pissed off, we have to tolerate each other long enough to put up the lights and ornaments. Putting up the lights never goes well because we don't tend to work well together when it comes to that sort of things. By the time we get to ornaments, I just want to get the hell out of there, so I put them anywhere I can find a spot, just as long as I get them done.

No wonder I can't wait for that tree to get out of my house. It's not Christmas I'm tired of, it's that fucking tree.

Merry Christmas, part 5

One of those neat music-activated light shows, performed to one of my favorite christmas songs:

Merry Christmas, part 4

Canon Rock

pachelbel's Canon is far and away my favorite classical piece. It's also a favorite of Kristin's and it's what she's going to walk down the isle to. I happened to come across this today, and not only was I blown away by the outstanding guitar work, but this is a 15 year old kid!!!!



Apparently this was started by a Korean guy that calls himself "JerryC", then the guy linked below received so much attention that he's got the most popular video on all of Youtube. When you listen to him play you can see why:

Speakers

Here is my post about the pair of speakers mentioned below that I built for my in-laws for Christmas this year. I had wanted to post numerous progress reports, but for fear that they may have wandered into this blog, I didn't want to spill the beans until after they got them.

Kristin and I started talking late last year about the idea of me building some speakers for her parents. At the time, a few ideas were discussed but nothing came of it. Fast-forward to late September or early October of this year, and the discussion resurfaced. Kristin seemed to think that her parents would like something, and I'll take any excuse that I can get to build speakers without having her nag me constantly, so we decided that we'd do it. The stipulations were that we had to keep it affordable, and they had to fit in with their lifestyle, which meant small and unobtrusive. After going back and forth between a tiny subwoofer/statellite system, on-wall speakers, and conventional 2-ways, I picked the 2-ways. The on-wall speakers would have worked well except that I don't think they ever would have allowed speaker wires running up the walls to the speakers. The subwoofer/satellite option tanked because by the time I built the passive network or bought a plate amp, it would have gone over budget, and I still would have been stuck with the issue of what to do with the satellite speakers. So, stand mounted 2-ways were chosen. I could have built floor standers that actually had a smaller footprint, but these look less intrusive, plus it gave me a lot more options in terms of pre-existing designs to choose from. I'm still way too stupid with my Soundeasy measurement software to design my own system that can compete with some of the better sounding designs that are already out there. I knew I'd never get it done in time. John Krutke "Zaph" has a very good reputation for designing good sounding speakers, so I chose his budget design that uses a 5.5" Silverflute woofer and a 1" Vifa D27 tweeter. I've wanted an excuse to build this speaker for a long time, and here it was!

The first part of construction was nothing special. I rough-cut all of the pieces in my workshop with my circular saw and a straight edge. I brought all the rough-cut pieces to Dad's and cut them to size on the table saw. Every time I use the table saw I get better with it, and this situation was no different. All of my cuts were precise enough that when I assembled the box, everything went together with nice tight seams, and no overhang or underhang. Sanding was minimal on the enclosures, which is always good. The front panel was cut 1/4" oversized so that I had 1/8" overhang on all sides. This way I could trim it down with the router to ensure a 100% perfect fit. From that point on, speaker "1" and speaker "2" was labeled and the baffle stayed with the proper speaker even though the fitment was good enough that they could have interchanged if needed. Any differences from one to the next were so small that they would be dwarfed by the thickness of the veneer, poly and paint.

While working on the front baffles, I discovered that my current home-made circle jig didn't allow for small diameter cuts necessary for the tweeter, so I had to make a new improved model. Now I can cut holes all the way down to approximately 2 3/4" diameter. If I was a little smarter when I made it, I could have allowed for even smaller cuts, but I guess I'll build version 3 when I need to.

Thanksgiving came and went, and at that point I had the boxes built, the baffles were built and had the driver cutouts, but that was about it. Nothing had anything resembling a finish yet, and things weren't close to assembly. Kristin's parents came over for Thanksgiving, but I made sure I kept them out of the workshop.

After Thanksgiving I started piling up the sanding sealer on the pieces that would be painted, paying particular attention to the end grain on the roundovers. In hind-sight, it still took a ton of primer, and I think the sanding sealer wasn't really worth the effort, though it did seem to harden the wood a great deal, so in that sense I suppose it still had merit.

As I worked into the first week of December, it started to become obvious that I was going to be under a time crunch. We celebrated Christmas with her family on December 16th (The weekend before Christmas weekend), which left me a full week less time than I'd anticipated. At this point, I became a slave to the garage. Kristin prepared all the meals and cleaned up while I got back out to work, where I usually stayed until 10:00 or later every night. To make things worse, during the last week, I was battling a cold with a sore throat. The baffles & stand pieces that were to be painted black were given their final preperations and brought to Dad's shop where I sprayed them with a black Urethane basecoat/clearcoat finish. The clear flowed beautifully out of the gun and required only minimal sanding before polishing. The main areas that had to be sanded was the buildup around the driver cutouts, and a run or two here and there on some of the stand pieces. While the paint was still drying on those, I began to veneer the enclosure, 2 sides at a time to get them done as rapidly as possible. While that continued, I wetsanded and polished the black painted parts, began to assemble the stands, and covered the grills with cloth. Once veneering was completed, I put a couple coats of polyurethane on the veneered surfaces. The problem with this is that the only surface that builds up a suitably thick coat is the horizontal surface. On all of the vertical surfaces, you can't build it thick enough, and you wind up sanding through it before you're able to sand it flat. I of course learned this the hard way, and had to touch up some spots with stain, then re-varnish. This time I had to do one side at a time so that I could allow it to build up to a proper thickness, but I was running out of time. I decided that I was only going to be able to do the top and sides. The back was already thick enough, and nobody sees the bottom anyway, so it was also good enough. On Wednesday night I put poly down on the top, then a few hours later I laid them over and put poly on one side. Inbetween I built the crossovers. Before work on Thursday I had hoped to lay the poly down on the last side, but the poly on the side I did the night before was still tacky. Since I had to lay the speaker on that side to poly the other side, it had to wait. Thursday night I sanded and polished the two sides that I had already put the new coat of poly on, then I began assembly. I couldn't find my padding that I line the inner walls with, so I had to put them together without it. I got them all assembled, and brought them up for an audition.

Though they were nice overall, they certainly wasn't what I'd hoped for. bass sounded good on some things, but on Hotel California it was thick, resonant, and lacked any distinction between notes. Vocals had a harshness and an echo that drove me nuts. As far as I'm concerned, if speakers sound bad on Hotel California, I might as well throw them away because I'll never like them.

Knowing that adding the padding inside would fix a lot of what these speakers did wrong, I took them back apart and put the poly on the remaining side of each speaker, and off to bed I went at 1:00 Am.

At 8:00 in the morning I woke up with a pounding headache. I took 4 advil and 2 sudafed and thankfully, by 9:00 the headache was mostly gone. I sanded and polished the last side that I put the poly on the night before, then went back around to all pieces and re-polished with a finer compound. I wrapped everything up, but left the speakers apart since I now had no choice but to stop at Home Depot to get the padding, and finish them up on-site. I built a care package that consisted of all the tools I figured I'd need, plus a few that I hoped I wouldn't need.

On Saturday morning, I took over the downstairs bathroom and went to work. I cut the padding and began installing it. One big piece wrapped around the back and side walls, followed by 2 pieces on the top and 2 pieces on the bottom above the crossover. During the process Kristin's parents began to think I was ill, and at one time asked Kristin if they were going to need a new toliet downstairs! 2 hours later, I had them all together and was glad to finally be done... or so I thought.

To go with the speakers we bought them an Onkyo TX-SR504 receiver, and Kristin's sister gave them a Sony DVD player that I picked out. The dvd player is unimportant since I'm using it only as a cd transport. The receiver handles the D/A conversion, which eliminates the cd player from the "sound quality" chain. Thus, I chose the cheapest DVD player that still had at least a reasonable build quality and tasteful appearance. Unfortunately, since their TV downstairs is so old that it has only a coax input (no RCA input even!!), it wasn't possible to hook up their VCR and the DVD player, so the new DVD player went upstairs, and their DVD/VCR combo went back in downstairs. But, at least it was a Philips and not some insanely cheap Christmas brand. Through the coax output, the audio sounds just as good.

So anyway, on Saturday night, with a crowd of 5 people watching everything I did, along with Kristin providing a non-stop intoxicated commentary of my every move, I hooked everything up. I popped in a cd, and to my extreme dissatisfaction, there was a heavy rightside bias to the midrange. After some experimentation I realized that the mid was not hooked up on the left speaker. In my haste to assemble everything, I forgot to re-attach the leads. I popped the speaker open (Thank God I built a removable front baffle!!!), hooked it back up, and tried again. Plenty of midrange, but now something else is wrong. Now the tweeter doesn't work. Apparently I dislodged the tweeter wire when I opened it back up to hook up the woofer. Take it all apart again, hook the tweeter back up, and try again. This time everything sounded great! For the next half hour or 40 minutes, a bunch of cds were put in and out of the player, but by then I didn't give a shit and just wanted to go to bed, which we finally did shortly after 11:00.

Finally on Sunday I had an hour to myself where I was able to do some real listening to my new creation. What I heard really impressed me. The highs, while nothing spectacular, were extremely natural sounding. The midrange really impressed. It offered up a ton of detail, but not at the expense of a balanced response. Usually people mistake "detail" for too much high frequency output. It's amazing that these woofers are under $20 each. The bass response, while seeming very taught and precise, did seem to blur some bass frequencies together on certain tracks. On the Hell Freezes Over version of Hotel California, the bongo beats have two distinct tones that are only a few hz apart. On many speakers, including these, you can't tell the difference. Hopefully once these break in that will come around. With everything else, the bass sounded very natural and realistic, especially considering that these are only 5.5" woofers. The integration between woofer and tweeter was absolutely seamless, and off-axis listening made it obvious that these have a very good power response. Overall, I'm amazed at how "big" these speakers sound. My main criticism with almost all small speakers that I've heard, is that they all sound their size. These speakers don't. While they certainly don't have the dynamics of much larger speakers, they do have the full, rich, lively sound that I do not expect to hear in small speakers. John Krutke designed an amazing speaker here. In terms of improvements, I do think that a better tweeter could certainly provide a noteworthy improvement, and I think supplimenting these with a good quality subwoofer would also provide an improvement, but for what these cost, I am simply amazed. I am most amazed at how good that Silverflute woofer is.

I can't really compare these to any commercial speakers that I've heard, because I haven't really heard anything that quite has this balance of sound. I've certainly heard some better sounding speakers than these, but most of those were $5,000 or more. I remember listening to some $3,000 floorstanding Dynaudio Audience 72se speakers that I was very fond of, but still didn't have the same type of detail in the midrange that these do. I really think that if a company sold this design, that they could price them at $1,200-$1,500 and have a very sucessful speaker. Of course, for the amount of time that I spent building these, if somebody offered me that much to build them a pair, I'd probably tell them to piss up a rope.

Overall, Kristin's parents seemed to be very happy with their Christmas present. They both spent some time listening to it, and although they both have a tin ear, I think that if they take the time to sit down and actually spend some quality time with their classic rock collection, that they will find it to be an enjoyable experience, and they just may find that after a while, without knowing it, that they become good enough listeners that they'll start to really be able to appreciate not only the music, but the sound.

Christmas in Connecticut

This past weekend we traveled down to Simsbury CT to Kristin's parents for an early Christmas. We did it this past weekend because Kristin is working all of next weekend including Christmas day. There were two noteworthy aspects of this trip; the speakers, and everything else. The speakers will be handled in a separate post, which will actually wind up above this one on the site because that's how blogs apparently work. That also means that you already either read that entry, or glazed over it and came down to this one. In any event, this one deals with the rest of the trip.

The ride down was a pain in the ass. The car was full of precious cargo (speakers), and every fuck-nut who shouldn't have a license seemed to find the Turnpike on Friday, myself being one of them. As I almost got run over by a car rapidly approaching from behind as I merged onto the 'pike, I quickly realized that the good ol' Camry is a gutless pig above 50mph. The well chosen gear ratios in the transmission and in the differential provide tolerable acceleration dispite the anemic motor, so long as you're going under 50mph. Once you are at 50 and try to accelerate, as I quickly discovered, you'd better give yourself PLENTY of room, because you're going to be doing it for a while.

Anway, we got there and nobody got killed this time. On Friday night we went to a Wolfpack game. As always, that was a great time. On Saturday morning I finished the speakers, then did a little Christmas shopping for my parents.

On Saturday night we exchanged gifts, which is always very interesting. Kristin got a bunch of girly shit that she really seemed to like. I was the proud recipient of a Johnny Black gift set that included the booze and a couple Johnny Walker glasses. I also got a badly needed pair of pants, a neat t-shirt, Dunks Coffee, a Camaro sign, and other trinkets. Kristin and I together got a Target gift card from her grandmother, and from her parents we got an outdoor fireplace thingie and an ass-ugly painting for our living room. I can call it ugly without offending her parents because she picked it out, not them. :) It's a painting of some kind of bowl with twigs sticking out of it. I can't imagine why you'd want a painting of that shit, but who knows. I couldn't find any cars or breasts anywhere in the painting, so I quickly lost interest. The fireplace, though in reality a good gift that will probably prove to be very useful, was a bit disappointing to me because I had planned on constructing a very nice stone fireplace at the back of our property. But, since Kristin is afraid of basically everything, she'd probably never walk through the back yard, so the fireplace would never get used. Though this shoots down my aspirations of building such a grand container of nature's fury, in reality this will probably get used much more often.

I spent sunday hanging around and listening to the inlaw's new stereo. I must say, they have great taste. It sounded wonderful. :)

Overall, it was a very good weekend spent with Kristin's (and soon to be my) family. Every time I go down there, I feel a bit more "at home" and feel more welcomed all the time. This christmas felt more comfortable than last year, and I also noticed that their gifts had a level of thoughtfullness that made me feel like part of their family.

The stages of a cold

Getting sick is something that doesn't happen very often for me. Fortunately, when I do get sick, it also tends to be very minor. This week I've been battling a cold, which is the first one I've had in probably a year or more. Most of my colds seem to follow the same progression. On the first day, I wake up with a tickle in my throat, unsure if it's the start of a cold or if it's just a dry throat from snoring all night. Shortly after getting up it's gone, and doesn't return until late that night. On the second day, the throat hurts a lot more, and I get some sinus pressure and perhaps a runny nose. On the third day, my throat hurts less, but the sinus pressure is so strong that I want to run a drill through my eye to relieve the pressure. Copious amounts of sudafed and Advil usually help. Then there's the fourth day (that would be today). On the fourth day, the sore throat is gone, the sinus pressure feels like there's a truck on my face, and since the cold is breaking up, every time I cough or sniff, I get a throat full of thick, chunky mucus that tastes absolutely disgusting, and thanks to the little chunks, feels pretty gross too. And oh the color! Such beautiful hues of bright yellow, greens, and brown chunks suspended within.

At least the cold is almost over. Tomorrow I'll be tired, but otherwise feeling fine.

Building a good box with shitty tools

Every so often I come across a post online where somebody is attempting to build a speaker box, and fails. Sometimes it's just due to the usual stack-up of dimensional errors that occurs when you're free-handing everything, but sometimes it's due to a person's complete inability to focus their brain cells at the task at hand and actually think about what they're doing before they start a project. Those people should spend more time studying in school so that they can get into a career that pays them well enough to just go buy the shit they want.

But in any case... for those that just want to learn a technique for building good boxes with minimal tools, follow along. This tutorial will show you how to build a square looking enclosure with minimal tools and skill by showing you how to cut everything oversized, and trim it to the proper size using a router. Since most people who have a router have other tools too, you may be able to simplify a lot of this process with the use of a circular saw or table saw, but if you're a beginner and you can only afford one tool to start out with, make sure it's a router. Even when using a table saw, if you're not very precise and careful with your cutting routine, you can wind up with nice straight cuts that wind up being just a tad too big or a tad too small, resulting in a box that doesn't have nice flush edges. This tutorial will also help you eliminate those problems by demonstrating the technique of cutting oversized pieces and trimming with a router.


Necessary equipment: Router, framing square, clamps (pipe clamps or similar device), flush trim bit (the type that's got the bearing below the cutting area), drill, 7/64 drill bit, philips screw attachment for drill, wood glue, #8 sheetrock screws, 1 sheet of 3/4" MDF and a flat work area (I usually use the piece of MDF that I'm cutting from on saw horses).
Useful tools: Circular saw (or better yet a table saw), tape measure (necessary if your framing square doesn't have units of measure).

It's important to start out with a sheet of MDF that's square. Most factory-cut 4x8' sheets are very good in this regard.

This tutorial assumes that you're screwing the panels together. If you decide to clamp the panels, that's fine too.



So, on with the step-by-step:
1. The first task is to cut the rear panel, and along with it, the top & bottom panels. This is probably also the most important piece, since it's what you're going to build the whole box from. If you look in the pic, you'll see that this piece's dimensions are 6.5"x10.5". "Final" and "first cut" dimensions are the same because this piece is what it is and because of that, you need to cut it well. What you're going to cut here is a piece that's 6.5"x24" Start from the corner of the MDF so that you'll be nice and square. Use your framing square to measure out and draw the 6.5"x24" piece. Set up your router (or circular saw if you've got one handy) and determine how far your straight edge needs to be positioned so that you cut along the measured line. You'll cut the 24" length first. Once it's set up and is verified square by using the framing square, clamp it into place, and use it to guide your router or circular saw along the cut. Cut beyond the 24" measurement to ensure that it's cut all the way through the wood at that point (important with circular saws). Now you should have a clean, straight 24" cut.

The next step is to measure 10.5" down from the corner and set your jig up the same way to cut across the wood. Once you do, what you should wind up with is a perfectly square (as in, nice 90 degree cuts, not square in the sense that all 4 dimensions are the same) piece that's 10.5"x6.5", or close to it. Having it square is more important than having the exact dimensions. The next step is to cut across again at the 7.5" mark, then do it again. Now you've got your top, bottom, and back pieces cut, and all 3 should be the exact same width. Figure 2 shows the pre-cut layout of what you should be cutting from your sheet of MDF.



2. Now that you've got your back and top/bottom cut, you need to put them together. Let's start with attaching the bottom and the back. Stand them up on their sides and align them so that the end of the bottom is flush with the back of the back. This is how they'll be attached. Smear a little glue in the appropriate spot and put them back together, this time using the pipe clamp to keep them positioned. If you're glueing this with no screws, use a 2nd clamp to make sure that you have even pressure on the joint. If you're screwing it together, use your drill bit to pre-drill the holes, then sink a couple screws in. Make sure that you stay 1" to 1.5" away from the end, and drill 3/8" down from the back to make sure the screws go into the center of the back piece. Once this is accomplished, do the same procedure for the top. The finished result should look like Figure 3 and will be referred to as "BTB" (Back Top Bottom) from now on.



3. Now it's time for the sides. Cut the 2 sides out of the MDF in much the same way you did the back/top/bottom, but keep in mind that this cut doesn't require ultra precision because you're cutting them a bit oversized.

4. The next job is to attach the sides to the BTB section. Start by standing the BTB so that the end pieces that the front panel will attach to are facing down on the work area. Set one of the sides into position with the square "factory cut" MDF edge is facing down onto your work area also. Position it so that your overhang past the sides of the TBT sections is roughly equal. This isn't real important, but it is absolutely necessary that you have overhang at all spots! Remove, glue the right areas, and reinstall. Clamp the piece into position and drill/screw or just clamp to attach. Do the same for the other side. Now what you have is a pice that should have a nice flat surface for the front panel to attach to, as well as a nice set of sides that are parallel to each other. Figure 4 should help you see the positioning of the sides vs. BTB pieces:



5. Using your router with the flush trim bit attached, go around the sides to trim them flush with the BTB pieces. The result should look like Figure 4.

6. Finally, cut your front panel out of your remaining MDF. Cut it to the "first cut dimensions" listed in figure 1. Set it on the front of the enclosure and verify that you have overhang in all dimensions. Next you want to clamp it into place, and run the flush trim bit around the 3 sides that the clamp doesn't interfere with. Once that's done, clamp from the other side, release the first clamp, and trim that last edge flush.

7. Now you can remove that front panel, and do whatever else you need to do, including cutting your driver holes, roundovers, etc. Once completed, you can reattach, this time with glue and clamps or screws.

Conclusion
What you'll wind up with is an entire enclosure that's pretty close to square, but even if it's not dimensionally perfect, should appear square to the naked eye, and best of all, has nice flat edges that can be easily wrapped in vinyl laminate or veneer, or painted with very good results. If you've got some small gaps between the pieces, you can fill them with bondo or wood putty and sand smooth when dry.

Merry Christmas, part 3

12 pack a Bud...

Here, have a can of Shut The Fuck Up

Some people just talk too fucking much. I work with such a person. He's a very nice guy, who is an active member of his church, is a boyscout leader, has a few kids, and a couple hobbies. How he can find time to do all this shit is beyond me, because all I ever see him do is talk. I hate it when I need to go to his cube, because I need to budget at least 15-20 minutes to listen to one of his stupid stories about his kid or something he's done for the boyscouts. This morning, he stopped by my cube to inquire about my crock pot under my desk (christmas party food), and he stood there for nearly 40 minutes blubbering on and on about his church, their sermons, the search for a new pastor, and the house that the church owns that the pastor lives in that they have sense sold. Jesus Jumps Up Christ! In that entire 40 minues, I may have mumbled 3 or 4 words. The rest was all him.

So why don't I just say something? Because for one he's a nice guy, so telling him to shut up and get the hell out of my cube would come across as a bit harsh. Of course, I usually don't care, but at work I need to maintain a higher level of manners than in my regular life. Secondly, I depend on him for a lot of things at work, and he's always willing and happy to help me any time I need it.

So, I just sit there and stare at him, hoping that eventually he'll figure out that I don't give a shit and he'll stop talking. So far, no luck there.

Merry Christmas, part 2

T'was The Night Before A Non Denominational Winter Holiday...

You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave...

Hotel California. This is arguably the best rock song the world has known. Few will agree with me, but I don't care. Few are as familiar with the song as I am. This song was written in the mid 1970s by Don Henley, Glen Frey and Don Felder during the height of their power struggle within the Eagles and during the height of their partying, drinking and drug use. It's a well known fact that rock music can not be written properly without prodigious use of Cocaine, which is the most likely reason for my inability to write grammy winning songs. The meaning of the song remains somewhat mysterious, but the most commonly accepted theme is that it tells a dark tale of the California rock scene of the mid 70s and the effects of drugs. The drugs were (are) a part of that culture and it was not possible to separate the two.

The song opens to a long, slow guitar motif. The music paints a very dark, distant, and depressing landscape in which the story is told. The story tells of a traveler in the California desert who stops at a motel for the night who encounters a woman at this hotel, and finds himself unsure of what may lie ahead. He finds that she's strange, rich, and men dance with her for a variety of reasons, and thus begins the traveler's journey into addiction. Or is it the beginning of the California rock star's spiral into hedonism and greed? The imagination plays a very powerful role in the beauty of this song.

The last passage tells of his attempts to get out of the hotel, only to find that you can checkout any time you like, but you can never leave!

After the lyrics end, you are left with a haunting instrumental with two guitar solos. The first by Joe Walsh, then the last by Don Felder. Each in its own right is a remarkable guitar solo that perfectly finishes the painting set forth at the beginning of the song, but the two in tandem gives another dimension altogether.

Aside from the dark lyrics and accompanying composition of the music, there's also the production quality of the song. The original album is very well recorded and allows you to really delve into the intricacies of the composition. You can clearly discern each instrument and it's place on the soundstage. You can hear Timothy Schmidt's bass guiter, as well as the individual guitars of Walsh and Felder. There's an unnatural cleanliness to the drums that lend to that closed in 70s sound. Overall there's a bit of a closed in, clinically clean sound that somehow still has a veil over it that really conveys the dark, overly emotional feeling of the song.

The remastered DVD-Audio release of the album has both a 5.1 surround mix and a high resolution stereo track. The stereo track is clearly superior to the original, with better dynamics, and a more modern accuracy to the instruments. The veil is gone from the original, and while that cetainly makes for a superior recording, it does detract from the mood of the original. The 5.1 surround mix is very interesting. I'm not typically fond of multichannel mixes because rather than putting you in the front row of the crowd, it puts you in the middle of the stage, with sound coming from all around. Somehow though, with this sohg, it helps immurse you into the song in a way that heightens the emotional impact that seems to be somewhat gone from the 2 channel remaster. Another added benefit is that each instrument is more easily discernable and allows you to easily focus in on any that you may want to. You can then take this back to the 2 channel mix and more easily pull them out of that recording.

Yet another aspect to this song is their live performance of it. While the Eagles are known for providing live music that sounds very similar to their recordings, with Hotel California, they always bring a new dimension to it. Whether it's an acoustic set like on their outstanding "Hell Freezes Over" release, or their newest live album where they replace the guitar intro with a horn section. As we approach the 30 year anniversary of this historic song's debut, it remains as fresh and poignant as it was when it was new, perhaps more so if we compare it to the garbage that pollutes the popular music stations now.

Take some time to explore this song. If you don't have an audio system that's up to the task, find a friend or a local hi-fi store (not best buy or circuit city!) and give this cd a spin. Listen to just what this song is made of, and you might find that it's a far more complex composition than you had previously realized.

If I ever learn to play the guitar, I'm going to start an Eagles cover band called the Turkeys.

Merry Christmas part 1

Donnie the Retard, had an 8 pound water head...

When swearing is funny...

Pittsfield and their incompetent highway dept.

Every time it snows, Pittsfield turns into a disaster area. This morning was yet another example. We got about 3 microns of snow overnight, at a pace of approximately 3 snowflakes per hour, and yet the city of Pittsfield still has absolutely nothing salted. I buzzed along at my usual 60 mph pace (time spent following timid idiots not withstanding) all the way until I went past Astro Beef and found a parking lot. Problem? Up ahead (way up ahead) over the Pittsfield line, some dipshit in a Trailblazer (it's always that over confident fuck-tard in an SUV that crashes) was halfway up an embankment on the other side of the road. While I put the blame primarily on the SUV-driving dipshit, it was also very clear that the nice wet black road immediately turned into a skating rink at the Pittsfield line near the mall. This was the case for the entire remainder of my route through Pittsfield until turning into work off of Merril Road. The allendale intersection, which is likely the busiest intersection in all of Berkshire County, was as slick as a Clinton under oath. Every time it snows, it's the same way. Smooth sailing until I get to the pittsfield line, then for that last few miles, it's a tapdance to avoid a bunch of sliding idiots. It's time for the city of Pittsfield to man up and do something about the piss-poor condition of their roads.

Passwords - What the hell!?

The password frenzy at work has gotten out of control. My windows password was almost ready to expire (as it does every 90 frigging days), so I spent the first half hour of my morning today trying a million different entries until it FINALLY deemed one of them acceptable. Fortunately, this time I actually remembered it long enough to write it down. Usually I have to try so many different cryptic passwords that by the time it accepts one, I forgot what I typed in, and I have to call CSC (the IT department) to reset it for me, which means I have to start all over. I go through this nonsense every 90 days. As a result, my password is on a sticky note, stuck directly to my PC case along with the other 13 stickies that are already chock full of passwords. So much for security.

So this afternoon I decide to check my voice mail. In the 5+ years that I've worked here, I've never had to change my voicemail password (passnumber?), but today it decided that now is the time! I try a new numeric entry, and just like Windows, it tells me that it's not good enough! Rather than a 4 number code like I've done just fine with for the last 5 years, it now needs six. So I add 2 more digits. Not accepted!

I guess I'm not using voice mail anymore, because I do NOT have the patience to deal with that bullshit. It's bad enough that I have to deal with it on my PC. These fucking security nazis are driving me crazy.

Transition periods suck

Well, it's that time of the year. Though I can't be sure until I drive home, it appeared this morning that the roads were blessed with their first coating of salt overnight. This signals the official end to "car" season. The Camaro will not travel over public roads until they've been sufficiently cleansed by spring rain.

However... we're still at least 3 weeks away from the start of snowmobile season, though it's entirely possible that it could be even farther away depending on when we get sufficient snow.

For me, driving is my release. It's time to myself. It's adrenaline and excitement. It's relaxation. It's the culmination of my hard work and efforts that have gone into restoring/upgrading/maintaining my vehicles. In the winter, I have to park my cars, and that leaves a huge void in my "entertainment" quota for each week. For the last couple years I drove my truck, which while quite different from my cars, was still a very fun vehicle to use. This year I'm not driving the truck, but instead I'm driving Kristin's Camry. While reliable and very economical, driving it puts me into a coma.

Fortunately, my snowmobile helps me fill that void. While it's a very different experience than driving my car, it's filled with excitement and entertainment, but still provides me with plenty of relaxation. It certainly helps me to get through the winter. But... right now I'm in that transition where I get to do neither. It's only been a couple days since I drove the Corvette, but I'm already getting that antsy, twitchy feeling of restlessness that drives me absolutely insane. I need to get my current speaker project finished so that I can start wrenching on the cars before I go nuts.