Russian or Baltic Birch Plywood?

I am building a pair of studio reference speakers, and the *very* tight specs call for Baltic birch plywood cabinets. I accidentally bought Russian birch ply. I've read in here before that they are the same thing, but the names would tend to imply otherwise. Can one of the many plywood experts clarify? Thanks!

Reply to
Jonny Durango
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They're the same thing. They may not be exactly the same, but you'd have to look into the quality grading marked on the boards to tell them apart. At the level of "birch plywood" they're equal.

But cheap MDF makes a better speaker cabinet.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

It's the glue.

Russian birch is usually made with interior glue.

Finnish birch (Baltic) uses exterior glue.

If you ever try to laser cut a piece of Russian, it will be a problem.

HTH

As far as speaker cabinets are concerned, why not use MDF?

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

I had a pair of these, if I recall they were Spendors, great speakers.

Bernard R

Reply to
Bernard Randall

Unless you want to move it.

Most portable and musical instrument speaker enclosures are birch ply, as it's lighter and more durable than MDF.

If it's not moving often, I'm with you, MDF is better,

Barry

Reply to
B a r r y

Johnny can you share some more about the process? I cruised the site a bit this morning looks interesting as I'm a KEF fan and these compare favorably to kef.

Where do you expect your investment to come in? I'm looking for pricing on the cicable xover now, but not having any luck.

Alan

Reply to
Alan W

Could you share some details on this speaker project. I think I'm interested in trying it. Where did you get the plans? Are the components easy to come by? How expensive? Thanks much

---> Ed

Reply to
Ed Lowenstein

It makes a good cheap speaker cabinet, which is great for the DIY'er, but MDF does not necessarily a make better cabinet. Most high-end speaker systems do not use MDF as a cabinet material as it's acoustic properties can be bettered by other materials.

Reply to
mp

such as?

dave

mp wrote:

snip Most high-end speaker

Reply to
Bay Area Dave

All of the Russian plywood I've seen in Seattle has fewer plies than the little bit of Baltic birch I've seen. Is that common? The Russian plywood seems to be less dense, also.

Reply to
Hitch

Like what ? I've a pair of Musician Bonsais (if you remember obscure Scouse loudspeaker designs from 25 years ago) which have cases made of an organic polymer concrete. Now that's better than MDF, but it's pretty damned obscure.

For rational materials though, MDF is pretty hard to beat. It's crummy shelf-building properties actually work to its advantage for speaker cabs.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

Cargo cult bullshit (in a hi-fi product ? how unusual !)

You can't claim to tell the difference between beech and oak corner fillets on one hand, then not specify the grade of ply on the other. Use poor (or thin) ply and you _will_ tell the difference.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

Solid wood (well seasoned) or high quality plywood.

MDF is pretty good, it's resonance properties are predictable, and it's easy to work with, but many designers feel it sounds dull compared other choices. A lot depends on the driver choices, but I'd never build a bottom octave subwoofer out of MDF, for instance. Same with open baffle systems.

Reply to
mp

|On Wed, 21 Apr 2004 02:08:07 GMT, "Jonny Durango" | wrote: | |>The use of any hardwood for the beech |>fillets produced a audible colouration caused by the resonance of the B110 |>on its chassis." | |Cargo cult bullshit (in a hi-fi product ? how unusual !) | |You can't claim to tell the difference between beech and oak corner |fillets on one hand, then not specify the grade of ply on the other. |Use poor (or thin) ply and you _will_ tell the difference.

Heh Heh,

I am reminded of a guy that worked for me who after hours was a musician and a "hi-fi" buff.

He was one of those guys who claimed that they could hear the difference in speaker wire. Since we were electronic engineers and our department had a gazillion dollars worth of test equipment available I defied him to assemble a test setup that could measure _any_ difference between OFHC (oxygen-free-high-conductivity) copper wire and zip cord of the same size. He declined. See:

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there's "sonic differences" between tube amps and solid-state, blah blah....

Reply to
Wes Stewart

Ignoring for a moment the effects of microphonics and valve's use for guitar amps, then there is certainly a valve sound vs. a transistor sound. However this is a _bipolar_ transistor sound, not specifically a solid-state sound. Better MOSFET designs (like Self's for E&WW a couple of years back) avoid this.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

If you can't hear the difference between tube and solid amps on a decent quality system then you have a tin ear.

Reply to
mp

Guitar amps have more of a sonic signature than stereo amps, which ideally should be sonically transparent, but typically most people can differentiate between solid state and tube amps. I know I can, probably even with earplugs on and my head under water.

Reply to
mp

I bought some from Compton's. I think it's 7-ply. It was on sale, so I got a few sheets for something non-critical, but I'll check out Crosscut for more important cabinets.

Reply to
Hitch

Resonance ? What are we making here, loudspeakers or violins ?

Reply to
Andy Dingley

I can honestly say I've never seen any MDF violins.

Reply to
mp

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