General Forum

Re: Speaker cloth?

Henri — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 18:21:14 GMT

Hmm? Are those original wall mounts? I didn't know they even existed.

In my application, I need to mount them at an angle (both vertical and horizontal) relative to the wall(s), so mounts like that are pretty much out of the question, but if they're really OEM, they're an interesing bit of trivia nonetheless. I just wonder how they're attached, as there are no screws on the backside of the speakers - with the exception of plastic "screws" to tighten the straps/bands, of course.

Re: Speaker cloth?

joeyboygolf — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 16:56:08 GMT

Henri:

The wall mounts seem to work and they're pretty simple to make. A steel plate with three 6mm holes, corresponding to the holes in the back of the 35, so that they grip the inside edges of the housing. I'll probably weld two of the screws in place and use the third to tighten the mount in place. A regular M8 thread nut can be welded on the other side of the steel plate so it'll attach easily to the majority of camera mounts, swiveled wall mounts etc.

See here for wall mounted RL35's

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&item=140308394343

Re: Speaker cloth?

Henri — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 13:42:41 GMT

ouverture:
the gunmetal grey that B&O use for the RL speakers is not an exact match that Radio Silks can offer, they have about four different greys, but if you email me your address Henri, I will send you in the post a sample of each colour, and you can see which one you like the most !

Thanks!

On the other hand, in the case of these RL35:s, I'm rather leaning towards white - again. This means that all I really need is to know the type / model # of cloth that's closest to Redline original frets, besides the colour.

The wall mounts seem to work and they're pretty simple to make. A steel plate with three 6mm holes, corresponding to the holes in the back of the 35, so that they grip the inside edges of the housing. I'll probably weld two of the screws in place and use the third to tighten the mount in place. A regular M8 thread nut can be welded on the other side of the steel plate so it'll attach easily to the majority of camera mounts, swiveled wall mounts etc.

Re: Speaker cloth?

ouverture — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 19:23:28 GMT

the gunmetal grey that B&O use for the RL speakers is not an exact match that Radio Silks can offer, they have about four different greys, but if you email me your address Henri, I will send you in the post a sample of each colour, and you can see which one you like the most !

Re: Speaker cloth?

ouverture — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 19:16:54 GMT

the width of the roll is 142cm wide, so they send you in the post a 1 metre cut from this roll, so 142 x 100 = 1.42 sq metres

the pricing on the website includes VAT and postage and packing.

my Beovox Redline 60.2 measure about 55cm high x 45cm wide - so I can easily cover 2 speakers with a 1 metre cut.

however, the bigger RL140's may need a few centimetres more, and if someone could get back to me the exact measurements of the RL140's, then I will speak to Frank at Radio Silks and see if he can do a special for owners of RL140's

As an aside, the fabric industry sells cloth mainly in 142cm and 183cm widths, and more increasingly fabrics sourced from Europe are coming in 100cm, 150cm and 200cm widths

Re: Speaker cloth?

Henri — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 07:22:12 GMT

ouverture:
I have some RL60.2 speakers in the bedroom, so I will take one of them to Radio Silks next week and ask them what comes closest to that for you Henri

That would be absolutely fantastic. If you really would do that, I'd appreciate it very much - I used to take my old RL60:s with me to my summer cottage a couple of times a year so I have some first-hand experience that they're not the easiest speakers to haul around.

I just checked the RL35:s, drivers are fine (not prone to foam rot in the first place?), the white edges of the housing are slightly scratched so I'll probably mask & respray them and frets look even worse from the inside than they do on the outside. I've also sketched up prototypes of RL35 wall mounts, I'll have to weld together a prototype to see how it'll work; I really can't figure out why the most obvious candidate for wall mounting, ie. the smallest speaker of RL series, isn't wall-mountable by default.

Let's sum up this speaker cloth issue so far:

Penta: Generic, 100den+ matt satin Lycra

C/CX: Shear poly blend, Jersey / Polo shirt fabric

Redline: TBA...

P30/45/50: ???

3000/4500/5000 panels: Find a wino, mug him, get the well-worn gray shirt...

As a sidenote, replacement bands for RL-series are still a problem. Heavy duty packing band that was mentioned in another thread might work, the width on RL35/1000 is 5mm, the same as narrow "standard" metric band. I'd suppose the band on RL45/60/140 is close to other standard widths too. Finding a source that will supply anything less than a full 1000m roll of it can be difficult, though.

Re: Speaker cloth?

Jandyt — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 20:21:04 GMT

Henri!!
I too am late catching this thread.
Your white Pentas are absolutely drop dead gorgeous!!

Andy T.

Re: Speaker cloth?

Xseries — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 02:51:07 GMT

Only just caught up with this thread - but those Pentas in white do look really excellent. I may just buy another set of Pentas to recover!

It is a pity Radio Silks do not state the width and length as 1.42 sq metres could be a thin long rectangle through to a square (thinks - 1.42 is almost the square root of 2!)

Brian

Re: Speaker cloth?

Eugene — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 18:40:00 GMT

My solution as Joanns Fabrics (cloth store chain here in the US).I found some fabric that looked very close to what was used on the RL60's. More or less a shear poly blend used for making athletic wear (jersy's). Paid $3 a yard and there was plenty of color selection.

It sounds like Craig and I found the same solution from his description.

In addition to speaker cloth they also had a large selection of heavy duty fabric ribbon in more colors than I can list.

They had some really nice irredescent white fabric I was thinking about recovering a set of my Redlines with along with some black ribbon.

Re: Speaker cloth?

ouverture — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:32:16 GMT

I have some RL60.2 speakers in the bedroom, so I will take one of them to Radio Silks next week and ask them what comes closest to that for you Henri

Re: Speaker cloth?

Craig — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:31:16 GMT

There was a link somewhere to a website which detailed recovering a pair of Redlines.

Craig

Re: Speaker cloth?

Henri — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:59:37 GMT

Thanks for the tips, ouverture and Craig. The OEM cloth on C(X):s actually does resemble polo shirt fabric.

Does anyone have experience of choosing the right cloth for RL:s? A speciality shop like Radio Silks probably has a wide selection and not knowing what, exactly, to look for may make the choice difficult.

Re: Speaker cloth?

Craig — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:46:24 GMT

Henri:

Cooldude: thank's for the offer, I'd really appreciate CX-style cloth - white frets are somewhat hard to come by in eBay speakers and ones that are in decent shape fetch premium prices.

When I recovered some CX100's, I brought a pack of cheap kids white Polo Shirts. It was quite amazing how close it was to the original. They only cost about £3, and I only used one shirt out the pack for all 6 panels. To glue them on, I used a glue gun. These seem to work very well for this job.

Craig

Re: Speaker cloth?

ouverture — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:10:21 GMT

most people buy from Radio Silks Limited in North London

http://www.radiosilks.co.uk/homepage.html

Radio Silks specialize in supplying loudspeaker grille cloth, the material is supplied in a pack containing 1.42 square meters of cloth, enough to cover the grilles of most domestic loudspeakers.

The cloth is specially produced for loudspeakers, it is acoustically transparent and is as currently used by a number of major hi-fi manufacturers. It is perfect for replacing damaged grilles, or if you just want to change the colour to match a new colour scheme.

Re: Speaker cloth?

Henri — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 11:44:12 GMT

A good point. The answer is, for nothing more than the casing, I'm in it for the looks. That's what "the worse shape the better" -clause was for, a basket case Cona would do nicely as there's no point in gutting an intact one.