Slanted Soffits

I'm finally finished plywooding the studio, getting ready to acquire the sheet rock and screw that on top, not at the joists as per Knightfly's suggestion. Anyway, I've been thinking about soffits on and off for a long time, and the more I think about it the more I like the idea of soffits. I have two problems however, the ceiling is slanted, and the monitors are huge, so they can't be soffitted into the slanted ceiling. There's joists and slate in the way :-D Excuse the monkey work in the picture, I tossed one of the monitors on top of two stacked cardboard boxes for an approximately 6" lower height than I would want the monitor, but it illustrates approximate position at least. By building the soffits off the side wall and the slanted ceiling, I can possibly gain the benefits of soffit mounting, and still have the space underneath for the console table, which is 9" narrower than the final dimensions of the width of the room, and should just clear the bottom of the soffits if I'm measuring things correctly. What do you think? Make angled, weird soffits, or skip it and put the monitors on poles behind the console table (or on poles as part of the steel console table). Any thoughts, comments, or laughter welcome.

By the way, totally unrelated to my soffit question, I hooked up my larger monitors to an Alesis RA100, set it for "9" on both channels, plugged in my laptop and set it for AOL Radio (I know, sad, but it worked), and turned the laptop until it was intolerably loud inside the studio. Went through the bathroom/hallway to the left, closed the double hung doors, and I could hear the music, but it wasn't very loud at all. This is without moulding and gaskets between the doors mind you. There was some bass transmission through the crawlspace which I haven't finished insulating or closing up with plywood yet either. I then went into the third bedroom (off the same bathroom/hallway, other side) and closed the door. The music was very faint, with some bass hammering the inside closet back wall. Very reasonable. Then I went outside, and did a walk around the house, with all three windows closed in the studio, I'm leaking just a little bass, not too bad considering the windows are the original windows (1941) and total shit. I think maybe with replacement of the three windows, or internal shudders, the leakage will be a lot less and tolerable for my neighbors. Not that I mix at 105db :-D Inside the room I have standing waves, for sure, I can hear/feel them as I walk around. Also, the shower stall in the bathroom which butts against the inside wall of the studio vibrates nasty at 37hz. Vibrating shower, I love it. Patent pending. Even though I insulated most of the wall, there is a slatted door I put up temporarily just to keep airborne garbage out of the back of the stall. I need to have access in case the pipes burst, I can get at the new valves I put in (just to avoid 1955 valves/pipes exploding). Maybe I should replace the door with a solid door, and staple insulation to the back of it. Something to figure out later. Of course its an 11" wide opening :-D

Not a bad deal for sound isolation, all things considered - Now, when you drop the mix level down to 85 dB where it belongs, you'll get a "free" 20 dB improvement in quietness :lol: On the soffits, you'd probably be wise to involve Barefoot here - what little I know about speakers, one of the ideas on soffits is to extend the baffles of the speakers in a straight line, forcing the woofers to radiate in only the forward direction like the other elements. When you put angles close to the baffles, you create a type of "horn", which concentrates the sound and makes for a narrower sweet spot. Angling speakers downward causes more reflection problems, so that's not a good idea - Now that I've brought up some of the BAD things, we should really let Barefoot clear this situation up for you - if he doesn't chime in soon (he's been really busy in a GOOD way lately) then you should re-post this (or I can move it) to the Speaker forum... Steve

Not a bad deal for sound isolation, all things considered - Now, when you drop the mix level down to 85 dB where it belongs, you'll get a "free" 20 dB improvement in quietness :lol:

I like that, free 20db quietness LOL

close to the baffles, you create a type of "horn", which concentrates the sound and makes for a narrower sweet spot. Angling speakers downward causes more reflection problems, so that's not a good idea -

Regardless of whether I soffit them, or not, I intend to have them level to the floor, firing forward at my sitting position. I had the other monitors (aiwa cabinets, reglued and refitted with vifa drivers, new crossovers, etc) slightly above waist level, firing up at my face, as well as angled towards my sitting position. This solved the ceiling slant problem and to be honest, wasn't all that bad. Firing down I would not do. Slightly up, but preferably level. I'll wait for Mr. Barefoot to make fun of my idea :-D

Barefoot clear this situation up for you - if he doesn't chime in soon (he's been really busy in a GOOD way lately) then you should re-post this (or I can move it) to the Speaker forum... Steve

Fair enough, we could leave it, or move it, I'm happy either way.

Among 900 other tasks, I did a lot of geometry and trig today, calculating out the angles and such for my slanted-ceiling-surface-mount-soffits. What I've concluded is that i'm not really going to be building true soffits, but rather slanted-ceiling-mounted-monitor-stands. I'm okay with this, I have no room under the slant for floor standing stands, so this is a good alternative. I was thinking of being clever, and simply hanging the monitors from the ceiling as it would be easier to install eight large eyebolts, eight chains, and have the monitors hang at the right height/angle, but instead I am going to build slanted ceilign mounted stands. Why not. Bold new territory.

Yeah, just us and Star Trek 8) If you have a sketch, I'd like to see it... Steve

knightfly wrote:

Yeah, just us and Star Trek 8) If you have a sketch, I'd like to see it... Steve

Okay, I scanned the drawings. Do not they aren't even slightly to scale, as its just sketches.

Drawing two, also not to scale, but slightly larger (easier to see)

I'm going to call what I'm making "slant soffits" for lack of a better term, and be consistant throughout the explaination. In a nutshell, the back wall is 39.5" high. the slanted ceiling is 30 degrees up away from this wall. I can extend the "slant soffits" up to 50" forward, because any further and the electrical box won't open. 50" is the edges of the surface mounted hinges. This leaves 20" from the the hinge line (50" from the back wall) of "console stick out space" which is more than enough, I need 18" to leave a little margin of space between the edge of the console table and the side door frame. The problem I have putting the console table against the slanted wall, is twofold. First, the room is approximately 13' wide, and the console table is a hair over 11' wide. This means the monitors have to go behind the console table on stands, and fire "up" so they aim at my ears while sitting, AND clear the slanted ceiling. Second, if I fire them level, at my ears, any poles or stands for them to sit on will interfere with the console table, thus forcing it to move forward, then blocking the side door. :-D So, mounting them on the ceiling slant, forward and angled, seemed like a reasonable option. My original design was to mount one on top of the other, however even at an extreme angle (60 degrees to hit my sitting position) the console table will still be too wide - the higher the monitor stack, the closer to the ground the monitors have to be to clear the slanted ceiling. So side by side, I can extend them over the back of the console table, covering the jackfields of the cascaded mixers, which doesn't matter once its all installed because I have 6 ADC 144TT patch bays and 10 ADC 48 1/4" patch bays I can use with this on the side, thus not have to ever plug/unplug anything into the row of mixers. Wire up, shove back, and forget about it. I can do the "slanted soffits" one of several ways. I can simply make a steel shelf sculpted to match the angles I want, then toss the monitors on top of the shelf, screwing it to the back and side walls, with one steel 1" square tubing going from between the two monitors directly up to the slanted ceiling, then screw that down as well. Or, I can soffit the tops and sides of the "slanted soffits", and sheetrock over all of it, then put the monitors inside, with gaskets, and everything will be flushmount, though the bottom of the "slanted soffits" will be nothing more than a sheetrock covered 3/4" plywood with a steel support underneath, so one side of the soffit is simply missing, i.e. the bottom. The last and final option is when I build the steel table, to include upward braces and make neoprene covered steel pads for the monitors to rest on, then make them swivel so I can angle them appropriately. Thought about that too, though it won't look as clean. For whatever reason, I really like the idea of sculpting the monitors into the ceiling slant. I can even extend the left and right slanted soffits across the width of the room, install rack rails, and get a good 3 or 4U of space multiple times across the width. There's that option too. Or, just skip it and sculpt it nicely right to the back. Now what do you think? :-D

I'm still somewhat confused as to your intentions here - when you said that there would be room under the soffits for the console table, you meant that you would stop the soffit front baffle at a height just above the console table so that the console would fit back under the soffit? "My original design was to mount one on top of the other, however even at an extreme angle (60 degrees to hit my sitting position) the console table will still be too wide - the higher the monitor stack, the closer to the ground the monitors have to be to clear the slanted ceiling." - Am I correct in thinking that you want to mount TWO sets of monitors in your "slant soffits"? I'm seriously going to move this thread over to Barefoot's Speaker forum, so he can have a go at it - from what I'm getting, your construction won't act much like a soffit at all, but Thomas should be able to sort this out better than I - I'm looking forward to learning a bit here (Lotta room for that where speakers are concerned, really glad Thomas is here)... Steve

I'm confused too. I tried explaining what I'm trying to achieve, while engineering it in my head, so there were several iterations mushed together. my apologies. Essentially what I'm building (at the moment) are two steel platforms that have two monitors each, with the monitors angled so the faces are aimed at my listening position. The obvious difference is I'm hanging the platforms from the slanted ceiling, rather than using monitor stands. By doing this I can shove my console table back a little bit, so the door (that I cannot move more than 2" left or right) does not interfere with the console table. Also, because the ceiling slants on this side of the room, the monitors can only go so far back before they are too low to the floor thus below my ears in my sitting position. So I'm essentially building two steel cages, mirror image of each other, that mount on the ceiling, to house the monitors. The question I'm faced with is should I enclose these steel cages, thus making them more of a soffit type thing, or leave them open, and toss the monitors on them and call it a day. Open cages would be just like having them on a monitor stand, but if I gain something from partially soffit mounting them, I will put in the effort to arrive at all the complex miters necessary to close it all up. However, the soffits, if made, will only be partial soffits - top, left, right, but not bottom. The console table needs a little room to slide under. I guess thats really what i'm asking... sorry for the confusion... I was engineering this on the fly and each post I put forward I had done a little more engineering in my head. Worse case scenario though, once the cages are made, mounted, and the monitors installed, I can take a picture and say "hey, should I close these up?" and it would be much easier to visualize :-D

knightfly wrote:

I'm still somewhat confused as to your intentions here - when you said that there would be room under the soffits for the console table, you meant that you would stop the soffit front baffle at a height just above the console table so that the console would fit back under the soffit? "My original design was to mount one on top of the other, however even at an extreme angle (60 degrees to hit my sitting position) the console table will still be too wide - the higher the monitor stack, the closer to the ground the monitors have to be to clear the slanted ceiling." - Am I correct in thinking that you want to mount TWO sets of monitors in your "slant soffits"? I'm seriously going to move this thread over to Barefoot's Speaker forum, so he can have a go at it - from what I'm getting, your construction won't act much like a soffit at all, but Thomas should be able to sort this out better than I - I'm looking forward to learning a bit here (Lotta room for that where speakers are concerned, really glad Thomas is here)... Steve

why not make one set of speakers at 60 degrees and the outer one at 90 degrees?? cheers john

Yeah, that made sense of everything before - Here's my "SWAG" on this (stands for Scientific Wild-Assed Guess :? ) Keeping in mind the above disclaimer - AFAIK, the main purpose of soffit mounting is to extend the speaker baffle so that the wavelengths the speaker can put out are short compared to baffle distance, forcing the lows to only emanate forward as the highs do (the actual front of the speaker cab is large enough compared to tweeter wavelengths to already accomplish this) So, if you were to "3/4 soffit" your speakers, the best I would expect would be MAYBE an improvement but more likely a more difficult path to accurate sound, since one direction from the woofer cone would NOT be extended. Under those conditions I would be afraid to even TRY to guess what results you'd get. Probably a nice "boom box cavity" behind your console table, might give the effect of a free (but flawed) subwoofer... Another thing that could get dicey here - you're dealing with pretty close-coupled speaker/human triangle from the look of it, and being forced by geometry of room to mount your speakers horizontally. This puts tweets beside woofs, and the closer you are to this setup the more phase shifting you will see when moving from side to side - to picture this, draw a top view of your head, woof and tweet positions - now, draw a scaleen triangle (it actually probably SHOULD be an isosceles) with center of woof, tweet, and your ear as the three corners of the triangle. If this is drawn to scale, you'll see that it doesn't take much of a head movement to get a (relative) path length change between woof and ear vs. tweet and ear. A change in this relationship of as little as 1/2, possibly even 1/4 inch will cause phase shifts at higher frequencies. Whether you will actually HEAR these I'm not sure, but the possibility is there. I know you see horizontal NS-10's on top of every high dollar console you've ever seen in Mix or EQ mags, but that doesn't mean that it's right or that it's even how they are used when the cameras are gone. I also know that people use their speakers this way every day, and it may average out by inadvertent head movements so that few if any wrong mix decisions are made because of this - In your case, since you have literally no choice, it's best to simply be aware of the possibility and watch out for it. The other thing - how heavy/what shape steel, and do you know the resonant frequency of it, how do you plan to isolate speakers from it, can you fill the steel with damping material like "great stuff" foam, etc - Gonna be late for the DDJ, I'll check back manana, hopefully Barefoot will get some time to rescue BOTH of us... Steve

The other advantage of soffit mount is to stop the low frequencies from going behind the speakers and bouncing back at you from the front wall causing low end phase problems. I agree with Rick about mounting the speakers vertically - I know Thomas recommends vertical speakers. cheers john

60/90 are good guesses based on my lame sketches... You're on the money actually, John. Because the slanted ceiling, um, slants at a 30 degree angle rather than, a more comfortable 60 degree angle, I have no choice but to run the monitors on their sides. Do know that all four monitors aren't in the monitoring circuit at the same time, but rather as inner and outer pairs. I have a homemade switchbox that handles the sub switching in and out of the circuit, as well as up to 16 pairs of monitors, of which I'll have two pairs as you know. I fully understand your thoughts regarding tweeter/woofer phasing, however mounting them horizontally is out of the question, I just can't do it. The ceiling slants too far. I either move the monitors and the console out from the wall, and interfere with the electrical box and the side door (same wall), or, I pick a different wall. Now because of other quirks of the room, even though the room is about 13x20, its not truly 13x20, there are some things that "hang in" that are structural that I cannot move. So putting the console against the back wall (stairwell in the way), or the right wall (slanted cove next to dormer in the way) or the left wall (entry door!) that leaves me with the slanted ceiling wall. If the console were narrower, fine, I could do this. but its difficult to slap in a 11'9" wide console table in a 13x20 room with a dormer cove, two radiators, a ceiling slant, a stair well, and a shower stall that indents into the room but is accessed from outside the studio. Now here is where I truly fucked up. When I measured the space the monitors would take up, I measured them exactly. I didn't take into consideration that when I turn the monitors at 60 degrees and 90 degrees, they stick into the slanted ceiling. In fact, based on the original location I had engineered into this space, they back top inner corners of the monitors would be touching the slate roof if I kept their center axis where it was. I know, that was really stupid and a major oversight, but this put me in this pickle forcing me to deal with it now. Anyway.... steel tubing and cages. The steel is 3/4" rectangular tubing, 1/8" in thickness, simply because I have a lot of it in the garage I won't be using for a car project because its too thick (the 1/8" measurement), and its strong enough if triangulated properly, to support the weight of both monitors on each side. Because I have an understanding of vehicle dynamics, road generated low-frequency oscillations and handling related issues, I was hoping to draw a parallel into the construction of these monitor cages. :D By triangulating the structure on all sides but the face (so the monitors can blow out without tubes in the way), I achieve two things - I make the structure significantly stronger of course, but also I significantly lower the resonant frequency of the structure, as it will then vibrate as an entire structure. Because no two pieces in the structure are the identical length, there is a lot of cancellation of intermediate harmonics and the fundimental frequency is the one I have to seriously pay attention to. This, in road/rally cars, are significantly reduced by injecting at high pressure, an expanding foam into the tubes through a nozzle. This is done by boxing (sealing) the exposed ends of the square tubing with 1/8" thick .75" square plates. Each enough to punch out of 1020 plate. I've already made about 20 such punches. Anyway, those get welded on, and they each have a 1/8" hole in them. This way, foam can be injected in one end, air can escape out the other. Once its filled, a razor slices down the holes to remove any excess foam, and I do a quick butt weld over the hole to seal it up with the foam in it. With a mig welder, this is a quick zap, thus the foam isn't bothered that much, and I don't have slag fly out the other end. The weld is a little contaminated by the expanded foam, but its a 1/8" hole so it does seal up just fine. Its a sealing weld, not a structural weld, so it doesn't matter as long as it does in fact get sealed. Tubes that will be butted together, thus one or more tubes will have their ends sealed against the side of another square tube, will have to be pre-drilled with a 1/2" hole so that the foam can force its way easily into the tubes without their ends exposed. High pressure application of the foam enables the foam to go anywhere and everywhere no problem. We've done this with 1.75" tube chassis's before from one end of the vehicle, and had foam leak out at the other diagonal corner, no problem. The monitor cages aren't rectangular in shape, they are mroe or less a boomerang type of structure for lack of a better description, so that too significantly hampers vibrations in the structure itself because of the odd shape. Its measurable side benefit, but an accidental discovery rather than deliberate engineering. its a "fit under the slant" thing :) On the top sides of the bottom of the cage, to which the monitors would rest on, I intended to use butyl rubber glued to the cage, or neoprene, I've already purchased both so I can experiment as to which dampens vibrations the most. Same for the sides of the cage that surrounds the two monitors, and the top. Whether I build a true soffit or simply keep them as a cage, I intended to make the monitors fit somewhat snug so they don't "walk" on the cages, resting on the butyl or neoprene. So I'm hoping there is a parallel that I can draw on racing car construction to monitor cage construction. If so, I can use the above experience to make this work. But I am very worried about phasing issues, like you said. I chose steel for several reasons - I can use .75" square tubing where as a .75" square or round dowel would snap with the monitors on them. Second, if there are any miscuts, I can fix that by zapping it with the MIG welder. Once you cut wood, well, you've cut it and doweling and gluing is not always a good thing with heavy monitors on them. I could have used 2x4's, however thats just plain ugly. even if I sheet rocked over them. They take up too much space, anyway. I can make the cage physically smaller and closer to the slanted ceiling out of steel than I can with 2x4's. Another reason is welding allowed me to "fasten" the different pieces of the structure without regard for having screw access throughout the structure. Zap and let cool and its over with. Now that I have a nice miter saw, I can do complex miters in multiple directions. I also have the steel, the mig welder, the flux-core welding wire ready to go. In fact, I just finished cutting out all the pieces, both sides, ready for welding over the weekend if I can get away from hanging the gutter that fell down *again*. Pulled the front soffit off this time friggen (#@*$&@(# wind. Then of course, the initial soffit discussion as to whether partial soffits are any advantage over no soffits, or equal, or worse. Its something I'm just not grasping well, and thats okay. I am of the opinion that an open cage will be very similar to mounting the monitors on a pole, or a bracket, or a hinge of some kind. Its still open. I can easily attach plywood around the monitor faces and see if that sounds better, or worse, or no change. Maybe making a full sized soffit around the three sides, and hanging down a 2" soffit might be enough. Really, I barely understand the whole soffit theory, dispite your excellent explainations. I understand it in a simple sense, I do realize its purpose is to prevent back wall cancellations by keeping waves going forward, in phase. I understand this conceptionally due to my understanding of anti-reverberation headers on race cars, which essentially achieves the same thing, for different purposes. For audio reasons its to eliminate wave cancellations, and for racing purposes, its to encourage exhaust scavanging, but the principle is the same. And regarding what pro studios do in magazines, you're right. Just because a pro does it doesn't mean its theoretically correct or optimum, or even in practice. I'm unfortunately faced with a lot of compromises, which I'm really okay with considering this space is a major improvement over my last home studio space, by about 1,000%. I'm trying to balance "correct" with "practical", and I'll be the first to admit I've already made a shitload of compromises. I'm trying to do the best I can, with what I got. I probably should have redone the dormer half of the room to make it a complete dormer rather than have this stupid 3' slanted cove against the one wall, and put the console across the side wall with the single window. In fact, I wish I did. Unfortunately... I can't do that at this point based on the money thats been allocated and spent, and the fact that its getting really friggen cold outside - not the time to tear off dormer walls :-D Anyway, thanks for allowing the core dump. Not sure if that helps, or not. I don't think i addressed the soffit discussion at all, but rather just explained in more detail about why I chose steel, how it was to be constructted, and some of the reasoning behind both. If this is getting out of context or boring, let me know. I know sometimes I'm a bit dense at times.

Well - here's a pro looking studio but if you analyse the plan the monitors are at 70 degrees :shock: I must say frederic - why don't you work out which speakers would be best soffit mounted and mount them - then use the other pair as nearfields?? cheers John

Just the opposite, Frederic - I'm an admitted square tube junkie, but haven't scored a wire machine yet - lotta fun doing lighter weight tube with a stick welder (can you say "swiss cheese" - oh well, practice and thin rod helps. I think your instincts re the race car applications are right on the money. It's still vibrations, after all. And you're right, doing it the way you are you can always experiment with chunks of plywood later. Hey, if your sweet spot gets too small, just get one of those machines the eye docs use to immobilize your head, the ones with the little spikes (rubber tipped) that they make you lean your forehead against - cut away all but the forehead rest, and voila - perfect sweet spot (albeit with possible point source headaches - no plan is perfect :=) Steve

John Sayers wrote:

I must say frederic - why don't you work out which speakers would be best soffit mounted and mount them - then use the other pair as nearfields??

Because I have nothing to stand them on, and if I get stands, the monitors will hit the ceiling as they'd have to be further back, as nearfields :(

Just the opposite, Frederic - I'm an admitted square tube junkie, but haven't scored a wire machine yet - lotta fun doing lighter weight tube with a stick welder (can you say "swiss cheese" - oh well, practice and thin rod helps.

If you want my opinion on welding, arc welding is really tough on thin materials. If you're going to weld cracks on cast iron engine blocks, repair .500" thick steel on bucket loaders, bulldozers and other such items, nothing beats arc welding. its cheap, its easy, the splatter isn't terribly awful, you don't need any shielding gasses, and you can weld in very windy areas. The big attraction to arc welding is the material you are welding, can be dirty. best to clean, but if you're too lazy, who cares. This is because of the high current and the thickness of the material (.5"-1.000") a little garbage on the surface doesn't matter. MIG welding produces a lot more splatter, and isn't really good for really thick materials, or softer stuff like aluminum. I've done aluminum welding with my MIG, but I have to tell you its a real pain in the arse. The aluminum wire turns into a birdsnest inside the machine, because its soft. The solution to this is drop cash on a teflon liner for your gun/hose, or, simply lay the gun/hose straight from the machine, across 6-8 jackstands so its level with the machine. Tight bends causes it to clog up. MIG for steel is great, because you can use a shielding gas such as argon/co2 mix (80/20 or thereabouts) and use regular wire, or you can use flux-core wire which has the shielding built in. I use the latter, just because I'm lazy and not into refilling bottles. Just requires a hair more grinding after the fact, but thats what grinders do best :) Mig is the easiest to learn, because its a single hand process. Essentially, point the gun, squeeze the trigger, and make zapping noises and nice smoke. If you oversize the welder slightly, you can ignore the 80/20 rule (80% sit, 20% weld) and just make a 48" long bead if you feel like it. Rarely do you need to run a MIG at 100% current anyway, unless you're welding together 1/4" plate, which at that point I'd seriously consider TIG or oxy/acetylene (gas) welding. Gas welding is a two hand process, essentially a welding torch is a giant soldering iron. Welding with the torch takes a lot of getting used to, but its an easy way of welding aluminum (and cheap too - gas, rods, goggles). Aluminum is tough to weld or braze only because it has two modes, a solid, and liquid. The transistion from solid to liquid is a small range, so its very easy to warp or have run down your welding table. Once you get the hang of it, you can make cool things with aluminum. I made an aluminum intake for a rover v8, actually fairly recently. For steel, gas welding is actually easy. When the metal turns red, apply welding rod, dabbing in and out like solder, then move over slightly. Very easy to do, but it gets tiring if you have a lot of beads to make. TIG is welder's paradise. Steel, aluminum, but the machines are much more expensive and of course you need a shielding gas as well. I'm waiting for the new Miller "pocket tig" to come down in price, and I'm going to snag one. Instead of a giant power transformer, its all solid state, and only slightly larger than an AT/ATX power supply. Talk about portable. Right now they are priced at about $1100 on the street, $1000 mail order here in the USA. Saw a brand new one sell on eek-bay for $950, so its coming down fairly quickly.

I think your instincts re the race car applications are right on the money. It's still vibrations, after all. And you're right, doing it the way you are you can always experiment with chunks of plywood later.

Thank you, I hope i'm correct. If not, I guess I'll find out very quickly :)

Hey, if your sweet spot gets too small, just get one of those machines the eye docs use to immobilize your head, the ones with the little spikes (rubber tipped) that they make you lean your forehead against - cut away all but the forehead rest, and voila - perfect sweet spot (albeit with possible point source headaches - no plan is perfect :=) Steve

No plan is ever perfect. My other option is to install pontiac fiero seats in the studio, which have speakers in the headrests :) Construction has begun. Here are the two monitors sitting on a plywood template:

Here are the tools of the trade... for cutting anyway. Ignore all the pine needles everywhere. You never weld near pine needles. Just don't look at them :)

Here are all the front pieces of the cage, cut out and placed near the monitors and remeasured to make sure I cut them in the right place. I now measure everything three times, because I'm an idiot.

And here are the results of two short (6") pieces I butt-welded together with the mig, to see if I really need to bother getting the right wire. I used "standard" wire thats been sitting around for about a year in the garage, thus slightly corroded, and of course my argon bottle was empty. I should have used flux-core wire which has built in shielding, but it wasn't handle so I gave it a hearty try. Not to bad considering it was cold, windy, and as I was welding pine needles were falling all over me, the project, and my tools. But it works :) And there you have it, I'm ready for a nice day tomorrow of monitor cage welding. The rest of the steel should be arriving at the ace hardware store tomorrow, so I can cut everything out and get it ready.

John Sayers wrote:

Well - here's a pro looking studio but if you analyse the plan the monitors are at 70 degrees :shock:

Hey John... sorry I only half responded... I didn't see the studio picture you posted the first time. Not sure why, but I see it now. 70 degrees, huh? I am always astonished how you guys can eyeball such stuff so easily.

:lol: :lol: no eyeballing involved :) cheers john

Got gas torches and a 250 amp AC-DC arc, only use the gas for heating/bending/brazing anymore. Too much heat, too much distortion. Arc is bad enough for trying to get angles to stay where you put them after welding. Keep drooling over a Miller 251 wire machine, and TIG would definitely be nice (use it at work occasionally) So many toys, so little time... :cry: Steve