Narra Speaker enclosures by Bill

Thought I'd show a bit of what has been occupying me (Bill) of late. No, not mountain biking again - though that is still in there but a bit reduced due to another pull at my time. Woodworking!

I am building a pair of speaker enclosures for a teacher here at Brent. They are made from the treasured national tree of the Philippines - Narra. Click on the links if you want to know more than you wanted to know about the species Pterocarpus indicus.

Here is a couple of pictures taken after the first coat of lacquer was sprayed just last Friday. I'm not sure why I am always so surprised when I get to experience how the finish makes the grain pop to life, but it surely does.

Here is a shot taken before the finish was applied.

Since Narra is a protected species due to over harvesting I purchased some reclaimed wood which, I believe is quite old, and was rescued siding from an old building. It started out pretty ugly!

And so it took a bit of work to see its striking beauty show through. First - Sandpaper.... It helped but a ways to go yet.

Then hammer, chisel and pliers to remove these....

(Old reclaimed wood remember.)

Glad I didn't try running it through my thickness planer before checking. Even with the above metal being removed there is still several pieces left in the finished cabinets - I hope without any future bad news to be reported (but let me know Mike as it features my full, unqualified, 'Tail-Light Guarantee*).

After a bit of layout work and some careful cutting etc.,

I ended up with this pile of boards.

I used my Akeda rig to machine dovetail joints.

Then glue and clamps.

Did I design these enclosures? Nope. Though I dabbled in that in bygone days (Heath Co 1967-1973), I cannot take any credit for this design. Rather it is a copy of Mike's current speaker cabinets. Here's a picture of them side-by-side. (Hint - the particle board one is on the left and the Narra on the right.)

















What do you bet he switches back to the original cabinet when he gets to his next post?


* -Tail-Light Guarantee - When my tail lights are out of sight the warantee has expired!