# What lightweight wood?



## bonehead848 (Jan 21, 2007)

I want to mount a few B3S speakers on the wall. I have 3/4" mdf around but I imagine that is going to be fairly heavy and overbuilt. These are only 3" speakers. So what lightweight wood would you guys recommend? They will be painted black so the wood does not have to be pretty.


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## mrsollars (Apr 17, 2008)

basswood is fairly cheap and light. holds paint well. 
i use it for woodcarving. 

matt


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## Anthony (Oct 5, 2006)

You could go with 1/2" MDF. It will keep the low-resonance and stability of MDF, but be a lot lighter.

While wood movement is less of an issue as the scale of the box gets smaller, it is still something to worry about. Ply/MDF do not have this problem.

Another trick people do is to build the case out of MDF or ply and make the front baffle out of oak or maple and have it "float". Basically, secured, but weatherstripped to get a good seal. It is free to expand and won't split the cabinet. however if you are going to paint the whole thing, this may be overkill.


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## Tripp (Apr 2, 2008)

Ply wood is a very good aterial imo, its lighter and very very rigid, although i dont know how good the sound dampening qualities are compared to MDF.


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## Bent (May 24, 2006)

Are trying an established design, or using your own?
Why I ask, is I have a pair of B3S's and associated filter components on order to build Zaph's B3S full range system, I can't hit his 0.12 ft^3 enclosure recomendation, but I have a pair of 12" long tubes cut out of 4" PVC with a slice out of them for a faceplate that should allow 0.08 ft^3. 
Zaph said I may notice a bit of a response hump, but I'm sure they will work pretty good none-the-less.


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## bonehead848 (Jan 21, 2007)

Yeah they are zaphs design but I don't think the tubes would pass for WAF. I had thought about .5" mdf but my local lowes does not carry it. I guess I could try calling around. I also really like the idea of ply. I believe that would be the lightest right? Some stuffing should take care of any dampening issues.


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## Bent (May 24, 2006)

stiffness woun't be much of an issue with these 'lil fellas, I think they run out of steam at about 90 hz, and don't go too much lower.


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