Materials: ODDVAR stool, 6 MDF boards (precut at hardware store), glue, screw clamps, power drill, different hole saws, a hifi amplifier, speakers, bass reflex vent
Description: ODDVAR Acoustic Amplifier
I wanted to build a small practice amp for home use only, so I gathered an old hifi-amp and disassembled an old speaker box. For a while the components just laid around until I stumbled across this beautiful website, so I decided to start hacking, since my rooms already look a bit like the IKEA catalogue pages.
I used the stool as a frame for the amp, so first I attached two boards on the sides, one on the bottom, and one that was shorter on the back. Next I cut holes for the two speakers and one for the bass reflex vent. In this case I used a piece of plastic drain pipe common in Germany ("HT-Rohr"), because it should be more of a low price project.
I put the speakers on the rear side of the front board, because they're a little fragile. Maybe later I add some protective grills.
After that I glued the front onto the frame and put in the last board to hold the amplifier.
The high frequency speaker is now near the amplifier, but the main speaker can develop its sound in a closed box. You could cut the holes differently to place all speaker components under the hifi amplifier.
I ordered an adapter 1 TS mono female -> 2 cinch male, to feed the guitar signal (electro-acoustic guitar) into the AUX input on both channels equally, so later I have the possibility to plug in a second external speaker, since the Oddvar amp does only use the left output channel.
The seat is still loose, because I'm thinking of making it removable. So this hack isn't perfect yet, but fully functional.
It sounds very nice and does what is was designed for. Just a simple recycled practice amp. It also has a mic input built in. But I haven't tested that yet.
~ Christoph, Germany
