Building a " Belle " ?

[Tom Mobley]

A couple (well, several actually) questions arise after looking at the material I've been able to gather on Belles. Can somebody with a factory Belle measure this stuff and post?

1) How tall is the bottom riser?

2) How far is it set in from the front, back and sides?

3) The vertical wood panel between the grilles in the bottom section looks like it is set back a little from the front edge of the cabinet, how far?

4) Is the bass bin built with mitred corners like a hardwood Cornwall or Heresy?

5) How tall is the riser between the top and bottom sections?

6) How far is it inset, front back and sides?

7) On my '60 Khorns the top section is set back about 3/4", is the top section of a Belle flush to the front of the lower section? Looks flush in the pics I've got.

8) How tall is the top section not counting the riser?

9) Looks like the sides of the top are set in a little, how much?

10) How far does the grille wrap around the sides?

11) Is the grille removable?

12) On my old Khorns the top grill is actually set in about 1/8", is the Belle like that?

13) How far back from the front of the top section is the motorboard?

14) Does the motorboard basically run across between the front edges of the side panels? Or is it further forward?

15) Can anybody come up with the basic outside dimensions of the K-500 or 505 front flange?

16) How about its' depth with a k-55 attached?

17) Anybody think it would be nice to have the option of mounting the tweeter centered above the K-500 or vertically at one side?

18) Anybody got any bright ideas before I go buy a table saw?

[edwardre]

Hi Tom....no, the 22.5 does not include the riser. The riser is about an inch and a half, but I'll check. I printed out your list of questions and will take it home tonight and measure my factory Belle to try and get as much answered as is possible.

[D-MAN]

Tom, good questions. I don't have a Belle but I might be able to answer one of them; sides are butt-jointed overlaps but I don't know about the back, but I would guess that the top and bottom overlaps the back panel instead (at least, that's what I expect). This is an unusual style for Klipsch in that none of the others seem to be built this way.

I have a couple questions to add.

1) Are there any baffle cutouts in addition to the throat cavity opening?

2) What is the shape and dimensions of the access panel?

3) is the motor board with the reported 13-3/4" circular cutout mounted directly to the baffle board or does it use mounting bolts and wingnuts?

4) is there any insulating material inside the back chamber?

5) I am assuming that the throat cavity opening is the typical 3" x 13" one used in the Khorn and La Scala. If so, then there is a capacitance associated with the 13-3/4" circular opening in the motor board. Is the La Scala setup the same?

6) does the top and/or bottom overlap the back panel?

DM

[Tom Mobley]

Here's a shot of the back of a Belle from a recent ebay auction. Looks to me like the back is inset, similar to a Heresy or Cornwall. In this shot it looks like the top, bottom and sides are butted and overlapped. From the presence of the K-55-M it appears that these might be newer models, possibly built from MDF and veneered after construction. From the front or side I certainly can't see anything that looks like a butted joint. Maybe someone who owns these older models will pipe up with more definite details.

Possibly the earlier models were constructed of hardwood plywood with mitred corners? I'm under the impression that Klipsch didn't use butted joints on hardwood models? Is this right?

[edwardre]

Tom, DM, I have 'cut and pasted' your questions into a Word doc so I could print out one question sheet. I need some clarification in order to provide clear answers....

What specifically is the 'motorboard'? I always thought the 'motorboard' was the 'extra' piece of wood you mount the woofer on in a khorn bin, then you mount woofer and board to the 'throat board'. The Belle does not have one of these, the woofer mounts directly to the piece of wood with the throat cutout. With that in mind, what is it you are calling the 'motorboard in Tom's questions 13 & 14. Are you (Tom) referring to the 'back of the bottom' section board? The 'inset board'?

DM - What do you mean by 'baffle cutouts'? The only thing that needs to be cutout on a Belle is the throat (3"x13") and the 'hatch'.

On question #2, are you referring to the actual size of the hole, or the hatch door itself?

Question #3 has me confounded. The 'motor board' reference I've already questioned, but what 'reported 13 3/4" circular cutout are you referring to? And what do you mean regarding 'mounting to the 'baffle' board'?

OK, now that I review the plans again, I'm thinking that you all are calling the 'gasket' between the woofer itself and the throat board (used as a spacer for forward travel of the cone) the motor board? If so, I'm thinking that when I peeled open my Belle and removed the woofer, there was no gasket or 'spacer', but rather the woofer was mounted directly onto the board with the throat opening and thus, I constructed the clone the same way. However, this was awhile ago so I will verify.

[Tom Mobley]

Edward,

To me, the motorboard is whatever the drivers are mounted on. Maybe that's the same as the baffle? Anyway, my old Khorns have the woofer mounted on a separate board, looks like an "ease of assembly" deal to me. On the LS I've seen the woofer is mounted directly, no removeable board. That's the way I would expect to build the Belle. I personally don't see the need for the "gasket", Klipsch didn't use them that I know of. I'm looking at using a 13" x 3" slot in the back panel of the doghouse, screwing the woofer directly to it.

In #13 & #14 I referring to the panel that runs across the front of the top section, has the mid-horn and the tweeter mounted to it. The "inset" board I referred to in the later post is the back of the cabinet.

Edward, that list of questions grew much larger than I originally expected because I'm now thinking in terms of actual construction techniques. Sorry if it's a sort of a PITA.

I've also made a top view to scale on graph paper and figured the wood requirements. Looks like a Belle can't be built from a single sheet of plywood. I came up with a figure of 39 sq. ft. of plywood needed, not counting riser strips and hatch cover. A guy could save a little by making the back panels of the doghouse and the cabinet out of regular plywood. I haven't tried to lay it out to see if the pieces could be cut from one sheet. Square footage alone doesn't tell the story. Leaving out the two back panels reduces it to about 32 sq. ft., but it probably won't help.

The local Home Depot and Lowe's have birch 3/4" panels for about $45. Pretty nice looking stuff, looks like solid core. It's not like Baltic Birch, has thicker inner plies.

Any comments or other input?

[D-MAN]

Edward, Tom, thanks for the info.

Edward, you have already answered some of my questions, like with the baffle cutouts. Thank you for your efforts.

I take it the access panel is on the bottom like the La Scala.

DM

[Tom Mobley]

yes. It's not particularly critical, just has to be big enough to get the woofer in and out. Same for the cover, just big enough to cover the hole with an inch or so arond the edge. Hmpf, I left it out of the sq. ft. calculation.

[edwardre]

So sorry folks, didn't have a chance to get to it, my daughter fried the PC so I spent all last evening trying to avoid the inevitable, re-formatting and re-installing Win2K - I was unsuccessful. Had to start from scratch.

Here are a few of my thoughts regarding construction philosophies. The parts that you cannot see (the doghouse specifically) or will be painted black (the exterior of the doghouse, the 'floor', the back, the 'hatch', the upper section 'motorboard') I figure can be made of significantly less expensive material. I used a nice 3/4" ply that was finished nicely on one side and finished marginally on the other. Think it was CDX? ~$40. Structurally, very sound. For the visual pieces (the sides, the top section, the bass bin front piece, the collar and risers), I used 3/4" walnut ply, being careful to match the 'grain direction' of the factory unit. Whereas I'm sure you can engineer for maximum efficiency when laying out for your pieces, you want to keep in mind that the side pieces should have the grain of the wood going vertical, same with the front piece, rather than one side horizontal grain, one side vertical, etc. If you use a lesser visual quality wood for the 'don't care' areas, you can devote the expensive wood pieces to exactly what you want, you do not have to compromise in order to avoid having to purchase another whole sheet for one last piece.

I live in a fairly rural area, there are no Home Depots, no Lowes. Only a 'wannabe Home Depot' Ace Hardware. In order to reap the benefits of a Home Depot or Lowes, I have to travel over an hour. However, a mere 15 minutes away in Auburn CA, there is a hardwood retailer. Auburn Hardwoods is a warehouse stacked to the 30' (at least) roof with row after row after row of exotic hardwood ply sheets. There are woods there I've never ever heard of before. Most range from $60/sheet to well over $200/sheet (for 3/4"). I just stuck with the walnut ply, it was $95/sheet of 3/4". They also have 1/4" walnut which I used to refinish a pair of mid-1950's Khorns with exactly matching grain. The best part of this place is that they let you pick and paw through stacks of wood to select the exact piece you want.

Naturally, each (hardwood) piece will have to be finished with iron on edge veneering. This stuff has to be right up there as one of the greatest inventions known to mankind. Extremely easy to use. Very, very forgiving. Inexpensive. And looks tremendous.

I'll get the info tonight in between loading and re-loading software......

[Tom Mobley]

Edward,

format c: always works for me.

Actually, (knock on silicon) I've been very fortunate over the years. I got my first 386/25 in early 1991, I still have files from then. I've never had a catastophic disk crash and lost everything. Maybe that's why my Outlook.pst email file is over 100MB. The advent of cheap CD burners really helped with backups too.

Good luck with it.

[Dale W]

Plans , cut list , dimensions , pictures , instructions , ??

Hell i missed out on a pair this week that sold for 900.00 frickin bucks !! You could barely buy all the components / materials and build them for that amount .

I'm starting to get real pissed now , i've missed on 8 pairs of belles now.

Hey tom : are you looking for one , or a pair ?

What finish do you want ? and if you find a pair and olny want one , i will always buy the other one if you can ship it to me .

That goes for anyone else as well , I WANT ONE BELLE AS A CENTER !!!! I'll split a pair with anyone that offers. Finish does not matter to me , as i'll spray it black to match my 1989 khorns for HT .

[Tom Mobley]

Dale,

I'm going to build one as a project. I gave up on buying and splitting a pair because nobody responded to my offers to split a pair from ebay or audiogon. I'm building it out of 3/4" Baltic Birch, sort of a prototype, excellent for painting black. My next one (assuming I can pull this off) will probably be in Mahogany to match my Khorns. I worked out the cuts on the two 5' x 5' pieces of plywood tonight. With two pieces of 5' x 5' I can build the whole thing out of hardwood, even the woofer hatch cover and back. Should be really solid.

[D-MAN]

Tom and guys,

The only one that I have actually seen was brand new and appeared to be 3/4" veneered ply (I guess). It also had a TV on it so I couldn't really get a good look.

The retail price on it was $4000 in oak. That was the same price as the spanking new Klipschorn sitting next to it. Now that is hardly right!

I am wondering about the ability to screw the woofer directly onto the baffle board - that seems like a not-real-good idea and is there enough room in there to get a drill in there too? I would prefer the carraige bolt/motor board setup with wingnuts. What do you think?

DM

[edwardre]

Tom - You probably don't have kids messing with the PC....."dad, the computer isn't working" "what did you do?" "NOTHING...."

Dale, if you are consistently missing auctions by the skin of your teeth, might I suggest a 'helper' like esnipe.com? This service, which is 10ths of pennies, has won me more goods at unbelievable prices than I can remember.

I guess I was fortunate....I got my single walnut Belle (sn with a "P"...'74?) on ebay for the remarkably low price of $385 about a year ago. Naturally, after I got it I decided to add a rear center....that's how I got into the 'clone one' activity.

OK folks, here goes with the answers:

1) How tall is the bottom riser? 2" exactly, with mitered joints.

2) How far is it set in from the front, back and sides? Front: 5/8" Back: 1/8" Sides: 3/4"

3) The vertical wood panel between the grilles in the bottom section looks like it is set back a little from the front edge of the cabinet, how far? 3/8"

4) Is the bass bin built with mitred corners like a hardwood Cornwall or Heresy? No

5) How tall is the riser between the top and bottom sections? 1"

6) How far is it inset, front back and sides? Front: 13/16" Back: flush Sides: 11/16"

7) On my '60 Khorns the top section is set back about 3/4", is the top section of a Belle flush to the front of the lower section? Looks flush in the pics I've got. Flush

8) How tall is the top section not counting the riser? 10" exactly

9) Looks like the sides of the top are set in a little, how much? 3/16"

10) How far does the grille wrap around the sides? 4-1/4" from the front edge.

11) Is the grille removable? Yes

12) On my old Khorns the top grill is actually set in about 1/8", is the Belle like that? 3/8"

13) How far back from the front of the top section is the motorboard? 3/8 to the grillcloth, the grillcloth is stretched over the motorboard....so maybe add 1/8" to account for the cloth.

14) Does the motorboard basically run across between the front edges of the side panels? Or is it further forward? Don't know what you are asking here. The motorboard and 'grille' are one and the same. See attached photo. It is basically a 3/4" piece of ply with openings cutout for the two horn lens', then the cloth is stapled to this. The sides are constructed from what looks to be 2x4's, with the 3/4" ply glued and screwed to these 2x4's.

15) Can anybody come up with the basic outside dimensions of the K-500 or 505 front flange? I can only speak to the openings in the motorboard/grille. Midrange opening is 4"x11-5/8", and the tweeter opening is 1-11/16"x4".

16) How about its' depth with a k-55 attached? Can't answer this one, I use a different configuration.

17) Anybody think it would be nice to have the option of mounting the tweeter centered above the K-500 or vertically at one side? The tweeter is mounted centered above the K500. I have done limited testing with a vertical mount tweeter scheme, doesn't seem to be as 'expansive' in that config.

18) Anybody got any bright ideas before I go buy a table saw? Good luck.....

Now for DM's additional questions:

1) Are there any baffle cutouts in addition to the throat cavity opening? No

2) What is the shape and dimensions of the access panel? See attachment for shape, it's basically a pentagon. The measurements are just enough to accomodate the woofer. I had to defile my hatch opening to accomodate the woofer mod. The long side is 14-5/8". The two sides at 90 degrees from the long side are both 5-3/8. The 45 degree sides are 5", and the remaining short side is 9". The hatch cover is a rectangle that covers the hole. It has a rubber gasket to seal.

3) is the motor board with the reported 13-3/4" circular cutout mounted directly to the baffle board or does it use mounting bolts and wingnuts? The woofer mounts directly to the motorboard. The woofer is mounted with screws that go from the basket side of the woofer through the motor board into one of those nuts with the spikes on it to permanently afix it to the motorboard.

4) is there any insulating material inside the back chamber? Nope.

5) I am assuming that the throat cavity opening is the typical 3" x 13" one used in the Khorn and La Scala. If so, then there is a capacitance associated with the 13-3/4" circular opening in the motor board. Is the La Scala setup the same? Don't know. Have never been in the same room as a LaScala.

6) does the top and/or bottom overlap the back panel? The back panel is inset (flush) within the top, bottom and sides.

Let me know if there are further requests for info.

[D-MAN]

Edward,

I can't thank you enough for your time and effort on this!

Splendid work, sir.

DM

[edwardre]

Pleasure was all mine. I have receive so much valuable information, insight, connections and answers from this forum that I am honored to be able to give a little back.

[Tom Mobley]

Splendid work indeed. I guessed wrong on a couple things, so I'll have to adjust my diagrams a little. No biggie, there's really only one critical area on the cuts as I have them laid out. I'll look at this stuff again tonight.

[Tom Mobley]

just looked at that pic you posted. Thanks Very Much for taking time to do that. I really appreciate it. Makes it very apparent how the motorboard/grille piece is done.

[edwardre]

Folks, your list of questions was very thoughtful and thorough. There is not much left unanswered. I tried to think of things that I ran into during the build process. Today's tutorial will focus on some of these....

First, the bass bin grilles. Klipsch makes the bass bin grilles (in '74, don't know if they are constructed the same today) out of 1/2" ply. The middle is cut out (roughly hewn is more precise), and one long side is cut at 45 degrees rather than 90. The 45 degree edge is then flush across the front when installed. The grilles (4 in all) are held in place via screws from the top and bottom of the bin. Like all of Klipsch's grilles for the heritage speakers, the number of staples used to fasten the cloth is staggering. In fact, it was easier for me to fabricate new grillecloth frames rather than to try and remove all the staples in order to recloth. The attached pic is of one of the factory grille frames with the cloth removed. You can see that the construction is 'not exacting'. I use the grilles on the factory belle because the factory belle's interior area is 'less than stunning' visually. However, not to be a braggart, but I did finish the interior a bit more 'cleanly' than my factory counterpart, and quite honestly, I do not typically use the grilles on this unit. The grille dimensions are: 9"x20-7/8" again, with one of the 20-7/8" edges cut at a 45 degree angle.

Great care should be taken with regards to the front 'finished' strip (center vertical woodgrain piece). I recommend that you identify a visually pleasing grain pattern because after all, this single piece of wood draws the eye the most. Especially when a single belle is used as a center. Top and sides are important, but when you are sitting, it's this front piece that gets stared at. The factory grain configuration for this piece is vertical. With this in mind, it is this piece that gave me the most grief when constructing the speaker enclosure because during the construction of the 'doghouse' portion, which is essentially the starting point for the project, this piece is subjected to a lot of handling. I ended up masking it off and only unveiled it after everything else was completed in an effort to save it from unnecessary handling.

Edging this frontpiece afforded pause as well. The factory belle is painted black all the way out to the face of this piece. In other words, on a factory belle, this front piece is edged black. I at first thought to simply paint it, but then thought that the ply would still show. It does not show on the factory unit. I ended up spraying birch edge veneer black then ironing it on. I used birch edge veneer because the grain was less evident when painted and again, you see no grain pattern through the black on the factory belle. Once ironed on, the iron on glue kind of oozes out the sides. This is generally no problem as you would normally use say walnut edge veneer on walnut ply, and sand to smooth this transition to create a unidentifiable seam. However, any sanding on the painted edge veneer creates an obviously 'fuzzy corner', and the goal is a crisp 'black to woodgrain' transition. Be careful here.

The grain pattern for the sides is vertical from the factory. The grain pattern for the top is front to back rather than side to side. I further suggest that you paint the 'insides of the sides, top and back' first before assembly. After you have completed the basic assembly, then edge veneer the sides and top.

[Tom Mobley]

Edward,

I still coming up with a discrepancy on the overall height. This might be due to differences between years or whatever. I think I'm going to blow it off. Klipsch sez the current Belle is 35&5/8" tall. up the dims I've got so far 2" riser, 22" bassbin, 1" riser, 10" HF section comes out to 35" even. Like I said, I think I'm going to forget about it, unless you know of some reason?

Looks like I can lay this out on two 5' x 5' pieces of baltic birch. Not a lot of anything useful left over. The 1" riser will end up with vertical grain, I think.

BTW, Thanks again for your time and trouble in sorting this stuff out.