Grille Cloth Question

[FirstBass]

Hi

 

I like the look of grille cloth on bass cabs 

 

I bought some from E Bay, but it was a swine to get it taught over the frame. It wasn't tough enough to protect the driver within a gigging cabinet

 

Does anybody know of a source/technique for achieving a sturdy cloth grille, or even a cloth that shrinks when heat is applied to it? (I've read about this online)

 

Appreciate any advice

[Dan Dare]

Some helpful instructional vid's on YouTube. Have a look at them. I've never come across heat shrinkable cloth.

[Lfalex v1.1]

Stretch it over a metal grille?

Protects the drivers and looks the the way you like it.

[Chienmortbb]

On 26/12/2021 at 15:15, Dan Dare said:

Some helpful instructional vid's on YouTube. Have a look at them. I've never come across heat shrinkable cloth.

Apparently American style grille cloth can be heated and will shrink to fit. @Phil Starrhas mentioned this on another thread, I will try to find it for you.

[Phil Starr]

Yeah, I like the look of a grille cloth but it's years since I used it. I've done a few cabs recently and one of the big problems is that all the British manufacturers seem to have disappeared (well we knew that anyway) and so it is difficult to get hold of decent quality cloth at sensible prices.  Allparts stock a range and I've found a Chinese supplier who do the same range and may be the source for Allparts. Historically I used to always heat the cloth before fitting to soften it and I fitted some black and tan cloth that way sold to me off evilbay as 'American Style'. Unfortunately it was the type that shrinks when heated and it shrunk a bit, fortunately it had enough 'shrink' left to finish the job although it was a bit untidy. I experimented with thee offcuts later and this material would have been easy to fit if I'd known (there were no instructions). Later I bought the Marshall Bluesbreaker cloth from Allparts and this was completely different, much thicker and tougher. I cut off a sample and tried the heatgun on it. It didn't shrink and the heat discoloured it. It was really tough to stretch but in the end went on well and looked great. 

 

The moral is that you need to know what you have before you start and they don't tell you. Email to check or order enough to cut a sample. Beware also, most of the cloth on ebay is for hi-fi speakers and not tough enough for touring gear.

 

I'm going to order some samples from the Chinese supplier soon and do some experimenting over the next couple of months, I'll report back when I have more information.

[Chienmortbb]

I got this reply from Mojotone last year when I asked them “I believe the cane grill types we carry shrink slightly when misted with water and dried.  However, we do not use this technique in house. None of the plastic-made cloth will shrink. ”