Depar Sounds, X1 build.

After Tom from the local climbing wall manufactures had CNC’ed the ply for me, this weekend just gone is the first opportunity I have had to build my new sub bass speakers, speakerplans.com, X1's.

To get prepared Friday meant a visit to Definitions night in Bangor was in order for some beer and drum and bass. This meant Saturday was the day to get going and I spent 11 hours in the workshop with 8 hours from Michael. Sunday was the longest day with 15 hours spent at it, another 4 from Michael and 2 hours from Tom. Thanks Tom I hate all the sanding and preparing. Below are some pictures from the project at different stages for the two different cabinets. All the ply is top quality 18mm birch ply and they are now loaded with Void V18 1000’s.

The pictures are all very good but what you really what is to hear these monsters, I hope to see you out when they are playing soon.

The internals of cabinet number 1.

The internals of cabinet number 2 during construction.

Cabinet number 1 awaiting at paint job.

Number 1 after a couple of coats of paint.

Number 2 all ready for painting, with the removable speaker access panel showing.

The finished articles.

Two years on.

Two years ago some friends and I went to explore the Cynfal Gorge, we only made it as far as Rhaeadr y Cwm. We felt the prudent choice was to come back another time when the water levels were not rising and we had not underestimated the length of rope needed. The Sunday just gone about two years since we last visited some of the original party returned for another go. On this occasion Will, Mark and I made the journey from above Rhaeadr y Cwm to Rhaeadr Cynfal.

This is a spectacular gorge as you can hopefully see in the photos below and a great committing adventure. If you go to do it take a good amount of rope as we previously found a single 50m to potentially be a little short. This time we took 120m which was defiantly more than needed but was what was in stores on the day. Also don’t forget some tat and old crabs to leave behind on the abseils, some of the kit left from others looks very faded with river debris wrapped around it.

Will abseiling in.

Mark feeling drained after retrieving the abseil rope on Rhaeadr y Cwm.
Will leaping from the bottom Rhaeadr y Cwm.
Mark and Will repacking the ample rope after abseiling the fall above.
Mark (closest) and Will wading on downstream.

Will on a slide between Bont-Newydd and the Viaduct.

The sun is back.

Summer seems to be here again after having a break for August. This was great as it coincided with a day’s coasteering I was running for the RAF. What a great group to work with as we managed to get loads done covering a massive distance with plenty of swimming as it was such a still day.

The group climbing up to the jumps.

The view down the headland at Nefyn Golf Course.

It was also great that it was such a nice weekend as I was spending the Saturday night camping up in Yorkshire for my brothers stag do. Once the coasteering was finished it was back home shower, change vans and a four hour drive to the home of Black Sheep Ale, Masham. I think you can take a fairly good guess as to the events proceedings; needless to say the gang had late breakfast on Sunday before we all departed. This made for a good nights drinking for me, a good day of quad biking, brewery tours and drinking for the rest.

The Black Sheep Ale.

Unfortunately there is a downside to the nice weather as it seems like the toxic blue green algae in Llyn Padarn may benefiting from the sunshine after giving the impression that it was starting to disappear. This problem of the algae first came to light in June of this year and three months on there still seems to be no conclusive answers as to what has caused the problem. I do know however that is having a noticeable effect on local business and residents. This morning I have had a meeting with Alun Ffred Jones the local AM to express my concerns and hope to hear more from him soon.

Depar Sounds, improvements underway.

As a drum and bass DJ a good sounding system that can handle the bass lines, especially as the modern ones that are getting heavier is important. I have recently decided make my own (read, with the help of few others) subs to increase the output of the current Depar Sounds system. I decided to make a pair of X1’s and today most of the parts arrived from Pro Audio Parts, the most impressive being the 20Kg Void V18 1000 driver which will sit in the heart of the cabinet.

The Void V18 1000 and complimentary mouse mat.

The last 500m are the hardest.

The week following the August bank holiday was pretty quiet personal adventure wise because work was very busy. The centre had a group in which required a lot of attention so I worked in addition to the planned staff. The weekend did start early however, the group went home on the Thursday, an unplanned early departure. This just meant I had time to do all the jobs I should done earlier week before a days work of Canyoning on the Saturday.

After a family get together on the Saturday night this left enough time for a Sunday mountain bike ride. So after a heavy family night drinking and no serious exercise since being ill what did we choose I hear you ask? Well 30kms of the Penmachno trials is the answer.

What a great ride it was, I would have to recommend these routes although Nia and Kelv were a tough act to keep up with. I think the tiredness of 29.6km may well have attributed to my crash, thankfully only cut shins from peddles and bruised pride. I guess this will teach me, I should have thought more carefully before taking the mickey out of Kelv for his crash 500m from the van!

The days proudly worn war wounds.